Language Contact in Amazonia

This book investigates the contact between Arawak and Tucanoan languages spoken in the Vaupés river basin in northwest Amazonia, which spans Colombia and Brazil. In this region language is seen as a badge of identity: language mixing is resisted for ideological reasons. The book considers which parts of the language categories are likely to be borrowed. This study also examines changes brought about by recent contact with European languages and culture, and the linguistic effects of language obsolescence.

Alexandra Aikhenvald is Professor of Linguistics and Deputy Director of the Research Centre for Linguistic Typology at La Trobe University. She was a Research Fellow at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR 1980-89, and Professor of Linguistics at the Federal University of Santa Catarina, Brazil, until 1994.