It might not seem so at first glance, but South America is one of the most linguistically diverse areas on the planet. Nowadays, the continent is largely dominated by Spanish and Portuguese, with the vast majority of inhabitants speaking one of these two languages as their mother tongue. But the lands of South America once glimmered with incredible linguistic diversity, with various tribes speaking countless entirely unrelated languages—and today, many of those languages still persist, albeit in smaller numbers. And that brings us to Tucano.
With an estimated 10,000 native speakers between Colombia and Brazil, Tucano (also known as Tukano, Tucana, or the endonym Dahseyé) boasts relatively strong influence in the area it’s spoken. Tucano is recognized as an official language in the Brazilian municipality of São Gabriel da Cachoeira, and since the region is so multilingual, Tucano has emerged as the local lingua franca, learned by speakers of various other languages. Of course, the influence of Portuguese and Spanish on the language’s vitality nonetheless constitutes a threat. Unlike most other translation firms, which overlook languages like Tucano, we at TranslationServices.com are proud to introduce our new Tucano translation team.
For a free quote for our Tucano translation services, simply message us!
Tucano: the primary language of a deeply multilingual people
Tucano speakers reside in the midst of the Amazon rainforest, straddling the border between Colombia and Brazil, with some tribes living further inland in Colombia. Culturally, Tucano men must marry women who speak a different language, as marriage between speakers of the same language is viewed as incest, which has led to a huge variety of languages being integrated into Tucano society. Spouses learn each other’s language, and children learn both parental languages as well as tongues spoken by others in the community. Multilingualism is so natural to the Tucano that they barely even register that they’re speaking multiple languages.
Tucano belongs to the Tucanoan language family, a grouping of about two dozen related languages spoken in parts of Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. Like many other Amerindian languages, Tucano exhibits grammatical complexity in its makeup, rich in inflection. The language shows a strong preference for suffixes over prefixes and uses them to encode all sorts of information into verbs, including tense (with various past tense forms to indicate how long ago an action took place) and evidentiality, which indicates whether the action was directly experienced or witnessed or simply assumed or reported. If you work with our native-speaking Tucano translators, you won’t have to worry about any of these grammatical challenges, though.
Your go-to source for Tucano translation services
Just like the highly multilingual Tucano people, we at TranslationServices.com are passionate about languages. That’s why we’re dedicated to bringing you the best Tucano translation services we can, whether you’re looking to translate a message from Tucano or into Tucano. Our translators hail from different communities in Brazil and Colombia, giving you access to translators who represent different Tucano dialects.
Our Tucano translators are capable of translating a wide variety of texts for any number of projects, accommodating various subject matters and media. Our more academically oriented translators are a good fit for translating research questionnaires to disseminate to Tucano speakers or translating educational content into Tucano to secure a robust education for Tucano-speaking children. If you run a business or organization, you can work with our business translators to put your marketing collateral in Tucano, connecting with locals through the regional lingua franca. We also have literary translation specialists who can translate stories and other literary content, including poetry, games, and apps, to either share Tucano tales with the world or bring new, quality content to the Tucano language. Whatever you need, our diverse Tucano translation team is here to handle it.
Let us help you with your Tucano translation project—put in your first order now!