Slavey language.html



Slavey (also Slave, Slavé) (pronounced: [slevi]) is an Athabaskan language spoken among the Slavey First Nations of Canada in the Northwest Territories where it is also has official status. ²

In older literature, the name of the language was spelt Slave; however, the connotations of this, along with the pronunciation of the homograph slave (the final e should be pronounced) have caused the change to Slavey instead.

The language is written using Canadian Aboriginal syllabics or the Latin alphabet.

Slavey was the native language spoken by the fictional band in the Canadian television series North of 60. Nick Sibbeston, a former Premier of the Northwest Territories, was a Slavey language and cultural consultant for the show.

North Slavey language and South Slavey language

North Slavey language is spoken by the Sahtu people in the Mackenzie District along the middle Mackenzie River from Fort Norman north, around Great Bear Lake, and in the Mackenzie Mountains of the Canadian territory of Northwest Territories.

Statistics: Speakers: 1,065 (2006 Statistics Canada)

Alternate names: Slavi, Dené, Mackenzian, Slave

Dialects: Hare, Bearlake, Mountain

South Slavey language or Dene-thah, is spoken in the region of Great Slave Lake, upper Mackenzie River and drainage in Mackenzie District, northeast Alberta, northwest British Columbia.

Statistics: Speakers: 1,605 (2006 Statistics Canada)

Alternate names: Slavi, Slave, Dené, Mackenzian

Sounds

This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters.

Consonants

The consonant inventories in the dialects of Slavey differ considerably. The table above lists the 30 consonants common to most or all varieties. Hare lacks aspirated affricates (on red background), while Mountain lacks /w/ (on blue). In addition, for some speakers of Hare, an alveolar flap /ɾ/ has developed into a separate phoneme.

The most pronounced difference is however the realization of a series of consonants that varies greatly in their place of articulation:^{verification needed}

In Slavey proper, these are dental affricates and fricatives; comparative Athabaskan work reveals this to be the oldest sound value. Mountain has labials, with the voiceless stop coinciding with pre-existing /p/. Bearlake has labialized velars, but has lenited the voiced fricative to coincide with pre-existing /w/. The most complicated situation is found in Hare, where the plain stop is (as in Bearlake) a labialized velar, the aspirated member is missing, the ejective member is replaced by a /ʔw/ sequence, the voiceless fricative is (as in Mountain) /f/, and the voiced fricative has (again as in Bearlake) been lenited to /w/.

Phonological processes

The following phonological and phonetic statements apply to all four dialects of Slavey.

• Unaspirated obstruents are either voiceless or weakly voiced, e.g.
  • /k/ → [k] or [k̬]
• Aspirated obstruents are strongly aspirated.
• Ejectives are strongly ejective.
• When occurring between vowels, ejectives are often voiced, e.g.
  • /kʼ/ → [ɡˀ] or [kʼ]
• /ʦʰ/ is usually strongly velarized, i.e. [tˣ].
• Velar obstruents are palatalized before front vowels, e.g.
  • /kɛ/ → [cɛ]
  • /xɛ/ → [çɛ]
  • /ɣɛ/ → [ʝɛ]
• Velar fricatives may be labialized before round vowels.
  • The voiceless fricative is usually labialized, e.g.
    • /xo/ → [xʷo]
  • The voiced fricative is optionally labialized and may additionally be defricated e.g.
    • /ɣo/ → [ɣo] or [ɣʷo] or [wo]
• Velar stops are also labialized before round vowels. These labialized velars are not as heavily rounded as labial velars (which occur in Bearlake and Hare), e.g.
  • /ko/ → [kʷo]
  • /kʷo/ → [k̹ʷwo]
• Lateral affricates are generally alveolar, but sometimes velar, i.e.
  • /tɬ/ → [tɬ] or [kɬ]
  • /tɬʰ/ → [tɬʰ] or [kɬʰ]
  • /tɬʼ/ → [tɬʼ] or [kɬʼ]
• /x/ may be velar or glottal, i.e.
  • /x/ → [x] or [h]

Vowels

• a [a]
• e [e]
• ə [ə]
• i [i]
• o [o]
• u [u]
• nasal vowels are marked with an ogonek accent, e.g., ą [ą]

=Tone =

Slavey has two tones:

• high
• low

In Slavey orthography, high tone is marked with an acute accent, and low tone is unmarked.

Tones are both lexical and grammatical.

Lexical: /ɡáh/ 'along' vs. /ɡàh/ 'rabbit'

Grammar

Please help improve this section by expanding it. Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion. (June 2008)

Notes

See also

• Broken Slavey

References

Further reading