Wayoró language

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Tuparian language of Brazil

title: "Wayoró language" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["tupian-languages", "languages-of-south-america", "mamoré–guaporé-linguistic-area"] description: "Tuparian language of Brazil" topic_path: "linguistics" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayoró_language" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Tuparian language of Brazil ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox language"]

Field	Value
name	Wayoró
altname	Wayoro, Ajurú, Wajuru
nativename	wayoro emẽto
pronunciation
region	Rondônia (Brazil)
ethnicity	~250 Wajuru (FUNASA/SESAI 2016)
speakers	3 (+ 11 semispeakers)
date	2019
ref
familycolor	tupian
fam1	Tupian
fam2	Tuparí
iso3	wyr
dia1	Ngwayoroiat (Wayoroiat)
dia2	Kupndiiriat
glotto	wayo1238
glottorefname	Wayoró
::

Wayoró (also Wayoro, Ajurú, Wajuru; Wayoró: wayoro emẽto ) is a moribund Tuparian language (Tupian family), which is spoken in the state of Rondônia, in the Amazon region of Brazil. As of 2019, there were reported to be 3 speakers (all above 70 years old) and 11 semispeakers out of the ethnic population of approximately 250.

Dialects

The Wajuru people is subdivided into three subgroups: the Ngwayoroiat (‘those from the Stone’), the Ngwãkũyãian (‘the Agouti ones’), and the Kupndiiriat (‘the Forest ones’). Some lexical and phonological differences have been reported between the varieties spoken by the Ngwayoroiat (Wayoroiat) and by the Kupndiiriat.

Phonology

Consonants

The graphemes which correspond to each phoneme are given in .

::data[format=table title="Consonant inventory{{rp|8}}"]

labial	alveolar	palatal	velar	labio-velar	glottal	plosive	nasal	sonorant



::

Underlying nasal consonants may be partially or fully oralized in oral environments. Nogueira (2019) describes the following allophones:

/m/ → ,
/n/ → ,
/ɲ/ → ,
/ŋ/ → ,
/ŋʷ/ → ,

Vowels

::data[format=table title="Vowel inventory{{rp|9}}"] | front | central | back | short || long | short || long | short || long | high | oral | nasal | mid | oral | nasal | low | oral | nasal | |---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | ::

Syntax

As in other Tuparian languages, the main clauses of Wayoró follow the cross-linguistically rare nominative–absolutive pattern. Person prefixes on the verb are absolutive, i.e., they index the sole argument of an intransitive verb (S) and the patient argument ('direct object') of a transitive verb (P). Person pronouns, which follow the verb (either cliticizing to it or not) are nominative: they may encode the sole argument of an intransitive verb (S) or the agent argument of a transitive verb (A), but not the patient of a transitive verb (P). This is exemplified below.

V:verb S:sole argument of an intransitive verb P:patient argument of a transitive verb A:agent argument of a transitive verb TH:thematic vowel:thematic vowel PL:pluractionality:pluractionality

|Eamõyãn (en). |s-V (S) |/e-amõc-a-t (ẽt)/ |2-dance-TH-NFUT (2.NOM) |‘You danced.’}}

|Etopkwap nã on. |p-V {} A |/e-top-kʷ-a-p nã õt/ |2-see-PL-TH-p FUT 1.NOM |‘I’ll see you every day.’}}

References

(2019). "Predicação na língua Wayoro (Tupi): propriedades de finitude". Universidade de São Paulo.
(20 July 2018). "From object nominalization to object focus: The innovative A-alignment in the Tuparian languages (Tupian family)". Journal of Historical Linguistics.

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::