THE MIXED ORIGINS OF SANTIAGUENO QUECHUA SYNTAX

Long-tenn contact of Santiagueilo Quechua speakers with the majority Spanish-speaking population has modified their linguistic repertoire. Language mixing on all linguistic levels, variable loss of competence in Quechua and language shift to Spanish were assessed by means of sociolingl.)istic interviews, linguistic elicitation techniques and ethnographic work. Language shift can be interpreted within a long-term sociohistorical pattern of social inequality and subordination of one group (Quechua-speaking, traditional American Indian culture} to another (Spanish-speaking, modem Euro-American culture}.This study attempts to insert Santiagueilo Quechua within current research on other syncretic or mixed American Indian-European languages such as Media Lengua, Mexicano and Michif Cree, all the result of intense cultural contact between American Indian and European languages. Sociohistorical Overview Jn Santiago del Estero (Argentina) Santiagueilo Quechua (called Quichua locally; SQ henceforth) is spoken mainly in the central departments located in the rural areas, especially along and in between the Dulce River and Salado River, which traversed the province from northwest to southwest. All SQ speakers can also speak regional Spanish with different degrees of fluency and native-language interference, though it is unlikely SQ monolingual speakers are found to be alive even among the oldest people. In these remote rural enclaves children grow up speaking SQ at home and acquire Spanish in school. Despite the existence of a 1983 provincial decree allowing the teaching of Quechua in primary schools, in actuality only a few schools recruited and trained bilingual teachers to do so (Censabella 1999:41). Nonetheless, SQ remains one of the few Argentina's indigenous languages taught in universities and institutes. It was Prof. Domingo Bravo, a self-taught Santiagueiio rural teacher, who almost single-handedly contributed to a renewed interest and preservation of SQ. Through his teaching of the language to a younger generation of SQ teachers and his publications he helped much to preserve the language. Indeed, much of what is known about SQ Kansas Working Papers in Linguistics v25, ppl J 1-120

It is a matter of dispute how Quechua came to be spoken originally in northwestern Argentina, being reduced by the late nineteenth century to only Santiago del Estero.Historical evidence favors two possible migration scenarios for the origin of SQ.These scenarios, which need not be incompatible, may represent two sequential periods outlined as follows: (1) The Inca Empire expanded southward from its central power in Cuzco through the mitimaes who might have been originally from the Cuzco or represented a minority among the aboriginal cultures subordinated to the Incas.These mitimaes were able in the end not only to bring the dominated people under the Incas' political organization but also to impose Quechua as the superstrate language displacing aboriginal languages spoken in northwestern Argentina.This earlier period of settlement by Quechua-speaking people may go as far back as 1000 years.
(2) Spaniards are known for taking advantage of both the efficient road system developed by the Incas and their language, at the time used as a vehicular language (/engua genera{) throughout the Empire.Thus it is thought that in travelling southward Spaniards brought along with them yanaconas or mestizos who were conversant in Quechua and Spanish and, thus, could help Spaniards establish more easily among the encountered cultures, both Quechua and non-Quechua speaking (cf.Stark 1985, Manheim 1991) Because national censuses in Argentina have consistently omitted information about indigenous languages, the number of Quechua speakers in Santiago de! Estero can only be estimated.This figure is calculated to be around 100000 speakers (Cerr6n-Palomino 1987:72, Granda 1999); the total population of Santago del Estero is around 670000 (Dargoltz 1980: 167 ff.; Argentina 1991 ).
The lack of information on the ethnolinguistic vitality of SQ is heightened by urban migration, which took place from rural Santiago del Estcro to the country's capital, Buenos Aires, and other important industrial centers such as Rosario, Cordoba and Mendoza.Argentine industrial growth beginning in the 1950's catalyzed such migration from the poorest provinces, leading migrants to seek improved living conditions and better job prospects in the capital.Santiagucflos are the largest migrant population group, having settled mainly in Buenos Aires (250000, including Spanish monolinguals).As a result, the non-migrant Santiagueflo population dropped to 20-40% compared to the premigration figures.Indeed, the villas miserias or shantytowns on the outskirts of Buenos Aires are made up of at least 10% of migrant Santiagueflos.
The description SQ syntax that follows on is part of a wider ethnolinguistic project whose scope is to study language-related effects at the societal level such as questions pertaining to Spanish-Quechua bilingualism, language maintenance and language shift, with special emphasis on the younger SQ generations, both migrants and non-migrant Santiaguefios in order to assess the future viability of the language.By doing so, this study hopes to contribute to the current general efforts made by other scholars, educators and indigenous communities in the protection and revitalization of endangered languages in the Americas. 12 The Syntax of Santiaguefio Quechua The following description of SQ attempts to highlight some of the syntactic features that show most clearly the mixing of SQ with Spanish.It does not claim to be a comprehensive analysis of the language nor an accurate reflection of the sociolinguistic situation since, as expected in any language contact situation, there is much variability whose ultimate linguistic and extralinguistic constraints remain to be understood.Thus this study leaves out the phonetics and phonology of SQ which also show that its contact with Spanish exerted a change in its phonemic inventory and distribution, and phonology.For example, the two phonemes /kl and /oj are neutralized in syllable-final position to give /x/, e.g.atuq /atox/ 'fox'.However, spirantization of stops syllable and word-finally in Cuzc-0 Quechua might have reinforced /k q/ > /x/ in SQ.Furthermore, the stress normally falls on the penultimate syllable in most Quechua varieties, though that is not always the case as indicated by SQ words which underwent vowel syncopation, e.g.wasipi /wasip/ 'at the house' ( cf Bravo 1970: 15-21, Kirtchuk 1987:97-102).
The presentation and discussion of the data will be divided along higher levels of organizational linguistic structure and its degree of hybridization at the word, phrase and sentence level, respectively.Each hybridization level will be illustrated with one or more linguistic features and its possible sources, i.e.Quechua or Spanish.
Word-level hybridization: this level of mixing is often indicated by a SQ root inflected with a Spanish suffix.Such hybridization process contrasts with both the more literary or written style as used in songs and stories as well as with some of the Quechua dialects spoken in other Andean nations.This type of language mixing can schematized as follows (Q=-Quechua; S=Spanish): Q !QQ1 + S -ero/era 'agentive nominal': the agentive -g can be suffixed to a Q noun stem in order to fonn words for skills or activities related in meaning to the stem, e.g.Q cliallu > challua-q 'fisherman'.In SQ one finds that the S agentive -ero/-era replaced Q -g functionally, and sometimes even extending to the latter Spanish gender distinctions (-ero 'masc'/ -era 'fem'), a semantic distinction absent in all Q dialects.Thus, the word challu-ero 'fishennan' (Q challua 'fish') and challua-q idem can be found side by side in SQ, becoming sylistic variants of the non-hybridized Q challuaq.
Q root+ Sdor/dora 'deverbalizing agentive': Q -g can also be described as a deverbalizing suffix.When attached to a Q verb root it indicates either the person who carries out or is affected by the action, e.g.wano-q 'person who dies, deceased' (wanuy 'to die') or its goal, e.g.ri-ni yutu-t kasaq 'l go to hunt partridge' ('go-ls partridge-obj hunt-dir).S agentive -dor/-dora (m/f) is productively suffixed to a Q verbal root such as saqmay 'to hit with the fist' to give saqma:dor 'a man who hits with the fist' (Bravo 1965:20).Further examples of mixing in SQ agentives are pushka:dor:a 'female spinner' (Q pushcay 'to spin'); the non- hybridized Q pushkaqj idem has been also attested in SQ.
Q root+ S -.!!! 'collective': in Q a reduplicated noun represents an object made by a group of objects sharing identical properties, e .. g sac/ta sacha 'wood' (Q sacha 'tree').Collectiveness is conveyed in SQ by adding the S collective -!!1, as in arena/ 'large expanse of sand' ( < arena 'sand'), to a Q noun, e.g.chaguar-al 'area covered with chaguar plants' (Q chaguar 'Bromelia serra ', Bravo 1956:82).Unlike other Q varieties, interestingly in SQ reduplication may have the meaning of'less than', in addition to the collective one.Therefore, SQ sacha sacha means a forest sparsely covered by trees (ibid.:286).This process is likely to have been borrowed into the regional Spanish of northwestern Argentina as shown by reduplicative pairs such asfrfo frlo 'somewhat cold' (Sun poco frlo idem), .pensando pensando 'to guess' (S adivinar idem.), harro harro 'muddy' (cf.S barrio/ 'claypit').The latter are expressed in standard Spanish by means of separate nouns, verbs or adjuncts (Nardi 1977: l 48).
Q root+ Sa ( ~ 'quality': S -a(d}o/a(d)a (m/f) is one of the two participial endings which can undergo noun incorporation adding to the SQ word the quality from which the noun is made o( This semantic change takes place after some morphonemic modifications (-dweakening and vowel raising, -o > - u) have applied to the noun stem, e.g.SQ chuqcha-du 'long-haired person' from Q chuqcha 'hair'.Adjectival derivation in Q is accomplished with participial -~. as in chuqcha-sqa 'long-haired person'.
Q root+ S -(c)ito/(c)ita 'diminutive/affectionate': Q has the diminutive markers :Ch!!, -!,Q and -Im, of which only the latter is encountered in SQ in the depalatalized fonn -rn, e.g.vida-la 'dear life' (also name for a popular song in the region; cf. also vidalitay below) and utu-la 'very small' (cf.Q lmcl111y-/la idem.).
The morpheme -rn remains productive in the language only as an hypocoristic, e.g.Crushu-la 'little Cruz, dear Cruz', Jishu-la 'dear Jesus, little Jesus', etc. (Nardi 1977: 145).That the diminutive •ill has ceased to apply to words other than persons' names can be explained as the result of S -{c)ito/(c)ita having displaced the fonner in all word domains except personal names.For example, Q ancha utula 'very small woman' becomes in SQ warmin utul-ita 'very small woman' (Q utula 'small'); also Q ancha qoni 'very hot' (Q ancha 'very') becomes in SQ qonicilo meaning 'lukewarm' (Q qoni 'hot').The semantic opacity of •ill in SQ can be gathered from words like utu-1-ita having S -ita inflected on what is now the adjectival stem utula.
Q root + S -illo/illa 'diminutive/affectionate': another source of SQ diminutives might have resulted from suffixation of S -illo/-illa (m/f) to Q ~oun stems, e.g.taq-el/o 'small tree' (Q taqo 'tree'); cf.Q taqo-lo idem.Q -!@ cannot be ruled out completely as the etymon of SQ -ilia (see above) since it is possible mutual reinfonncement between S -illo/-illa and Q -Ila favored SQ -illo/-illa.At a later s,tage in the development of SQ, the more productive S diminutive-(c)ito won out over SQ -illo/-illa.Nonetheless, further research in this area may throw light on these two allomorphs as being stylistic variants.
Q [Q2! + S -~ 'plural': although NP-related phenomena will be treated more at length below, it is relevant to mention here how plurality shows the extent to which hybridization has changed SQ syntax.In Q possession is indicated with juxtaposition of possessed-possessor with insertion of the linking particle -ni• after a consonant and suffixation of the pluralizer-kuna after the possessive adjunct, e.g.flan-ni-yku-kuna 'our roads' (road-link-our-pl): Though one may attest such possessive constructions in SQ, it is also found a more mixed construction in which the pluralizer-~ is added inmediately after the first noun rather than at the end of the adjunct, e.g.kiru-~-ni-yki 'your teeth' (kiru-pl-linkyour pl); cf.Q kiruykikuna 'your tooth'.
Q root + S -Wfil: 'action': a common verbalizing mechanism in SQ is the offixation of S -{c)ar to Q nouns and adjectives; the resulting verb means "to make or create what the noun or adjective indicates".Thus the wordpal/anq-ear 'to separate an animal from the herd and tie it with a lazo' derives from Spanish affixation to Q pal/anqa and chuqch-ear 'to grab someone by the hair' (Q chuqcha 'hair').That same function can be found in the Q factive -cha as in yaar-cha-y 'to bleed' fromyaar 'blood' or chuyanchay 'to rinse' from chuya 'diluted'.These two forms have been attested in Bravo (1956).Interestingly, -cha affixation to a Spanish word is attested in a token of local Spanish words collected by Nardi (1977), e.g.vuelta-char'to tum around' (S vuelta 'tum').
Phrase-level hybridization: gender, number and word order: this section deals exclusively with grammatical relations within the NP, namely, gender and number agreement, and word order.
Gender agreement: biological gender in SQ and other Q dialects is marked with two independent morphemes, orqo and china, which relate to male and female, respectively; e.g.mishi QIJJ.O 'male cat', mishi china 'female cat'.Many of descriptors used to indicate kinship relationships and human gender in Q have been kept relatively unmodified in SQ: qosa (man, husband), warmi (woman, wife), wauqe (brother's brother),pana (brother's sister), tura (sister's brother), naiia (sister's sister), waina (boy), sipas (girl), etc.However, unlike other Q varieties which have no gender agreement, the latter is extensive to SQ words with Spanish-derived suffixes: mishiti/1-ula 'very small cat (m/f)' (cat-dim-dim-gen).The non-marking of gender agreement in other Q dialects can be observed in mishin sumaq 'beautiful cat' which could be either male or female, and mishin saqra 'ugly cat (m/f)'.
The rule of gender agreement not only affects Spanish-derived suffix words in SQ but also Q words with no Spanish morphology.This kind of process is favored by the widespread presence of -u and -a in word final position and their analogy with generalized Spanish gender markers -o and -a.Examples of gender agreement in Q-derived suffixes arc: qosa punu-lu 'man who is fond of sleeping', warm in puiiu-la 'woman who is fond of sleeping' (Q puiluy 'to sleep'); the noncontrastive morphological pair in Q is qosa/warmin puilulu 'man/woman who is fond of sleeping' (Bravo 1965:32).
Number agreement: postnominalization of the plural marker -kuna is standard in all Q dialects, including the variety under investigation, e.g.wawa-kuna 'children' (wawa 'child'),pay-kuna 'they' (pay 'he, she'), sipas-kuna 'young women' (sipas 'young woman').In SQ plurality is conveyed with suffixation of Spanish -li in vowel-final words, e.g.weqe-s 'tears' (cf.Q weqe-kuna).Even speakers who use a more Hispanicized plural mechanism resort to Q-kuna in consonant-final words ranteq-kuna 'buyers'.Redundant pluralization is observed with both Q • kuna and S-~ in same word with no apparent semantic change.The latter suggests that SQ may be undergoing a reinterpretation of number assignment under Spanish pressure with word stems being added Spanish-~ to agree with -kuna, e.g.warmi-s-kuna 'women'; cf.Q warmi-kuna.
This type of borrowed NP agreement in SQ may be extended a degree further when one considers the hybridized SQ syntax in qari-s punulu-s 'men fond of sleeping'.Here, despite the uncontested Q lexical content of the NP, number agreement was modeled on the basis of Spanish redundancy plural marking without postnominal -kuna.The intensive mixing there is reinforced by word order as Q's canonical word order requires the placement of adjectivals in prenominal position (Qpuiiu-shiki qari-kuna idem).
SQ agreement shows some emerging features distinctive from other Q dialects in the verb phrase too.Thus an existential sentence in Q usually does not require a plural predicative even when it has two or more referents, e.g.Q ancha utula waina kanku 'There are very few kids' (very-few-kid-existential).Existentials in SQ do show predicative pluralization usually by means of the morpheme •li, e.g.ancha utula muchachu-s kanku idem.
Word order in the NP: as mentioned above, Q determiners (adjectives included) occupy a prcnominal position.On the contary, SQ's word order is like in Spanish, i.e.N-Adj: SQ muchachu chuqcha/u 'long-haired boy' (S [muchacho] 11 [de pelo largo]Ad;); cf.Q chuqcha/u waina idem and SQ chunka wira 'fat leg' (S [piema]11 [gorda]Adi; cf.Q wira chunka (Q chunka 'leg', Q wira 'fatl Likewise, possession in SQ shows the impact of Spanish word order since, as in the latter, the fonner has the possessed noun before the possessor; the Q possessive marker-ru) has remained in place in SQ.Such word order of possessive constructions follows the opposite arrangement in Q, e.g.[plumasta] [pavus-pa y atallpas-pa] 'turkeys ' and chickens' feathers' ([feather-pl-obj] [turkeypl and chicken-pl-poss] (Q atallpa 'chicken', S pluma 'feather', S pavo 'turkey') (Bravo 1965:219, quoted in Granda 1997:140).Unlike SQ, all Q dialects have the possessive word order illustrated in oveja-p wasatullunpi 'on the sheep's backbone' [sheep-poss backbone-3s poss-locative] (wasatu/Ju 'backbone', Q -n '3s poss', S oveja 'sheep') [Q: Possessor -p(a) + Possessed thing].The SQ example also shows some pronominal reduction as indicated by the omission of the agreement pronominals, namely, third person singular possessive-n that remains in use in other Q dialects.Sentence-level hybridization: in this final section the focus of the analysis will be given to some of those syntactic features which clearly deviate from non-Spanish influenced Q syntax.These features are the order of the constituents, subordination, evidentials and the analytical progressive.
Subordination: the same reversal in the order of the constituents discussed in 2.3.1 for the simple sentence can be observed in complex sentences.In Q the subordinate clause precedes the main clause as in [rupa-pti-n]sc [noqa mayupi chimpas gustaan]Mc 'I am happy when I go into the water' [Q rupa 'hot', Q mayu 'river', Q chimpa 'shore'] (cf.S gustar 'to like').In SQ one finds the the more Spanish-like clause arrangement with the main verb placed before the subordinate clause, e.g.[noqa gustarani]Mc [qamkuna amus kay:pli]sc 'l was happy that you (pt) have come' [Q qamkuna '2p ', Q amuy 'to come', Q -s 'gerundive', Q kay 'PERF', Q -pti 'subord'] (cf.again S gustar 'like').
Evidentiality: Q quotative -,fil is used to report mainly hearsay and it attaches to a subordinate clause as in kwentakuaspa-si purinki 'They say that you go around speaking evil [ofme]' [Q-si 'QUOT, Qpuriy'to go around', S contar 'to tell stories, to gossip').In SQ this kind of evidential is usually indicated grammatically via the Spanish complementizer que in an embedded sentence without the Q particle •fil, e.g.contestapun g_yg_ aprendcnaaspaqa cha oficiuta 'He said ifhe wanted to learn the skill' (Bravo 1965:204) [Q -pu '3s obj, Q-paqa 'conditional', S contestar 'to answer', S aprender 'to learn', S oficio 'skill'].
Analytical progressive construction: be + gerund: a progressive constructions are expressed with the morpheme -s(h)ka as in Q pay ashpatat tarpu-shka-n 'he is sowing the land' [Q ashpa 'soil', tarpuy 'to sow, to seed', Q -shka 'progr'].SQ's gerundive construction has come under Spanish influence though not completely since the auxiliary tianku 'be' occupies the verb final position afier, and not before, the gerundive.rn SQ there remains some of the original Q morphology since the gerundive is marked with -s, another Q gerundive morpheme: paykuna punu-s lianku 'they are sleeping' [they sleep-gerund be] (cf.S el/os estdn durmiendo they-be-sleeping).On the other hand, it interesting to note that, in addition to the fonnal and functional features the Spanish gerund has, infonnal Spanish in northwestern Argentina (NW AS) acquired a perfective meaning.The latter is present in a SQ construction involving the gerund.This situation is by no means unique to SQ but rather shared with other regions where Spanish and Quechua have been in contact for many centuries (Haboud 1996).

Conclusion
This paper presented an overview of the most salient mixed features of Santiagueflo Quechua syntax.It was shown that hybridization in SQ is extensive, affecting all levels of structure analyzed, from the morpheme to the sentence level.Though not studied here, the discourse level also shows an abundance of language mixing and codeswitching that remains to be explored in tenns of its linguistic constraints and cultural meaning.Further linguistic research on Santiagueflo Quechua will surely bring to light a more comprehensive analysis of this Quechua variety and a better understanding of the history of the language and its people.NOTES 1 I would like to acknowledge the comments of two anonymous reviewers.Fieldwork was possible thanks to a grant from the Whitney Foundation.