| Boruca | |
|---|---|
| Bronca, Bronka, Brunca | |
| Brúnkajk | |
| Native to | Costa Rica |
| Ethnicity | 1,000 Boruca people (1991)1 |
| Extinct | 201323 April 2018, with the death of Nemesio González (last semispeaker)4 |
| Revival | Taught in schools |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | brn |
| Glottolog | boru1252 Borucaquep1238 Quepo |
| ELP | Boruca |
Boruca (Boruca: Brúnkajk;5 also known as Bronka, Bronca, Brunca) is the native language of the Boruca people of Costa Rica. Boruca belongs to the Isthmian branch of the Chibchan languages. Though exact speaker numbers are uncertain, UNESCO's Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger has listed Boruca as "critically endangered".56 It was spoken fluently by only five women in 1986, while 30 to 35 others spoke it non-fluently. The rest of the tribe's 1,000 members speak Spanish.
Boruca is taught as a second language at the local primary school Escuela Doris Z. Stone. One can hear Bronka words and phrases mixed into Spanish conversations but it is extremely rare to hear prolonged exchanges in Bronka.
Grammar
The personal pronouns in Boruca (the ᵛ represents a glottal stop.)7
| Person | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| 1st | át | diᵛ / diᵛ rójc |
| 2nd | bá | biᵛ / biᵛ rójc |
| 3rd | i | i rójc / iᵛ rójc |
The numbers (the "n̈", "n" with the diaeresis "¨" on top may be unavailable in some fonts, it represents a slightly different sound from the normal n or ñ.)8
| Numbers | Boruca |
|---|---|
| 1 | éᵛxe, éᵛxi |
| 2 | búᵛc |
| 3 | man̈ |
| 4 | bájcan̈ |
| 5 | shishcán̈ |
| 6 | téshan |
| 7 | cúj, cújc |
| 8 | éjtan̈ |
| 9 | cújtan̈, éjcuj |
| 10 | téjcuj, cróshtan̈, búᵛc cúj |
Greetings
- ¿Ishójcre rában? 'What's up?'
- Morén, morén. 'Fine, well.'9
References
References
- Boruca at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
- Chamoreau, Claudine (2024-04-01). "Introduction" (PDF). International Journal of American Linguistics. 90 (S1): S3–S33. doi:10.1086/728138. ISSN 0020-7071.
- Castro, Damaris (September 2010). "The noun phrase in Boruca: studying a recently extinct language". STUF - Language Typology and Universals. 63 (3): 196–220. doi:10.1524/stuf.2010.0019. ISSN 1867-8319.
- Hanson, Seibert; E, Aroline (August 2019). "Reexamining the classification of an endangered language: The vitality of Brunca". ISSN 1934-5275.
{{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires|journal=(help) - Hanson, Seibert; E, Aroline (2019). "Reexamining the classification of an endangered language: The vitality of Brunca". Language Documentation & Conservation. 13: 384–400. ISSN 1934-5275.
- UNESCO. “UNESCO Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger”. 2017. http://www.unesco.org/languages-atlas/index.php.
- Quesada Pacheco 1995, p. 33.
- Quesada Pacheco 1995, p. 82.
- Maroto Rojas, Espíritu Santo (1999). "Palabras varias Saludos". Lengua o dialecto Boruca o Brunkajk. (in Spanish and Boruca). San José, Costa Rica: Editorial de la Universidad de Costa Rica. p. 49. ISBN 9977-67-554-6.
Bibliography
Bibliography
- Quesada Pacheco, Miguel Ángel (1995). Hablemos Boruca. (in Spanish and Boruca). San José, Costa Rica: Ministerio de Educación Pública. p. 33. ISBN 9977-60-114-3.