Kashaya language

language
name=Kashaya
nativename=Kʼahšá:ya
familycolor=American
states=United States
region=Sonoma County, California
speakers= 45
fam1=(Hokan)
fam2=Pomoan
iso3=kju

Kashaya (also Southwestern Pomo, Kashia) is a severely endangered Pomoan language spoken on the Northern California coast in Sonoma County, California by one of the several Pomo peoples. The Pomoan languages have been classified as Hokan, but this proposal is controversial. The name "Kashaya" corresponds to words in neighboring languages with meanings such as "skillful" and "expert gambler".

Phonology

Vowels

Kashaya has five vowels, which all occur as short and long.

Demonstratives are also distinguished for case; they are given here as subjective/objective:
* "mu(:) / mul" — "that, this, it, those, these, they (vague demonstrative or anaphoric reference)"
* "maʔu / maʔal" — "this, these (the closer object)"
* "haʔu / haʔal" — "that, those (the further object)"

witch reference

Switch reference refers to markings according to whether a subordinateverb has the same or different subject as the main verb. In Kashaya it also marks whether the time of theaction is the same, or preceding the main verb action in thepast or future. There is no consistent expression ofthese categories except for the element /pʰi/ in both futuresuffixes, but the remaining /la/ is not identifiable as a separate suffix.

The suffix containing /li/ is realized as "-wli" after vowels, "-u:li" (or /uwli/) after "d", and "-ʔli" after other consonants; this allomorphy is related to that of the very common Absolutive suffix, "-w, -u, -ʔ". A few examples of these morphemes:

* "t’eti:bícʰ-pʰi maya miyíc’kʰe" — "you should stand up and (then) speak" [same subject, future tense]
* "pʰala cóhtoʔ, duwecí:d-em" — "he left again as night was falling" [different subject, simultaneous]
* "cohtóʔ da:qac’-ba cohtó:y" — "having wanting to go, he went" [same subject, past tense]
* "ʔama: qʰaʔa:dú-ʔli, cohtoʔ" — "after morning had come, she left" [different subject, past tense] ; consonant-final stem /qʰaʔa-aduc/

ee also

* Pomoan languages
* Pomo people
* Fort Ross

External links

* [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=kju Ethnologue: Kashaya]
* [http://www.native-languages.org/pomo_words.htm Vocabulary Words in Native American Languages: Pomo]
* http://www.parks.ca.gov/pages/449/files/FORTROSS2.pdf
* http://home.pon.net/kashayapomo/

Bibliography

* Buckley, Eugene (1994). Theoretical aspects of Kashaya phonology and morphology. CSLI Publications, Stanford University.
* McLendon, Sally. (2003). Evidentials in Eastern Pomo with a comparative survey of the category in other Pomoan languages. In A. Y. Aikhenvald & R. M. W. Dixon (Eds.), "Studies in evidentiality"(pp. 101-129). Typological studies in language (Vol. 54). Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. ISBN 90-272-2962-7; ISBN 1-58811-344-2.
* Mithun, Marianne. (1999). "The languages of Native North America". Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-23228-7 (hbk); ISBN 0-521-29875-X.
* Oswalt, Robert L. (1961). A Kashaya grammar (Southwestern Pomo), PhD dissertation, University of California, Berkeley.