typically aged 35 and above, those aged 20–35 typically have a passive knowledge of the language, and speakers aged 20 and younger are often monolingual in Spanish. In the more urban communities of Angla and Casco-Valenzuela, this is not the case. Media Lengua is preferred and spoken on a daily basis among a wider age range of individuals. There are also cases of children acquiring Media Lengua from their parents and grandparents, which is not the case in Pijal. Lipski reports that Media Lengua is even being used by school aged children who attend a Kichwa-Spanish bilingual school in Topo. Estimates of the number of speakers vary widely. In Pijal, there is an estimated of around 600 speakers while in the communities of Angla, Uscha, Casco-Valenzuela, and El Topo, there may be as many 2000+ speakers. Phonology Consonants Words of Spanish origin often appear to conform to Kichwa phonotactics. However, voiced obstruents, which exist phonologically only as stops in a post-sonorant environment in Kichwa, appear phonemically as minimal pairs or near minimal pairs in Media Lengua through Spanish borrowings: Kichwa [-sonorant] [+voice]/[+sonorant]___ Another phonological difference between Media Lengua and Kichwa is that Media Lengua often does not take into account the voicing rule. However, in certain instances, especially regarding verbal inflections, the Kichwa voicing rule is preserved. Other Spanish borrowings Labial [+/-continuant] contrast ( vs. ) (1) fuerte "strong" vs. puerta "door" Kichwa influences Spanish intervocalic becomes in Media Lengua. (2) Spanish casa "house" becomes Media Lengua casa "house" Spanish becomes Media Lengua . (3) Spanish carro "car" becomes . Spanish becomes Media Lengua . (4) Spanish pollo "chicken" becomes . Archaic Spanish preservation of A number of lexical items in both the Salcedo and Imbabura varieties maintain Spanish preservations from the Colonial period; most notably word-initial /x/. (*)=reconstruction IPA Chart (Imbabura Media Lengua) Common allophones are marked in brackets([]) and affricates are presented under the place of final articulation. Vowels There are several competing views regarding the number and types of vowels in Media Lengua. One theory suggests Salcedo Media Lengua, like Kichwa, maintains three vowels [i], [u] and [a], with the occasional Spanish preservation of [e] and [o] in names, interjections and in stressed positions. Under that theory, all other Spanish borrowings assimilate to the Kichwa system. Another theory suggests that Imbabura Media Lengua passes through a three-step process of assimilation and words can maintain Spanish phonotactics [kabeza]