Sekani language

Sekani
Tse'khene
Spoken in	Canada
Region	British Columbia
Ethnicity	Sekani people
Native speakers	25 fluent, 61 partial  (date missing)
Language family	Dené–Yeniseian Na-Dené Athabaskan Northern Athabaskan Sekani
Language codes
ISO 639-3	sek

The Sekani language is a Northern Athabaskan language spoken by the Sekani people of north-central British Columbia, Canada.

Sounds

Consonants

Sekani has 33 consonants:

		Bilabial	Alveolar		Post- Alveolar	Velar		Glottal
			central	lateral		plain	labial
Stop	unaspirated	p	t			k	kʷ
	aspirated	(pʰ)	tʰ			kʰ	kʷʰ
	ejective		tʼ			kʼ	kʼʷ	ʔ
Affricate	unaspirated		ts	tɬ	tʃ
	aspirated		tsʰ	tɬʰ	tʃʰ
	ejective		tsʼ	tɬʼ	tʃʼ
Nasal		m	n
Fricative- Approximant*	voiceless		s	ɬ	ç	x	xʷ	h
	voiced		z	l	j	ɣ	w

• *Sekani, like other Athabaskan languages, does not contrast fricatives with approximants.

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
High	i		u
Mid	e	ə	o
Low		a

Tone

Sekani has two tones, low and high. High is the default. That is, syllables normally have high tone. Syllables phonologically marked for tone are low.

Ethnologue/ISO 639-3 Code

SEK

Examples

Kwadacha Tsek'ene dialect

• dune man; person
• tlįį dog
• wudzįįh caribou
• yus snow
• chǫ rain
• k’wus cloud
• kwùn fire
• ’įįbèh summer
• too water
• mun lake
• nun land
• tselh axe
• ʼukèʼ foot
• ’àtse my grandfather
• ’àtsǫǫ my grandmother
• lhìghè’ one
• lhèkwudut’e two
• tadut’e three
• dįįdut’e four
• ǫ yes
• Tlįį duchę̀’ ’ehdasde January
• Dahyusè’ nùkehde wìlę February
• Nùtsʼiide March
• ʼUtʼǫ̀ʼ kùnuyehde May
• Jìje dinììdulh July
• Yhììh nunutsunde wìlę August
• Yhììh ukudeh’àsde September
• ’Udììtl’ǫh ’uwit’į̀į̀h October
• Yus ’ut’į̀į̀h November
• Khuye ’uwììjàh December

External links

• Sekani entry on First Nations Languages of British Columbia site
• Bibliography of Sekani Linguistics
• Map of Northwest Coast First Nations (including Sekani)
• Ethnologue entry

Bibliography

• Hargus, Sharon. (1988). The lexical phonology of Sekani. (Outstanding dissertations in linguistics). New York: Garland Publishers. ISBN 0-8240-5187-4
• Mithun, Marianne. (1999). The languages of Native North America. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-23228-7 (hbk); ISBN 0-521-29875-X.