Catalina Santamaria

This project documents and describes Damana, an endangered Chibchan language spoken by the Wiwa people of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia, foregrounding how relations to land are encoded and enacted through linguistic practice. Based on collaborative fieldwork with Wiwa educators, poets, and elders, it develops a grammatical description grounded in natural discourse, oral narratives, and verbal art. Focusing on spatial and land-marking systems, it examines how linguistic practices articulate territory, ecological knowledge, and forms of sovereignty. Integrating linguistic description with language ecology within a community-driven framework, this research contributes to broader discussions on language endangerment, land, and Indigenous knowledge, while advancing documentation as a site of collaborative and epistemic engagement.