Macro-Jê languages
Macro-Jê languages
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Macro-Jê languages

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Macro-Jê languages

Macro-Jê (also spelled Macro-Gê) is a medium-sized language family in South America, mostly in Brazil but also in the Chiquitanía region in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, as well as (formerly) in small parts of Argentina and Paraguay. It is centered on the Jê language family, with most other branches currently being single languages due to recent extinctions.

The Macro-Jê family was first proposed in 1926, and has undergone moderate modifications since then.

Eduardo Ribeiro of the University of Chicago finds no evidence to classify Fulniô (Yatê) and Guató as Macro-Jê, pace Kaufman, nor Otí, pace Greenberg. Ribeiro does include Chiquitano, pace Rodrigues.

Glottolog accepts a 'Nuclear Macro-Je' consisting of Jean, Karaja, Krenak-Maxakalian, Ofaie, Rikbaktsa, and Yabutian (Jabuti), with extinct Jeicó unclassified within the family. Lexical parallels with Kamakanan and Purian have yet to be corroborated with reconstructions; the similarities with Purian disappear once Coropo is reclassified as Maxakalian. It notes suggestive grammatical similarities with Bororoan, Kariri, and Chiquitano, of the kind also shared with Tupian and Cariban, but little lexical evidence.

These languages share irregular morphology with the Tupi and Carib families, and Rodrigues (2000) and Ribeiro connect them all as a Je–Tupi–Carib family.

Pache (2018) suggests a distant genetic relationship between Macro-Jê and Chibchan.

Nikulin (2020) proposes the following internal classification of Macro-Jê:

Nikulin (2020) does not accept the following languages and language families as part of Macro-Jê.

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