Warekena language

{{Short description|Arawakan language spoken in Brazil and Venezuela}}

{{distinguish|Baré language|Warekena Velha language}}

{{Expand Portuguese|Língua baniva de Maroa|date=October 2020}}

{{Infobox language

| name = Warekena

| altname = Baniwa of Maroa, Baniwa of Guainía

| nativename = {{lang|gae|Guarequena}}

| states = Brazil, Venezuela

| speakers = 650

| date = 2001–2006

| ref = e18

| speakers2 = ca. 200 (1999)Aikhenvald (1999) The Arawak language family.

| familycolor = arawakan

| fam1 = Arawakan

| fam2 = Northern

| fam3 = Upper Amazon

| fam4 = Orinoco

| dia1 = Warekena do rio Xié

| iso3 = gae

| glotto = guar1293

| glottorefname = Baniva de Maroa

}}

Warekena (Guarequena), or more precisely Warekena of Xié, is an Arawakan language of Brazil and of Maroa Municipality in Venezuela, spoken near the Guainia River. It is one of several languages which go by the generic name Baré and Baniwa/Baniva – in this case, distinguished as Baniva de Maroa or Baniva de Guainía.

There may be 10 speakers in Brazil and 200 in Venezuela, per Aikhenvald (1999).

Kaufman (1994) classified it in a Warekena group of Western Nawiki Upper Amazonian, Aikhenvald (1999) in Eastern Nawiki.

Personal pronouns in Warekena are formed by adding an emphatic suffix -ya to the cross-referencing personal prefixes.{{cite book |last=Aikhenvald |first=Alexandra Y. |date=1998 |chapter=Warekena |title=Handbook of Amazonian Languages |editor-first1=Desmond C. |editor-last1=Derbyshire |editor-first2=Geoffrey K. |editor-last2=Pullum |volume=4 |publisher=De Gruyter Mouton |location=Berlin |doi=10.1515/9783110822120 |pages=225–439}} Cited in Bhat, D.N.S. 2004. Pronouns. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 25