// Workers AI · dad joke modeWhat did Vilela say to its grammar? You're vile-ly incorrect.
| Vilela | |
|---|---|
| Waka | |
| Native to | Argentina |
| Region | eastern Chaco |
| Ethnicity | Vilela (Wakambabelte) |
Native speakers | 2 semispeakers (2007)[1] |
Lule–Vilela
| |
| Dialects |
|
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | vil |
| Glottolog | vile1241 |
| ELP | Vilela |
 Map of the Vilela language | |
 Vilela is classified as Extinct by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger | |
Vilela (Waka, Atalalá, Chulupí~Chunupí)[2] is a moribund and possibly extinct language last spoken in the Resistencia area of Argentina and in the eastern Chaco near the Paraguayan border. Dialects were Ocol, Chinipi, Sinipi; only Ocol survives. The Vilela people call themselves Wakambabelte (/wɑqhambaβelte/[3]) 'Waka speakers'.[4][5] There were 2 semispeakers as of 2007.
History
[edit]Jesuit missionaries made their way into the Gran Chaco of South America region around the 17th-century. Their goal was to introduce the indigenous populations (including the Vilela people, which was really the general name of a conglomerate of many different groups of indigenous peoples[6]) to Christian practices and convert them to Christianity.[7] This assimilation of the Vilela people and their languages, practices, and religions contributed to the extinction of the Vilela language and the abandonment of Vilela traditions and practices, largely due to how some Vilela people were made to co-exist with the colonists through the encomienda forced-labor system granted by the Spanish Crown.[6] The last Vilela people were absorbed into the surrounding Toba people and Spanish-speaking townsfolk.
Dialects
[edit]Loukotka (1968) lists the following varieties of Vilela.[8]
- Chunupi - formerly spoken on the confluence of the San Francisco River and Bermejo River in the vicinity of La Encrucijada, Valtolema, Ortega, Esquina Grande and Laguna Colma.
- Pasain - formerly spoken in the vicinity of Macapillo, Argentine Chaco.
- Ocole - formerly spoken between Lacangayá and Laguna Colma.
- Omoampa - formerly spoken from Ortega as far as Miraflores.
- Macomita - once spoken west of the Juramento River, province of Santiago del Estero, Argentina.
- Yecoamita - once spoken northwest of the Teuco River, Formosa province.
- Sinipi - formerly spoken on the Bermejo River in the vicinity of Lacangayá.
Phonology
[edit]Vilela appears to have the five vowels /a e i o u/ of Spanish and approximately the following consonants:
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | |||||
| Plosive | voiced | b | d | dʒ | ɡ | ɢ | |
| voiceless | p | t | tʃ | k | q | ʔ | |
| ejective | pʼ | tʼ | tʃʼ | kʼ | qʼ | ||
| Fricative | central | f | s | ʃ | x | h | |
| lateral | ɬ | ||||||
| Approximant | w | l | j | ||||
| Rhotic | r, ɾ | ||||||
There is a lack of distinction between the voiceless alveolar consonant /t/ and the voiceless velar consonant /k/ in spoken Vilela. For example, in the word [huanokol] 'dog',[9] [k] could be pronounced as /k/ or /t/. The sounds may even alternate within the same word. This alternation appears to occur not only in casual speech, but also in formal speech. Although this alternation occurs, [k] tends to predominate.[10]
Open Language Archives Community (OLAC) has approximately 34 audio logs of the Vilela language being spoken in interviews. The audio logs consist of numbers, commands, and other aspects of the spoken language.[11]
Typology
[edit]The Vilela language is described as a head-marking language, meaning that the grammatical relationship is addressed at the beginning of the sentence rather than the start of the sentence focusing on the dependents.[10]
Notes
[edit]- ↑ Crevels, Mily (2012-01-13), "Language endangerment in South America: The clock is ticking", in Campbell, Lyle; Grondona, Verónica (eds.), The Indigenous Languages of South America, DE GRUYTER, pp. 167–234, doi:10.1515/9783110258035.167, ISBN 978-3-11-025513-3, retrieved 2025-02-17
- ↑ Not to be confused with Niwaklé, which is also called Chulupí~Chunupí.
- ↑ Balmori, Clemente Hernando (1967). "Ensayo comparativo lule-vilela: sufijos -p y -t con un breve texto vilela". Estudios de área lingüística indígena. Universidad de Buenos Aires, Centro de Estudios lingüísticos. p. 32.
- ↑ Fabre, Alain (2005). "Vilela". Diccionario etnolingüístico y guía bibliográfica de los pueblos indígenas sudamericanos (PDF) (in Spanish).
- ↑ Golluscio & Zamponi 2019a, p. 47.
- 1 2 "People & Culture". DOBES. Retrieved 2026-04-13.
- ↑ "7. Administration and native perceptions of baptism at the Jesuit peripheries of Spanish America (16th–18th centuries) from Cultural Worlds of the Jesuits in Colonial Latin America on JSTOR". www.jstor.org. Retrieved 2026-04-13.
- ↑ Loukotka, Čestmír (1968). Classification of South American Indian Languages. Los Angeles: UCLA Latin American Center. pp. 53.
- ↑ "Vilela Words". www.native-languages.org. Retrieved 2026-04-13.
- 1 2 Golluscio, Lucía; Grawunder, Sven (May 2014). "¿Lengua o hablante?–Investigando las alternancias coronal-velares en vilela". LIAMES Línguas Indígenas Americanas. 14 (1): 41–72 – via ResearchGate.
- ↑ "OLAC resources in and about the Vilela language". www.language-archives.org. Retrieved 2026-03-30.
References
[edit]
- Lozano, Elena (1970). Textos Vilelas. La Plata: CEILP.
- Lozano, Elena (1977). Cuentos secretos vilelas: I. La mujer tigre. VICUS Cuadernos. Lingüística, Vol.I: 93-116.
- Golluscio, Lucia A.; Zamponi, Raoul (2019a). "El vilela del siglo XVIII". Indiana. 36: 43–68. doi:10.18441/ind.v36i2.43-68..
- Golluscio, Lucia A.; Zamponi, Raoul (2019b). "El vilela del siglo XVIII". Indiana. 36: A1–A56. doi:10.18441/ind.v36i2.A1-A56..
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