Inuit phonology

"This article makes reference primarily to the Inuktitut dialects of Canada, although it provides some discussion of other dialects."

"Following standard notation, phonemes are written between two slashes, e.g. "/p/"; and phonetic transcriptions are written between square brackets, e.g. "IPA| [ɬ] "."

Most Canadian dialects of Inuktitut have fifteen consonants and three vowels (which can be long or short). Consonants are arranged with five places of articulation: bilabial, alveolar, palatal, velar, and uvular; and three manners of articulation: voiceless stops, voiced continuants and nasals, as well as two additional sounds – voiceless fricatives. Inupiatun has an additional place of articulation – retroflex – which adds two consonants to it, or three in the Qawiaraq variety. Retroflexes have disappeared in all the Canadian and Greenlandic dialects, except for the phoneme /IPA|ɟ/ in Natsilingmiutut, which derives from a former retroflex.

Vowels

Almost all dialects of Inuktitut have only three basic vowels and make a phonemic distinction between short and long forms of all vowels. In "Inuujingajut" (Nunavut standard Roman orthography) long vowels are written as a double vowel.

Intonation

In Inuktitut, intonation is important in distinguishing some words – particularly interrogatives – but it is not generally marked in writing. There are some minimal pairs in Inuktitut where only pitch distinguishes between two different words, but they are rare enough that context usually disambiguates them in writing. One common case, however is "suva". A high pitch on the first syllable followed by a falling pitch on the second syllable means "What did you say?". A middle pitch on the first syllable followed by a rising pitch on the second means "What did he do?"

In general, Inuktitut uses intonation to mark questions in much the way English does. When an interrogative pronoun is used, pitch falls at the end of a question. When there is no interrogative pronoun, pitch rises on the last syllable.

Inuktitut speakers tend to lengthen vowels with a rising intonation. So, a rising tone is sometimes indicated indirectly by writing a double vowel:

:

Alveolars

In Aivilimmiutut, North and South Baffin, and all dialects spoken further south and east, all double consonants starting with an alveolar consonant are geminated:

Uvulars

Only the Nunatsiavut dialect systematically geminates double consonants beginning with a uvular consonant.

Other systematic dialectical variations

Consonant weakening in Qawariaq

Many phonemes in the Qawariaq dialect have undergone a process of consonant weakening, although to what degree varies somewhat between villages. This process is motivated in part by prosody and parallels the consonant weakening processes at work in Yupik. As a result, many stops have become fricatives and many fricatives have become glides or completely disappeared. For example, the word "meat" – niqi in most dialects – is rendered as nigi in Qawariaq – the stop IPA|/q/ has become the fricative IPA|/ɣ/.

Consonant weakening is most noticeable in the area adjacent to the Bering Strait in the westernmost part of Alaska.

Palatalization in Inupiatun

The historical fourth vowel of Inuktitut – the schwa IPA|/ə/ – had an impact on the pronunciation of alveolar consonants following it. Where an IPA|/i/ was present in proto-Inuktitut, the following vowel is palatalized in modern Inupiatun (except where it has been assibilated – see "assibilation" below). Thus, for example, IPA|/t/ becomes IPA|/tʃ/ , spelled ch alone and tch when geminated, after some i's but not others. For example, the second person singular pronoun ilvit – "you" – in more easterly dialects of Inuktitut becomes ilvich in Inupiatun. In contrast, iqit ("fist", iqitii in Canadian Inuktitut), which was pronounced IPA| [əqət] in proto-Inuktitut, retains its plosive IPA|/t/.

Similar processes affect other alveolar consonants:

In the Malimiut variant of Inupiatun, this process is extended to some velar consonants, like IPA|/k/ and IPA|/g/.

Assibilation

In a number of dialects, IPA|/t/ preceded by an IPA|/i/ derived from an IPA|/i/ in Proto-Inuktitut rather than an IPA|/ə/ may become an IPA|/s/ (or an IPA|/h/ in dialects that use "h" in place of "s") when followed by another vowel:

English	Inupiatun	Siglitun	Natsilingmiutut	Kivallirmiutut	North Baffin	Kalaallisut
he/she comes in	isiqtuq	itiqtuaq	ihiqtuq	itiqtuq	isiqtuq	isirpoq

This feature varies from dialect to dialect and does not follow a consistent east/west pattern, as assibilation is present in some words in both Alaskan Inupiatun and Greenlandic Kalaallisut. The exact conditions in which Proto-Inuktitut consonants have been assibilated vary from dialect to dialect, often determined by the following vowel and other factors.

Fricative substitution in western Nunavut

Many of the western and central dialects of Nunavut – including Inuinnaqtun, Kivallirmiutut and Natsilingmiutut – express the phoneme /s/ as IPA| [h] . Inuinnaqtun also pronounces IPA|/ɬ/ as IPA| [h] . This leads to an additional constraint on double consonants in Inuinnaqtun: A plosive followed by the fricative IPA| [h] becomes a fricative at the same point of articulation. This feature does not extend west of Inuinnaqtun and is not present in Siglitun or Inupiatun.

English	Inuinnaqtun	Kivallirmiutut	North Baffin
egg	ikhi ( [i"x"hi] )	ikhi ( [ikhi] )	iksi
blubber	uqhuq (IPA| [u"χ"huq] )	uqhuq ( [uqhuq] )	uqsuq
walking (3p. sg)	pihukhuni ( [pihu"x"huni] )	pihukhuni ( [pihukhuni] )	pisukIPA|ɫuni

Nasalization of word-final consonants in western dialects

In western dialects, particularly Inuinnaqtun, Siglitun and Inupiatun, final consonants tend to be replaced by [n] at the ends of words. Thus, "inuit" becomes "inuin" in many western dialects. In central Nunavut, this tendency is more noticeable among older speakers at present, but in Inuinnaqtun and dialects further west, it is pervasive.

This is the reason why the names of eastern and central dialects generally end in the morpheme -tut , which means "like a something", while western ones end in -tun. The two are the same suffix, but the final /t/ in this morpheme becomes [n] in western dialects and remains [t] in eastern ones.

English	Inuinnaqtun	North Baffin
Inuit	Inuin	Inuit
snow	apun	aput

Retroflex consonants in western dialects

Natsilingmiutut retains as a phoneme the plosive, and often retroflex, palatal consonant IPA|/ɟ/. This consonant has merged with /j/ in all other Nunavut and eastern dialects of Inuktitut. In Inupiatun, the IPA|/ɟ/ of Natsilingmiutut and the /j/ in some central Inuktitut words has become IPA| [ʐ] (written r).

English	Inupiatun	Natsilingmiutut	North Baffin	Itivimiutut	Kalaallisut
eye	iri [iIPA|ʐi]	iri [iji]	iji	iri	isi
kayak	qayaq [qajaq]	qajaq [qajaq]	qajaq	qaraq	qajaq
big	angiruq [aŋiIPA|ʐuq]	angiruq [aŋiIPA|ɟuq]	angijuq [aŋijuq]	angiruq	angivoq

In addition to the voiced retroflex fricative IPA|/ʐ/ (written "r"), Inupiatun also has a voiceless retroflex fricative IPA|/ʂ/ written as "sr". This additional manner of articulation is largely distinctive to Inupiatun – it is absent from the more easterly dialects, except for the IPA|/ɟ/ of Natsilingmiutut.

English	Qawiaraq	Inupiatun	Siglitun	Natsilingmiutut	North Baffin	Kalaallisut
spider	aachivak	aasrivak	aasivak	aahivak	aasivaq	aasiak
penis	uchuk	usruk	usuk	uhuk	usuk	usuk

The Qawiaraq dialect of Inupiatun, furthermore, has a third retroflex consonant in addition to the two present in other varieties of Inupiatun: the retroflex approximant IPA|/ɻ/.

Double consonant clusters in Nunavimmiutut

Nunavik Inuktitut, in contrast to other dialects, does not allow two double consonants to appear with only one syllable between them. Wherever this occurs, the first consonant in the second consonant pair is deleted.

English	North Baffin	Nunavimmiutut
calendar	ulluqsiut	ullusiut
he is coughing	quiqtuqtuq	quiqtutuq

Glottal stops

In a number of dialects, uvular consonants and ordinary stops are replaced with glottal stops in some contexts. Which uvular consonants and which contexts varies to some degree across dialects. Most frequently, a IPA|/q/ or in some cases an IPA|/ɢ/ before another consonant is transformed into a glottal stop. Thus, the Inuktitut name of the hamlet of Baker Lake is pronounced "Qamaniqtuaq" or "Qamanittuaq" by most Inuktitut speakers, but is rendered "Qamani'tuaq" in Baker Lake itself. This phenomenon occurs in a number of dialects, but is particularly noticeable in Nunavimmiutut and in central Nunavut dialects like Kivallirmiutut.

In Natsilingmiutut, the velar nasal consonant IPA|/ŋ/ sometimes becomes a glottal stop when followed by another consonant, but not in all cases.

References

* [http://www.inuktitutcomputing.ca/Technocrats/ILFT_1.html Inuktitut Linguistics for Technocrats] , Mick Mallon.
*Arctic Languages: An Awakening, ed: Dirmid R. F. Collis. ISBN 92-3-102661-5 [http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0008/000861/086162e.pdf Available in PDF via the UNESCO website] .
* [http://www.livingdictionary.com/ Nunavut Living Dictionary]
* [http://www.alaskool.org/Language/dictionaries/inupiaq/dictionary.htm Interactive IñupiaQ Dictionary]
* [http://www.oqaasileriffik.gl/cgi-bin/katersat.cgi?lang=eng Oqaasileriffik Language database]