Yaminawa language

Yaminawa
Yaminahua
Native toPeru, Bolivia, Brazil
EthnicityYaminawá and related peoples
Native speakers
2,729 (2006–2011)
c.400 uncontacted speakers of Yora (2007)
Panoan
  • Mainline Panoan
    • Nawa
      • Headwaters
        • Yaminawa
Official status
Official language in
 Bolivia
Language codes
ISO 639-3Variously:
yaa  Yaminawa
ywn  Yawanawá
mcd  Sharanawa
swo  Shaninawa
mts  Yora
Glottologyami1255
ELPYaminawa
 Shanenawa

Yaminawa (Yaminahua) is a Panoan language of western Amazonia. It is spoken by the Yaminawá and some related peoples.

Yaminawa constitutes an extensive dialect cluster. Attested dialects are two or more Brazilian Yaminawa dialects, Peruvian Yaminawa, Chaninawa, Chitonawa, Mastanawa (=Nastanawa), Parkenawa (= Yora or "Nawa"), Shanenawa (Xaninaua, = Katukina de Feijó), Sharanawa (= Marinawa), Shawannawa (= Arara), Yawanawá, Yaminawa-arara (obsolescent; very similar to Shawannawa/Arara), Nehanáwa). Xinane Yura, a recently discovered variety, is spoken by a group contacted in Kampa and Envira River Isolated Peoples Indigenous Territory, Acre, Brazil during the 2010s.

Very few Yaminawá speak Spanish or Portuguese, though the Shanenawa have mostly shifted to Portuguese.