Tuscarora language
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| Tuscarora Skarureʔ |
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|---|---|---|
| Spoken in: | Canada, United States | |
| Region: | Six Nations Reserve in southern Ontario, around Niagara Falls, New York, and in eastern North Carolina | |
| Total speakers: | ~10 | |
| Language family: | Iroquoian Northern Iroquoian Tuscarora-Nottoway Tuscarora |
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| Language codes | ||
| ISO 639-1: | none | |
| ISO 639-2: | iro | |
| ISO 639-3: | tus | |
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| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. See IPA chart for English for an English-based pronunciation key. | ||
Tuscarora or Skarure is an Iroquoian language of the Tuscarora people, spoken in Canada and the United States, in western New York and southern Ontario. The original homeland of the Tuscarora was in North Carolina.
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[edit] Phonology
[edit] Vowels
Tuscarora apparently has eight oral vowels, /i ɛ a u iː ɛː aː uː/, and two nasal vowels, /ə̃ ə̃ː/. Nasal vowels are customarily indicated with an ogonek, long vowels with a following colon, <:>, and /ɛ/ (which may actually be [æ]) with <e>.
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Oral | Nasal | Oral | |
| Close | /i/ /iː/ | /u/ /uː/ | |
| Open-mid | /ɛ/ /ɛː/ | /ə̃/ /ə̃ː/ | |
| Open | /a/ /aː/ |
[edit] Consonants
| Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |
| Stop | /t/ | /ʧ/ | /k/ | /ʔ/ | |
| Fricative | /θ/ | /s/ | /h/ | ||
| Nasal | /n/ | ||||
| Glide | /j/ | /w/ | |||
| Rhotic | /r/ |
The consonant inventory of Tuscarora is quite small, with plosives /t ʧ k ʔ/, fricatives /θ s h/, nasal /n/, and sonorants /r w j/. There may also be the phonemes /b/ and /f/, although they probably occur only in loan words. /ʧ/ is commonly spelled <č>. <y> represents /j/. The phonemic consonant cluster /sj/ is realized as a postalveolar fricative [ʃ].
[edit] Bibliography
- Rudes, Blair A. (1999). Tuscarora-English / English-Tuscarora Dictionary. Toronto, Ontario, Canada: University of Toronto Press.
- Rudes, Blair A., and Dorothy Crouse (1987). The Tuscarora Legacy of J. N. B. Hewitt: Materials for the Study of Tuscarora Language and Culture. Canadian Museum of Civilization, Mercury Series, Canadian Ethnology Service Paper No. 108.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Language Geek: Tuscarora
- Tuscarora Language at the Tuscarora School
- Ethnologue Report on Tuscarora
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