Chickasaw language
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Chickasaw language test of Wikipedia at Wikimedia Incubator |
Chickasaw | |
---|---|
Chikashsha | |
Native to | United States |
Region | South central Oklahoma, from Byng or Happyland (near Ada) north, and from Davis or Ardmore west to Fillmore and Wapanucka in east. Some in Los Angeles, California. |
Native speakers |
< 75 (2012)[1] up to 2,000-3,000 in 1994[2] |
Muskogean
| |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 |
cic |
Glottolog |
chic1270 [3] |
Map showing the distribution of Oklahoma Indian Languages | |
The Chickasaw language (Chikashshanompa’, IPA [tʃikaʃːanompaʔ]) is a Native American language of the Muskogean family. It is agglutinative and follows the pattern of subject–object–verb. The language is closely related to, though perhaps not entirely mutually intelligible with, Choctaw. It is spoken by the Chickasaw tribe, now residing in Southeast Oklahoma, centered on Ada.
The language is spoken by as many as 2,000-3,000 people (as of 1994), although at present it is perhaps in a more imperiled state.[4]
Classification
Chickasaw is a Muskogean language, and Chickasaw and Choctaw together form the Western branch of the Muskogean language family. Chickasaw is also related to Alabama, Koasati, Mvskoke (Creek)—Seminole, Hitchiti and Mikasuki.[5]
History
Sometime prior to the first European contact, the Chickasaw migrated from western regions and moved east of the Mississippi River, where they settled mostly in present-day northeast Mississippi. That is where they encountered European explorers and traders, having relationships with French, English and Spanish during the colonial years. The United States considered the Chickasaw one of the Five Civilized Tribes, as they adopted numerous practices of European Americans. Resisting European-American settlers encroaching on their territory, they were forced by the US to sell their country in 1832 and move to Indian Territory (Oklahoma) during the era of Indian Removal in the 1830s.
Current status
![](../I/m/Chickasaw_stop.jpg)
The language is still spoken by about 75 people.[1] Emily Johnson Dickerson, the last monolingual speaker of Chickasaw, died on December 30, 2013.[6] Ethnologue estimates in its seventeenth edition that Chickasaw retains up to 600 speakers, but it is noted that this figure is rapidly declining because most speakers are 50 and older.[7] Children are no longer acquiring the language,[7] indicating Chickasaw has a notably low vitality. As of 2014, there were "four to five confident conversational speakers who are under the age of 35."[8] Besides a language dictionary,[7] the Chickasaw language is not well developed outside of the home. In terms of conservation and language vitality, Ethnologue evaluates the current language situation as moribund,[7] and UNESCO lists Chickasaw as a "severely endangered" language, also noting that most of roughly 600 speakers are over fifty and almost all are bilingual in English.[9]
Language revitalization
The Chickasaw Language Revitalization Program, founded in 2007, uses both Munro-Willmond and Humes alphabets. Because Chickasaw is a spoken language, "there is no 'right' or 'wrong' way to spell Chickasaw."[10] Chickasaw is taught through a master-apprentice program, community programs, and self-study programs.
A "Chickasaw Language Basic" app is available for iPhone, iPad, and other iOS devices.[11]
Classes and programs
The Chickasaw Nation has a department of Chickasaw Language with a 24-members Chickasaw Language Committee. In 2007, the tribe founded the Chickasaw Language Revitalization Program. Four levels of Chickasaw language classes are taught at East Central University in Ada, Oklahoma. Joshua D. Hinson, director of the Chickasaw Language Committee developed master-apprenticeship programs with guidance from linguist Leanne Hinton.[1][8]
Chipota Chikashshanompoli is a children's language program that meets monthly. Ada, Ardmore, Norman, Purcell, Sulphur, and Tishomingo all host non-academic adult language classes. The tribe also organizes immersion camps and publishes Chickasaw language literature through the Chickasaw Press.[1]
Sounds
Consonants
Chickasaw has 16 consonants. In the table below, the consonants are written in the standard Chickasaw orthography. The phonetic symbolization of each consonant is written in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) to the right of each orthographic letter when the orthography differs from the IPA symbol.
Labial | Alveolar | Post- alveolar |
Velar | Glottal | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
central | lateral | |||||
Nasal | m | n | ||||
Plosive | p b | t d | k ɡ | ’ /ʔ/ | ||
Affricate | ch /tʃ/ | |||||
Fricative | f | s | lh /ɬ/ | sh /ʃ/ | h | |
Approximant | ɬ | y /j/ | w |
- w is labiovelar.
- Voiceless stops /p t k/ have a small amount of aspiration [pʰ tʰ kʰ], especially at the beginning of words.[12]
- Voiced stops /b d ɡ/ may undergo lenition to voiced fricatives [β ð ɣ] between vowels.[12]
- All consonants except for the glottal stop may be geminated and most consonants can occur in biconsonantal clusters.[12]
Vowels
![](../I/m/Chickasaw_vowels.png)
Front | Central | Back | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
short | long | short | long | short | long | ||||
oral | nasal | oral | nasal | oral | nasal | ||||
Close | i [ɪ] | ii [iː] | i̱ [ĩː] | ||||||
Mid | o [o̟] | oo [oː] | o̱ [õː] | ||||||
Open | a [ə] | aa [ɑː] | a̱ [ɑ̃ː] |
Chickasaw vowels contrast between short and long oral vowels and between long oral vowels and long nasal vowels. Short vowels are centralized (see chart): short i is phonetically [ɪ], short o is phonetically [o̟], and short a is phonetically [ə].
Short vowels are also phonetically lengthened when they occur in the second syllable of a sequence of even-numbered open syllables.[15] For example, the word pisali ('I took him') is phonetically [pɪsəˑlɪ]. The lengthened short vowel is usually intermediate in length between a short vowel and long vowel. However, the phonetic realization varies depending on the individual speaker and also on phonetic environment. The lengthening does not occur at the end of words and is further restricted by certain morphological criteria.[16]
IPA | Example | Meaning |
---|---|---|
/i/ | pisa | 'she looks at him' |
/iː/ | piini' | 'boat' |
/ĩ/ | i̱sinti' | 'his snake' |
/a/ | paska | 'bread' |
/aː/ | sahashaa | 'I'm angry' |
/ã/ | ipa̱shi' | 'hair' |
/o/ | ofi' | 'dog' |
/oː/ | ihoo | 'woman' |
/õ/ | iso̱lash | 'tongue' |
Prosody
Grammar
Verb
Pronominal affixes
Verb arguments (i.e. subject, direct object, indirect object) are indicated with pronominal affixes (both prefixes and suffixes) which are added to verb stems. The pronominal affixes are inflected according to number (singular, plural) and person (1st, 2nd).
Chickasaw has an active–stative pronominal system with two basic series of pronominal sets: an active series (I) and a stative series (II). Additionally, Chickasaw also has dative (III), negative (N), and reciprocal (IR) series.
The active series is used for active intransitive subjects and active transitive subjects. (An active subject, simply put, is a subject that is in control of the action while a stative subject does not have control of the action. This is the difference between She fell on purpose vs. She fell accidentally where the first she controlled the falling while the second she did not control the falling.) The active series is in the table below:
singular | plural | |
---|---|---|
1st | -li | il- / ii- |
2nd | ish- | hash- |
3rd | - |
The third person lacks an affix and usually does not distinguish between singular and plural. The first person singular affix is a suffix while the other affixes are prefixes. The first person plural has two forms: il- which is used before vowels and ii- which is used before consonants — thus, il-iyya "we go", ii-malli "we jump". An example inflectional paradigm of the verb malli "to jump" is below (with the pronominal affixes underlined):
singular | plural | |||
---|---|---|---|---|
1st | mallili | "I jump" | iimalli | "we jump" |
2nd | ishmalli | "you jump" | hashmalli | "you all jump" |
3rd | malli "he/she/it/they jump" |
The stative series (II) is below. This series is used to indicate stative intransitive subjects and direct objects.
singular | plural | |
---|---|---|
1st | sa- | po- |
2nd | chi- | hachi- |
3rd | - |
Example with stative intransitive subjects, lhinko "to be fat":
singular | plural | |||
---|---|---|---|---|
1st | salhinko | "I am fat" | polhinko | "we are fat" |
2nd | chilhinko | "you are fat" | hachilhinko | "you all are fat" |
3rd | lhinko "he/she/it/they is/are fat" |
Example with direct objects, pisa "to look at (someone)" (the subject in the paradigm below is unmarked because it is in the third person):
singular | plural | |||
---|---|---|---|---|
1st | sapisa | "he/she/it/they look at me" | popisa | "he/she/it/they look at us" |
2nd | chipisa | "he/she/it/they look at you" | hachipisa | "he/she/it/they look at you all" |
3rd | pisa "he/she/it/they look at him/her/it/them" |
Both active and stative affixes can occur together in which case the active affix indicates the active subject and the stative affix indicates the direct object. Active prefixes occur before stative prefixes. When ish- "active second person singular" occurs before sa- "stative first person singular", it results in issa- (the sh assimilates to s). Likewise, hash- "active second person plural" + sa- is realized as hassa-. The full paradigm of pisa "to look at" is below:
verb form | translation | morpheme segmentation |
---|---|---|
hachipisali | "I look at you all" | hachi-pisa-li |
pisali | "I look at her" | pisa-li |
iichipisa | "we look at you" | ii-chi-pisa |
iihachipisa | "we look at you all" | ii-hachi-pisa |
iipisa | "we look at her" | ii-pisa |
issapisa | "you look at me" | ish-sa-pisa |
ishpopisa | "you look at us" | ish-po-pisa |
ishpisa | "you look at her" | ish-pisa |
hassapisa | "you all look at me" | hash-sa-pisa |
hashpopisa | "you all look at us" | hash-po-pisa |
hashpisa | "you all look at her" | hash-pisa |
sapisa | "she looks at me" | sa-pisa |
popisa | "she looks at us" | po-pisa |
chipisa | "she looks at you" | chi-pisa |
hachipisa | "she looks at you all" | hachi-pisa |
pisa | "she looks at her" | pisa |
Verb grades
- verb grades (gemination, epenthesis)
foyopa | 'to breathe' | ||
fóyyo'pa | 'to give a sigh of relief' | ||
foyohómpa | 'to be breathing' | ||
foyámpa | 'breathing' (at same time as another action) |
Vocabulary
English | Chickasaw |
---|---|
Hello (general greeting) | Halito |
how are you? (literally: are you well?) |
|
Family | |
"booski" | |
"booska" | |
"booske" | |
reply to Chi chukma and Chin chukma | Achukma akinni |
reply to Chukma | Homi, ishno ako |
reply to Homi, ishno ako | Homi, achukma akinni |
Notes
- 1 2 3 4 "Chickasaws Are On the Move." Archived July 16, 2012, at the Wayback Machine. Linguistics Society of America Committee on Endangered Languages and their Preservation. Retrieved 9 April 2012.
- ↑ Robins Hunter, Phoebe. "Language Extinction and the Status of North American Indian Languages".
- ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2016). "Chickasaw". Glottolog 2.7. Jena: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
- ↑ Robins Hunter, Phoebe. "Language Extinction and the Status of North American Indian Languages".
- ↑ "The Official Site of the Chickasaw Nation | Language". www.chickasaw.net. Retrieved 2015-08-29.
- ↑ "Last Monolingual Language Chickasaw Speaker Dies at 93", Native News Online. Retrieved 4 Jan 2014.
- 1 2 3 4 https://www.ethnologue.com/language/cic/***EDITION***
- 1 2 Russon, Mary-Ann (2014-05-08). "Chickasaw Nation: The Fight to Save a Dying Native American Language". International Business Times. Retrieved 2014-05-20.
- ↑ http://www.unesco.org/culture/languages-atlas/en/atlasmap/language-iso-cic.html
- ↑ "Language". The Official Site of the Chickasaw Nation. Retrieved 2012-09-29.
- ↑ "App Shopper: Chickasaw Language Basic for iPhone/iPod Touch (Education)". Retrieved 2012-09-12.
- 1 2 3 4 Gordon, Munro & Ladefoged (2001:287)
- ↑ Munro (2005:121)
- ↑ Gordon, Munro, Ladefoged. "Chickasaw" (PDF). linguistics.ucsb.edu.
- ↑ Gordon, Munro & Ladefoged (2001:288)
- ↑ See Gordon, Munro & Ladefoged (2000)
- ↑ Gordon, Munro & Ladefoged (2001:288–289)
External links
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For a list of words relating to Chickasaw language, see the Chickasaw language category of words in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
- Chickasaw Language Revitalization Program, Chickasaw Nation
- Chickasaw Language - Information & Videos - Chickasaw.TV
- Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Chickasaw
- A phonological and phonetic study of word-level stress in Chickasaw (pdf)
- The phonology of pitch accents in Chickasaw (pdf)
- OLAC resources in and about the Chickasaw language
Bibliography
- Gordon, Matthew. (2004). "A phonological and phonetic study of word-level stress in Chickasaw". International Journal of American Linguistics, 70 (1), 1-32.
- Gordon, Matthew; Munro, Pamela; Ladefoged, Peter (2000), "Some phonetic structures of Chickasaw", Anthropological Linguistics, 42: 366–400
- Gordon, Matthew; Munro, Pamela; Ladefoged, Peter (2001), "Illustrations of the IPA: Chickasaw", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 31 (2): 287–290, doi:10.1017/s0025100301002110
- Munro, Pamela (2005), "Chickasaw", in Hardy, Heather K.; Scancarelli, Janine, Native Languages of the Southeastern United States, Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, pp. 114–156
- Munro, Pamela; Willmond, Catherine (1994). Chickasaw: An analytical dictionary. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.
- Munro, Pamela; Willmond, Catherine (2008) Let’s Speak Chickasaw = Chikashshanompa’ Kilanompoli’. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.