Saanich dialect

Saanich (also Sənčáθən, written as SENĆOŦEN in Saanich orthography and pronounced [sənˈt͡ʃɑs̪ən]) is the language of the First Nations Saanich people in the Pacific Northwest region of northwestern North America. Saanich is a Coast Salishan language in the Northern Straits dialect continuum, the varieties of which are closely related to the Klallam language.

Saanich
SENĆOŦEN Sənčáθən
Native toCanada, United States
RegionBritish Columbia, Washington
Native speakers
ca. 5 (2014)[1]
SENĆOŦEN
Sometimes NAPA
Official status
Official language in
Pauquachin
Tsawout
Tsartlip
Tseycum
Language codes
ISO 639-3–
Glottologsaan1246

Language revitalization efforts

"The W̱SÁNEĆ School Board, together with the FirstVoices program for revitalizing Aboriginal languages, is working to teach a new generation to speak SENĆOŦEN" at the ȽÁU,WELṈEW̱ Tribal School.[2][3]

SENĆOŦEN texting, mobile app and portal

A Saanich texting app was released in 2012.[4] A SENĆOŦEN iPhone app was released in October 2011.[5] An online dictionary, phrasebook, and language learning portal is available at the First Voices SENĆOŦEN Community Portal.[6]

Phonology

Vowels

Saanich has no rounded vowels in native vocabulary. As in many languages, vowels are strongly affected by post-velar consonants.

Type Front Central Back
High i[lower-alpha 1] u[lower-alpha 2]
Mid e[lower-alpha 3] ə[lower-alpha 4]
Low ɑ[lower-alpha 5]
  1. /i/ is [ɪ] adjacent to a post-velar or labio-postvelar consonant, or preceding /ʔ/.
  2. The rounded close high back vowel /u/ is found only in loanwords, such as CEPU (/kəˈpu/) "coat", from French.
  3. /e/ is [e̽]—rarely as low as [ɛ]—adjacent to a post-velar or labio-postvelar consonant or preceding /ʔ/. It is closer—almost [i]—next to a lateral, post-alveolar, or /w/.
  4. /ə/ is generally mid central, but becomes [ɑ̽] adjacent to a postvelar or labio-postvelar, or a laryngeal obstruent, and especially between two such consonants, whether or not it is stressed. When unstressed, it is a close central [ɨ] following post-alveolars and before sonorants (including /ŋ/), and it is central rounded [ʉ] before the labialized obstruents.
  5. /ɑ/ is [ɐ] before /j/. It is also affected by post-velars and /ʔ/.

Consonants

The following table includes all the sounds found in the North Straits dialects. No one dialect includes them all. Plosives are not aspirated, but are not voiced either. Ejectives have weak glottalization.

Type Bilabial Dental Alveolar Post-
alveolar		 Pre-velar Post-velar Glottal
plainsibilantlateral plainrounded plainrounded
Stop plain p t ts[lower-alpha 1] tʃ k̟[lower-alpha 2] k̟ʷ k̠ k̠ʷ ʔ
glottalized pʼ t̪s̪ʼ tʼ tsʼ[lower-alpha 1] tɬʼ tʃʼ k̟ʷʼ k̠ʼ k̠ʷʼ
Fricative s̪ s ɬ ʃ x̟ʷ x̠ x̠ʷ h
Sonorant plain m n l j w ŋ̠
glottalized mˀ[lower-alpha 3] nˀ[lower-alpha 3] lˀ[lower-alpha 3] jˀ[lower-alpha 3] wˀ[lower-alpha 3] ŋ̠ˀ[lower-alpha 3]
  1. Does not occur in the Saanich dialect, but can occur phonemically in some of the other neighboring dialects of Northern Straits Salish, like Lummi, Sooke and Songish.
  2. The unrounded prevelar stop /k̟/ is found only in loanwords, as in CEPU (/k̟əˈpu/) above.
  3. The phonemic status of the glottalized sonorants /mˀ nˀ ŋ̠ˀ lˀ jˀ wˀ/ is not agreed upon. Some linguists analyse them as unit phonemes, others as sequences of a plain sonorant and a glottal stop /ʔ/. They do not occur in word-initial position. They tend to [ʔC] following a stressed vowel, [Cʔ] preceding a stressed vowel, and creaky voiced sonorants elsewhere.

The dentals are often written ⟨θ⟩, ⟨tθʼ⟩, but this is inaccurate, as they are laminal sibilants, [s̻, ts̻], and are only rarely interdental. The alveolars /s, ts, tsʼ/, on the other hand, are apical, as are all alveolars, including the laterals. The post-velars are often written ⟨q⟩, ⟨χ⟩, etc., but are not actually uvular.

Stress

Saanich stress is phonemic. Each full word has one stressed syllable, either in the root or in a suffix, the position of which is lexically determined. "Secondary stress" is sometimes described, but this is merely a way of distinguishing lexical schwas (with "secondary stress", like all other vowels in a word) from epenthetic schwas ("unstressed").

Writing system
Saanich alphabet
SENĆOŦEN
Sənčáθən
Script type
Time period
1978 to present
LanguagesNorth Straits Salish language
Saanich language
Related scripts
Parent systems
ISO 15924
ISO 15924Latn (215), ​Latin
Unicode
Unicode alias
Latin
U+0000 to U+007E Basic Latin and punctuation

The Saanich orthography was created by Dave Elliott in 1978.[7] It uses only uppercase letters, making it a unicase alphabet, with one exception: the letter s, which marks the third person possessive suffix.

AÁȺBCĆȻDEH
/e//ej//pʼ//k̟//tʃ//k̟ʷ//tʼ//ə//h/
IÍJK₭ḴḰLȽM
/i//əj/, /ɑj//tʃʼ//k̠ʼ//k̠ʷʼ//k̠//k̠ʷ//l/, /lˀ//ɬ//m/, /mˀ/
NṈOPQSŚTȾṮ
/n/, /nˀ//ŋ̠/, /ŋ̠ˀ//ɑ//p//k̟ʷʼ//s//ʃ//t//t̪s̪ʼ//tɬʼ/
ŦUWW̱XX̱YZs
/s̪//əw/, /u//w//x̟ʷ//x̠//x̠ʷ//j/, /jˀ//ts//-s/

The glottal stop /ʔ/ is not always indicated, but may be written with a comma: ,.

Plain and glottalized resonants are not distinguished.

The vowel /e/ is usually written Á, unless it occurs next to a post-velar consonant (/k̠ k̠ʷ k̠ʼ k̠ʷʼ x̠ x̠ʷ ŋ̠ ŋ̠ʷ/), where it is written A.

Example text

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

Saanich: EWENE SÁN E TŦE U¸ MEQ EȽTÁLṈEW̱ Ȼ SNI¸S SQÍEŦ E TŦE XĆṈINS. U¸ XENENEȻEL TŦE U¸ MEQ EȽTÁLṈEW̱ E Ȼ SI¸ÁM¸TEṈS. ĆŚḰÁLEȻEN TŦE U¸ MEQ SÁN. ͸ Ȼ S¸Á¸ITEṈS TŦE U¸ MEQ SÁN X̱EN¸IṈ E TŦE SĆÁ¸ĆE¸S.
IPA: /əwənə sen ə ts̪ə əwʔ mək̟ʷʼ əɬtelŋəx̟ʷ k̟ʷ sniʔs sk̟ʷʼɑjəs̪ ə ts̪ə x̠t͡ʃŋins. əwʔ x̠ənənək̟ʷəl ts̪ə əwʔ mək̟ʷʼ əɬtelŋəx̟ʷ k̟ʷ siʔemʔtəŋs. t͡ʃʃk̠ʷelək̟ʷen ts̪ə əwʔ mək̟ʷʼ sen. əjʔ k̟ʷ sʔeʔiteŋs ts̪ə əwʔ mek̟ʷʼ sen x̠ʷənʔiŋ ə ts̪ə st͡ʃeʔt͡ʃəʔs/
English original: "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood."

Grammar

Metathesis

In Saanich, metathesis is used as a grammatical device to indicate "actual" aspect. The actual aspect is most often translated into English as a be …-ing progressive. The actual aspect is derived from the "nonactual" verb form by a CV → VC metathesis process (i.e. consonant metathesizes with vowel).

     ŦX̲ÉT 'shove' (nonactual) → ŦÉX̲T 'shoving' (actual)
     ṮPÉX̲ 'scatter' (nonactual) → ṮÉPX̲ 'scattering' (actual)
     ȾȽÉQ 'pinch' (nonactual) → ȾÉȽQ 'pinching' (actual)

References
  1. There were 6 speakers of North Straits Salish in 8 of the 10 communities in 2014, and 3 speakers of the only other surviving dialect in 2011.
  2. "Daily Fact #9: There are over 50 First Nations languages in Canada". Miss Teen Southern British Columbia. Archived from the original on 2017-11-27. Retrieved 2013-06-02.
  3. "ȽÁU, WELṈEW̱ Tribal School". Archived from the original on 2 January 2013. Retrieved 17 April 2012.
  4. Renee Lewis (2012-08-02). "Indigenous tap new app to save old languages". Al Jazeera English. Retrieved 2012-08-21.
  5. "FirstVoices Apps". FirstVoices. Retrieved 2012-10-04.
  6. "FirstVoices: SENĆOŦEN Community Portal". Retrieved 2012-10-04.
  7. Dave Elliott and the SENÇOÎEN Alphabet

Bibliography
  • Bill, Adriane; Cayou, Roxanne; & Jim, Jacquelin. (2003). NEȾE NEḰȺ SḴELÁLṈEW̲ [One Green Tree]. Victoria, B.C.: First Peoples’ Cultural Foundation & ȽÁU,WELṈEW̲ Tribal School. ISBN 1-4120-0626-0.
  • Mithun, Marianne. (1999). The Languages of Native North America. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-23228-7 (hbk); ISBN 0-521-29875-X.
  • Montler, Timothy. (1986). An Outline of the Morphology and Phonology of Saanich, North Straits Salish. Occasional Papers in Linguistics (No. 4). Missoula, MT: University of Montana Linguistics Laboratory. (Web version of the author's PhD dissertation, University of Hawaii).
  • Montler, Timothy. (1996). Languages and Dialects in Straits Salishan. Proceedings of the International Conference on Salish and Neighboring Languages, 31, 249–256.
  • Montler, Timothy. (1999). Language and Dialect Variation in Straits Salishan. Anthropological Linguistics, 41 (4), 462–502.
  • Montler, Timothy. (2018). SENĆOŦEN: A Dictionary of the Saanich Language. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
  • Thompson, Laurence; Thompson, M. Terry; & Efrat, Barbara. (1974). Some Phonological Developments in Straits Salish. International Journal of American Linguistics, 40, 182–196.
  • YELḰÁTȾE [Claxton, Earl, Sr.]; & STOLȻEȽ [Elliot, John, Sr.]. (1994). Reef Net Technology of the Saltwater People. Brentwood Bay, B.C.: Saanich Indian School Board.
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