Huehuetla Tepehua

Huehuetla Tepehua
Lhiimaqalhqama7
Native to	Mexico
Region	northeastern Hidalgo, Mexico
Native speakers	1,500 (2007)
Language family	Totonacan Tepehua Huehuetla Tepehua
Language codes
ISO 639-3	tee
Glottolog	hueh1236
ELP	Huehuetla Tepehua

Huehuetla Tepehua is a moribund Tepehua language spoken in Huehuetla, northeastern Hidalgo, Mexico. There are fewer than 1,500 speakers left according to Susan Smythe Kung (2007).

Syntax

Word order tends to be VSO, although it can be SVO at times (Kung 2007).

Phonology

Consonants

Consonant phonemes

		Labial	Alveolar			Post- alveolar	Velar	Uvular	Glottal
			plain	sibilant	lateral
Nasal		m	n
Stop	plain	p	t	ts		tʃ	k	q	ʔ
	ejective	pʼ	tʼ	tsʼ		tʃʼ	kʼ
	voiced	(b)	(d)				(g)
Fricative				s	ɬ	ʃ			h
Approximant		w			l	j
Trill			r
Flap			ɾ

The voiced stops /b/, /d/, and /g/, as well as the flap /ɾ/ and the trill /r/, appear only in loanwords and ideophones. In younger speakers, the uvular /q/ has merged with the glottal stop /ʔ/.

Vowels

Vowel Phonemes

	Front	Central	Back
High	i		u
Mid	e		o
Low		a

Morphology

Huehuetla Tepehua has a large variety of affixes (Kung 2007).

Valency-changing affixes

• Reflexive -kan
• Reciprocal laa-
• Dative -ni
• Causative maa-
• Instrumental puu-
• Comitative t'aa-
• Applicative lhii-

Aspectual derivational affixes

• Inchoative ta-
• Imminent ti-
• Roundtrip kii-
• Ambulative -t'ajun
• Begin -tzuku
• Desiderative -putun
• Repetitive -pala
• Again -choqo
• All -qoju
• Distal -chaa and Proximal -chii

Derivative affixes

• Agent nominalizer –nV7
• Non-agentive nominalizers –ti and -nti
• Deverbalizer -n
• Instrumental prefixes paa- and lhaa-
• Locative prefix puu-
• Applicative prefix lhii-
• Comitative prefix t'aa-

References

• Kung, Susan Smythe. 2007 A Descriptive Grammar of Huehuetla Tepehua. Ph.D. dissertation: The University of Texas at Austin.