Tilquiapan Zapotec (Zapoteco de San Miguel Tilquiápam) is an Oto-Manguean language of the Zapotecan branch, spoken in southern Oaxaca, Mexico.
Santa Inés Yatzechi Zapotec is close enough to be considered a dialect, and Ocotlán Zapotec is also close. They were measured at 87% and 59% intelligibility, respectively, in recorded text testing.
Phonology
Vowels Vowel phonemes of Tilquiapan Zapotec Front Central Back Close Mid Open
Each vowel can also be glottalized, a phenomenon manifested as either creaky voice throughout the vowel or, more commonly, as a sequence of a vowel and a glottal stop optionally followed by an echo of the vowel.
Consonants Consonant phonemes of Tilquiapan Zapotec Bilabial Dental/Alveolar Post-alveolar Palatal VelarplainlabializedNasal / Plosive Fricative Tap ɾApproximant /
As with other Zapotec languages, the primary distinction between consonant pairs like and is not of voicing but between fortis and lenis (measured in length),See respectively, with voicing being a phonetic correlate. There are two exceptions to this in Tilquiapan: The contrast between fortis and lenis The contrast between fortis and lenis Neither is voiceless, but is pronounced a little longer and replaces in certain causative verbs in ways similar to other fortis/lenis consonantal changes (e.g. 'get loose' vs. 'let loose').
is not differentiated from in orthography. Word-final lenis is realized as .
and have fricative allophones and intervocalically.
before a consonant is .
varies between ~ ~ , and between ~ .
have retroflex allophones occurring before , while are typically occurring before .
Notes
References