Eastern Abenaki language

Eastern Abenaki
Alnombak, Alnôbak, Eastern Abnaki, Wawenock
Alənαpαtəwéwαkan
Native toUnited States
RegionMaine, New Hampshire
Ethnicity1,800 Abenaki and Penobscot (1982)[1]
Extinct1993, with the death of Madeline Shay[2]
Latin script
Official status
Official language in
Wabanaki Confederacy
Language codes
ISO 639-3aaq
Glottologeast2544
Eastern Abenaki

Eastern Abenaki is an extinct Algonquian language formerly spoken by the Abenaki people. They were spoken by several peoples, including the Penobscot of what is now Maine. The last known natively fluent speaker of Penobscot Abenaki, Madeline Shay, died in 1993.[3][1] However, several Penobscot elders still speak Penobscot, and there is an ongoing effort to preserve it and teach it in the local schools;[4] much of the language was preserved by Frank Siebert.[5] Other speakers of Eastern Abenaki included tribes such as the Amoscocongon who spoke the Arosagunticook dialect,[6] and the Caniba, which are documented in French-language materials from the colonial period.

Phonology

Consonants

Both the Eastern and Western dialects of Abenaki have 18 consonants in total.[7][8]

  Bilabial Alveolar Palatal Velar Labio-

velar

Glottal
Plosive p  b t  d   k  ɡ kʷ  ɡʷ  
Affricate t͡s  d͡z
Fricative   s  z     h
Nasal m n      
Lateral approximant   l      
Semivowel j w

References

  1. ^ a b Eastern Abenaki at Ethnologue (16th ed., 2009)
  2. ^ Eastern Abenaki at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  3. ^ "Penobscot". Native Languages of the Americas. Retrieved October 25, 2011.
  4. ^ "Penobscot". Abbe Museum. Archived from the original on March 20, 2016. Retrieved Feb 21, 2016.
  5. ^ Gregory, Alice (April 19, 2021). "How did a self-taught linguist come to own an indigenous language?". The New Yorker. Archived from the original on 2021-04-12.
  6. ^ "Arosaguntacook Indian Tribe". Native Languages. Archived from the original on Jan 9, 2024. Retrieved Jan 9, 2024.
  7. ^ Beach 2004.
  8. ^ Voorhis 1979.

Sources

  • Beach, Jesse (2004). The Morphology of Modern Western Abenaki (Thesis). Dartmouth College.
  • Voorhis, Paul (October 1979). Grammatical Notes on the Penobscot Language from Frank Speck's Penobscot Transformer Tales. University of Manitoba Anthropology Papers. Vol. 24. hdl:1993/18305.
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