Nasal Coarticulation and Prosody in Kakataibo.

This paper presents the first phonetic description of the patterns of nasal coarticulation in Kakataibo. While closely related Panoan languages have been described as having anticipatory nasal coarticulation in VN sequences, there are only a few reports of other types of nasal coarticulation. Based on a detailed investigation of the aerodynamic properties of nasality, we account for the full variety of nasal coarticulation patterns in Kakataibo and discuss their interaction with prosody.

Acoustic and electroglottographic analyses of nonpathological, nonmodal phonation.

Languages where phonation type and tone are contrastive make use of extremely fine and controlled actions of laryngeal structures; hence, there is little opportunity to variation in either phonation or pitch. Nonetheless, many American Indian languages have contrastive nonmodal phonation, which, moreover, is subject to a great deal of variation. There are a few studies addressing the phonetics of nonmodal phonation in American Indian languages, and little is known about the phonetics/phonology interface of laryngeal features within the sound patterns of these languages.

Linguistic and maternal genetic diversity are not correlated in Native Mexicans.

Mesoamerica, defined as the broad linguistic and cultural area from middle southern Mexico to Costa Rica, might have played a pivotal role during the colonization of the American continent. The Mesoamerican isthmus has constituted an important geographic barrier that has severely restricted gene flow between North and South America in pre-historical times. Although the Native American component has been already described in admixed Mexican populations, few studies have been carried out in native Mexican populations.