Kwaza language

Kwaza (also written as Kwazá or Koaiá, Kwaza: Tsẽtsitswa) is an endangered Amazonian language spoken by 25 of the Kwaza people of Brazil. Kwaza is an unclassified language. It has grammatical similarities with neighboring Aikanã and Kanoê, but it is not yet clear if that is due to a genealogical relationship or to contact.

Van der Voort (2005) observes similarities among Kwaza, Kanoê, and Aikanã, but believes the evidence is not strong enough to definitively link the three languages together as part of a single language family. Hence, Kwaza is best considered to be a language isolate.

An automated computational analysis (ASJP 4) by Müller et al. (2013) also found lexical similarities between Kwaza and Aikanã. However, since the analysis was automatically generated, the grouping could be either due to mutual lexical borrowing or genetic inheritance.

Kwaza is referred to as an isolate, however, it is truer to refer to it as an unclassified language. Research has not been able to prove Kwaza's connection to any other language, but there have been attempts to identify possible linguistic relationships with unclassified neighboring languages. Kanoê and Aikanã, neighboring languages of Kwaza, appear to have classifiers, a trait they share with Kwaza.

Kwaza shares the inclusive vs exclusive distinction in subject reference with Tupi languages. The most striking evidence of possible relationships of Kwaza with other languages in the area is lexical. The long history of contact between the peoples of Rondônia has caused cultural and linguistic similarities. Van der Voort, in a paper submitted to the Leiden Research School, demonstrated similarities between Kwaza, Kanoê, and Aikanã with the Tupari languages, being Akuntsu, Koaratira and Mekens.

The Kwaza language is threatened by extinction. In 2004, the language was spoken on a day-to-day basis by only 54 people living in the south of the state of Rondônia, Brazil. Of those 54, more than half were children, and half were trilingual, speaking Kwaza, Aikanã, and Portuguese, and some were bilingual, also speaking Portuguese. They live south of the original home of the Kwaza, on the Tubarão-Latundê indigenous reserve.

Jolkesky (2016) notes that there are lexical similarities with the Taruma, Arawak, Jeoromitxi, Arawa, Jivaro, Mura-Matanawi, Nambikwara, Peba-Yagua, Aikanã, and Kanoe language families due to contact.

Before 1995, data on Kwaza was not properly gathered and analyzed. Knowledge on its grammar did not exist in written form. Outside of its native speakers, lexical knowledge from early scientists and explorers of the Rondônia territory did not exist. The first documentation of the Kwaza people was made in 1913 by Cândido Rondon because of his expeditions with telegraph lines in areas of Rondônia. In the 1930s, the first written sources of Kwaza words were taken by Claude Levi-Strauss, an anthropologist. Levi-Strauss was on a reconnaissance expedition documented words on standardised enquiry forms developed for this purpose.