Luzmila speaking Otavalo Kichwa

This video was recorded by Daniel Bogre Udell in Peru and features Kichwa speaker Luzmila Zambrano. Imbabura Highland Quichua was spoken by about 150,000 people natively as of 2007. Kichwa is a Northern Chinchay language of the larger Quechuan family, and the term covers all the varieties of Quechua spoken in Ecuador, Columbia, and parts of Peru -- Imbabura Highland Quichua is one such dialect in this set, and among the most widely spoken, as most other varieties are spoken by 10 to 20,000 speakers each. Kichwa dialects have undergone some creolization with pre-Inca languages of Ecuador, and this has resulted in a relatively simplified grammar when compared to Southern Quechua. Standard Kichwa is written in the orthography Kichwa Unificado, or Shukyachiska Kichwa.