Cusco Quechua
Encyclopedia
Cusco Quechua is a dialect
of the Southern Quechua
language, more specifically Qusqu-Qullaw
Quechua, spoken in city
and the department of Cusco
.
It is the Quechua variety used by the Academia Mayor de la Lengua Quechua
in Cusco, which also prefers the Spanish-based five-vowel alphabet. On the other hand, the official alphabet used by the ministry of education has only three vowels.
Dialect
The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...
of the Southern Quechua
Southern Quechua
Southern Quechua , or only Quechua, is the most widely spoken of the major regional groupings of mutually intelligible dialects within the Quechua language family, with about 5 million speakers...
language, more specifically Qusqu-Qullaw
Qusqu-Qullaw
Qusqu-Qullaw is a variety of the Quechua language family, spoken throughout southern Peru , Bolivia, and northern Argentina, including the prestige dialect of Cusco Quechua. With about four million speakers, it is one of the largest dialects, along with Ayacucho Quechua...
Quechua, spoken in city
Cusco
Cusco , often spelled Cuzco , is a city in southeastern Peru, near the Urubamba Valley of the Andes mountain range. It is the capital of the Cusco Region as well as the Cuzco Province. In 2007, the city had a population of 358,935 which was triple the figure of 20 years ago...
and the department of Cusco
Cusco Region
Cusco is a region in Peru. It is bordered by the Ucayali Region on the north; the Madre de Dios and Puno regions on the east; the Arequipa Region on the south; and the Apurímac, Ayacucho and Junín regions on the west...
.
It is the Quechua variety used by the Academia Mayor de la Lengua Quechua
Academia Mayor de la Lengua Quechua
The Academia Mayor de la Lengua Quechua AMLQ in Cusco is a private institution, founded in 1990, concerned with the 'purity' of the Quechua language....
in Cusco, which also prefers the Spanish-based five-vowel alphabet. On the other hand, the official alphabet used by the ministry of education has only three vowels.