Atayal language


The Atayal language is an Austronesian language spoken by the Atayal people of Taiwan. Squliq and C’uli’ are two major dialects. Matu’uwal and Pa’kuali’, two subdialects of C’uli’, are unique among Atayal dialects in having male and female register distinctions in their vocabulary.

History

Several works on the language, including several reference grammars, have been published. In 1980 an Atayal–English dictionary was published by Søren Egerod. A translation of the Bible into Atayal was completed in 2003. Atayal was one of the source languages of Yilan Creole Japanese.
Under KMT rule, Taiwan saw the imposition of Mandarin Chinese as the sole national language, resulting in the suppression of indigenous languages, including Atayal. The education system mandated Mandarin instruction, leading to a decline in the intergenerational transmission of Atayal. Despite these challenges, Atayal communities maintained their language in private and informal settings. Following the lifting of martial law in the 1980s and Taiwan's subsequent democratization, policies shifted to recognize and preserve indigenous languages with the establishment of the Council of Indigenous Peoples.
In April 2020, an Atayal language Wikipedia was launched following efforts by Taiwan's Ministry of Education and National Chengchi University to promote the written use of Taiwan's Aboriginal languages.

Dialects

Atayal dialects can be classified under two dialects groups: Squliq and C’uli’.
There are 7 Atayal dialects according to Goderich.
  • Squliq: prestige dialect, most widespread
  • S’uli : spoken in Hsinchu County, and also along the Da'an River between Miaoli County and Taichung City
  • Klesan : historically lived around Mount Nanhu, but were relocated by the Japanese during the early 1900s. Currently, spoken about 40 km north and east of Mount Nanhu, in the villages of Pyahaw, Ropoy, Ləlaŋan/Buta, Iyu, and Kəŋyan.
  • Matu’uwal : spoken in three villages along the Rinax River in Tai'an Township, Miaoli County, including in Qing'an Village and Jinshui Village.
  • Plngawan: is spoken in Sasi tribal village in Ren'ai Township, Nantou County. Merged from three villages during the 1900s by the Japanese after they were relocated.
  • Skikun : is spoken in at least two villages, Skikun tribal village and Mnawyan tribal village, in Datong Township, Yilan County.
  • Matu’aw : spoken in Maymaralas and Matabalay villages in Daxing Administrative Village, Tai'an, Miaoli County.
Goderich classifies the Atayal dialects as follows, and also reconstructs over 1,000 words for Proto-Atayal.
  • Atayal
  • *Northern Atayal
  • **Matu’uwal
  • **Nuclear Northern Atayal
  • ***Skikun
  • ***Squliq
  • *Southern Atayal
  • **Plngawan
  • **Nuclear Southern Atayal
  • ***Klesan
  • ***Southwestern Atayal
  • ****S’uli
  • ****''Matu’aw''

    Orthography

The Atayal language is most commonly written in the Latin script; a standard orthography for the language was established by the Taiwanese government in 2005. In writing, represents the velar nasal, and the apostrophe represents the glottal stop. In some literature, is used to represent and are used to represent.
In some dialects but not all, schwa /ə/ is frequently omitted in writing, resulting in long consonant clusters on the surface.
The pronunciation of certain letters differs from the IPA conventions. The letter represents, is, is, is, and is.

Phonology

Dialects differ slightly in their phonology. Presented below are the vowel and consonant inventories of Mayrinax Atayal. Orthographic conventions are added in ⟨angle brackets⟩.

Vowels

Consonants

Most of these sounds are also encountered in other Formosan languages, but the velar fricative is a trademark of Atayalic languages. This sound has restricted distribution, though, as it never occurs in word-initial position.
Even though some literature includes a glottal fricative in the consonant inventory, that phoneme is phonetically realized as a pharyngeal, which is true for Atayalic languages in general. The alveolar fricative and affricate are palatalized before and , rendering and , respectively, as in the Sinitic contact languages Mandarin Chinese and Taiwanese Hokkien.
Plngawan Atayal differs from this inventory in that it lacks a schwa, and that there are two phonemic rhotics.
Squliq Atayal has a voiced alveo-palatal fricative , but Huang 2015 doubts its phonemicity, arguing that it is an allophone of .

Grammar

Verbs

Mayrinax Atayal has a four-way focus system.
  1. Agent focus
  2. Patient focus
  3. Locative focus
  4. Instrumental/Beneficiary focus
The following list of focus markers are used in Mayrinax Atayal.
  • Agent focus
  • * Realis: m-, -um- ; ma-, ø
  • * Irrealis: m-, ma-, -um-... -ay ; pa-
  • Patient focus
  • * Realis: -un, ø
  • * Irrealis: -aw ; -un
  • Locative focus
  • * Realis: -an
  • * Irrealis: -ay ; -an
  • Instrumental/Beneficiary focus
  • * Realis: si-
  • * Irrealis: -anay ; ø
Aspect markers include:
  • -in-: perfective
  • pa-: irrealis
  • kiaʔ and haniʔan: progressive
Other verbal markers include:
  • ka-: stative marker
  • i-: locative marker
  • ø- : agent-focus imperative
Dynamic and stative verbal prefixes run along a continuum. Here, they are listed from most dynamic to most stative.
  1. m-, -um-
  2. ma1-, ø1
  3. ma-2
  4. ø2

    Case markers

Mayrinax Atayal has an elaborate case marking system. The Mayrinax case markers below are sourced from Huang.
Wulai Atayal has a much simpler case-marking system.
CaseNominativeInstrumentalGenitiveComitativeLocative
Markersquʔnaʔnaʔ, nquʔkiʔte, squʔ, sa

Pronouns

The Mayrinax and Wulai Atayal personal pronouns below are sourced from Huang. In both varieties, the nominative and genitive forms are bound while the neutral and locative ones are free.
Type of
Pronoun		NominativeGenitiveLocativeNeutral
1s.sakuʔ, kuʔmakuʔ, mu, kuʔknankuzing, kun
2s.suʔsuʔsunanisuʔ
3s.–nyaʔhiyanhiyaʔ
1p. taʔtaʔitanitaʔ
1p. samimyansminansami
2p.simumamusmunansimu
3p.–nhaʔhganhgaʔ

Type of
Pronoun		NominativeGenitiveNeutral
1s.cu, ciʔmu, miʔkuing
2s.suʔ, siʔsuʔisuʔ
3s.–niaʔhiyaʔ
1p. taʔ, tiʔtaʔ, tiʔitaʔ
1p. caminiamcami
2p.cimumamucimu
3p.–nhaʔnhaʔ

Affixes

The following list of Mayrinax Atayal affixes is sourced from the Comparative Austronesian Dictionary.
  • Note: Some affixes are unglossed.
;Verbal prefixes
  • ma- 'stative'
  • ma- 'active'
  • man-
  • mana-
  • maɣ-
  • ma-ša- 'reciprocal, mutual'
  • ma-ši 'natural release or movement'
  • pana-
  • ma-ti-
  • ʔi-
  • pa- 'causative'
  • ši- 'benefactive'
  • ga- 'verbalizer'
  • kan- + RED + N 'body movement'
  • ma-ka- 'mutual, reciprocal'
  • maki- 'active verb'
  • mat- 'to turn'
  • mi-
  • paš-
  • ta-... -an 'location'
  • tiɣi- 'to release gas'
  • tu- 'for some to... '
;Verbal infixes
  • -um- 'agent focus'
  • -in- 'completive'
;Verbal suffixes
  • -an 'locative focus'
  • -un 'object focus'
  • -i 'imperative'
  • -aw 'future or mild request'
  • -ani 'polite request'
;Nominal affixes
  • -in- 'nominalizer'
  • -in-... -an 'nominalizer to indicate a completed action'
  • Male affixes include : -niḳ, -iḳ, -ʔiŋ, -hiŋ, -iŋ, -tiŋ, -riʔ, -ḳiʔ, -niʔ, -nux, -ux, -hu, -u, -al, -liʔ, -kaʔ, -ha, -il, -in-, -il-, -i-, -a-, -na-.