A phonological reconstruction of proto-kawapanan

Abstract

This paper aims to provide a full diachronic account of the segmental correspondences between two extant Kawapanan languages of Peruvian Amazonia, Shawi and Shiwilu. I put forward a reconstruction of the phonological system of Proto-Kawapanan, which differs from the alternative proposal by Valenzuela (2011) in several respects: I argue that Proto-Kawapanan had two liquid phonemes (*ɾ and *l), lacked palatal obstruents, distinguished between two front vowels (*i and *ɪ), and its codas did not contrast for place of articulation. The second part of the paper is devoted to the reconstruction of the phonological history of Shawi and Shiwilu, including sound changes such as umlaut and several kinds of palatalization. I conclude with an attempt at reconstructing sound changes that must have taken place before the disintegration of Proto-Kawapanan, such as the debuccalization of pre-Proto-Kawapanan consonantal codas and the positionally conditioned lateralization of *ɾ.