Baniwa of Icana

Baniwa of Icana is an Arawakan language of the Upper Amazon Arawakan group within the Northern Arawakan branch, spoken across Colombia's Guainia department, Venezuela and Brazil's Amazonas state, where it holds recognition as an official regional language. Speaker estimates range from about 10,000 to 18,000 people depending on the counting method used, drawn from data between 2007 and 2012, and UNESCO's Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger classifies it as Vulnerable. The language, historically also called Itayaine or Iyaine, forms a subgroup with Tariana, Piapoco, Resigaro and Guarequena, uses 46 noun classifiers with active-stative alignment and a verb-object-subject word order, and includes multiple dialects that are sometimes debated as separate languages.