Selkup language
Selkup language is the language of the Selkups, belonging to the Samoyedic group of the Uralic language family. It is spoken by some 1,570 people (1994 est.) in the region between the Ob and Yenisei Rivers (in Siberia). The language name Selkup comes from the Russian селькуп, based on the native name used in the Taz dialect, шӧльӄумыт әты šöľqumyt әty, lit. 'forest-man language'. Different dialects use different names.
| Selkup | |
|---|---|
| чу́мэл шэ, тюйкуй келл, шё̄шӄуй шэ̄, сӱ̄ссыӷӯй сэ̄, шöйӄумый эты | |
| Native to | Russia |
| Region | Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug |
| Ethnicity | Selkup people |
Native speakers | 1,600 (2020 census)[1] |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-2 | sel |
| ISO 639-3 | sel |
| Glottolog | selk1253 |
| ELP | |
 Northern Selkup is classified as Severely Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger | |
Selkup is fractured in an extensive dialect continuum whose ends are no longer mutually intelligible. The three main varieties are the Taz (Northern) dialect (тазовский диалект, tazovsky dialekt), which became the basis of the Selkup written language in the 1930s, Tym (Central) dialect (тымский диалект, tymsky dialekt), and Ket dialect (кетский диалект, ketsky dialekt). It is not related to the Ket language.
Phonology
There are 25 vowel and 16 consonant phonemes in the Taz dialect.
| Labial | Dental | Palatal(ized) | Velar | Uvular | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasals | m | n | nʲ | ŋ | [ɴ] |
| Plosives | p | t | tʲ | k | q |
| Fricatives | s | ʃʲ | |||
| Trills | r | [ʀ] | |||
| Laterals | l | lʲ | |||
| Approximant | w | j |
- Voicing is not phonemic. Stops and fricatives may be voiced between vowels or after sonorant consonants.
- The palatalized stop and fricative /tʲ/, /ʃʲ/ are most typically rendered as an alveolo-palatal affricate [tɕ] and fricative [ɕ]. Depending on the speaker, the former can be also realized as the stop [tʲ], the latter as a non-palatalized fricative, postalveolar [ʃ] or retroflex [ʂ].
- Before front vowels, palatalized variants of other consonants are also found.
- [ɴ] and [ʀ] are allophones of /q/ when occurring before nasals and liquids, respectively.
- The non-coronal stops /p/, /k/, /q/ have optional fricative allophones [f], [x], [χ] when occurring before /s/ or /ʃʲ/.
| Front | Central | Back | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unrounded | Rounded | Unrounded | Rounded | |||
| Tense | Close | i, iː | y, yː | ɨ, ɨː | u, | uː |
| Mid | e, eː | ø, øː | ɘ, ɘː | o, oː | ||
| Open | æ, æː | a, aː | ||||
| Lax | Close | ɪ, ɪː | [ɪ̈ ~ ə] | |||
| Mid | ɛ, ɛː | ɔː | ||||
- Vowel length is phonemic. /ɔː/ alone, deriving from proto-Selkup */aː/, has no short counterpart.
- The tenseness contrast, an innovation of northern Selkup, is independent of length (e.g. /i/, /iː/, /ɪ/, /ɪː/ all contrast).
- The full range of vowel quality contrasts is only possible in the initial syllable of a word: in later syllables, /e/ /ø/ /ɘ/ /y/ /ɨ/ of either length do not occur, nor does long /uː/. (Shown on a darker gray background.)
- The non-phonemic lax central vowel [ɪ̈ ~ ə] only occurs in unstressed non-first syllables; it is normally treated equivalent with short tense /ɨ/.
Selkup has a syllable structure (C)V(C). Word-initial /ŋ/ and word-final /tʲ/ or /w/ do not occur. Various consonant clusters and geminate consonants such as /nt/, /rm/, /ʃʲʃʲ/ may occur, though many potential combinations occurring morphologically are simplified.
Stress in Selkup is marginally phonemic. Generally the rightmost long vowel in a word is stressed, or otherwise the first syllable, but certain suffixes with short vowels may acquire stress, leading to minimal pairs such as [ˈtɕɛlʲtɕalqo] 'to stamp down' vs. [tɕɛlʲˈtɕalqo] 'to stamp once'.
Grammar
Noun
| Case name | Ending | Meaning | Example | Meaning of the example |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative case | ∅ | subject | маҗь | forest (as a subject) |
| Accusative case | -п, -м (rare) | direct object | ма́җеп | forest (as an object) |
| Genetive case | -т, -н (rare) | possession | ма́җет | of a forest |
| Dative case (animate) | -н | indirect object (animate) | ӄун, ӄумн | to the person |
| Dative case (inanimate) | -нд | indirect object (animate) | маҗӧ́нд | to the forest |
| Inessive case (animate) | -нан | the X has | ӄу́нан | the person has |
| Inessive case (inanimate) | -ӷэт/-ӄэт | in | маҗӧ́ӷэт | in the forest |
| Elative case | -эутэ/-утэ | out of, from, along | маҗӧ́утэ | out of the forest |
| Instrumental-comitative case | -ӽе/-хе, -э́ (with nouns denoting means of transport, always stressed) | with | маҗьӽе́ | with the forest |
| Abessive case | -галк/-калк | without | маҗьга́лк | without the forest |
| Translative case | -тӄо | into | маҗетӄо́ | [turn] into a forest |
| Exessive case (animate)* | -ндо/-эндо | from | ку́ндо | from the person |
| Exessive case (inanimate)* | -ӷэндо/-ӄэндо | from | маҗӧ́ӷэндо | from the forest |
* Almost out of use
References
- "Итоги Всероссийской переписи населения 2020 года. Таблица 6. Население по родному языку" [Results of the All-Russian population census 2020. Table 6. population according to native language.]. rosstat.gov.ru. Retrieved 2023-01-03.
- Helimski 1998, pp. 551–552.
- Korotkih, Grigoriy V. (2022). Современный язык нарымских селькупов (PDF) (in Russian). Соиздательство ценных книг «Грасион». p. 150. ISBN 978-5-6046304-5-7.
Works cited
- Helimski, Eugene (1998). "Selkup". In Abondolo, David (ed.). The Uralic Languages. London: Routledge. pp. 548–579. ISBN 0-415-08198-X.
.png.webp)