Atikamekw language

Atikamekw
Atikamekw
atikamekw nehiromowin
Native to	Canada
Region	Quebec
Native speakers	5,900 (2011 census)
Language family	Algic Algonquian Central Cree Atikamekw; ; ; ;
Language codes
ISO 639-3	atj
Glottolog	atik1240
ELP	Attikamek
Linguasphere	62-ADA-c
	This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

Atikamekw, which the endonym is Atikamekw Nehiromowin, literally the "Atikamekw Native language", is an Algonquian language, Cree, is the language of the Atikamekw people of southwestern Quebec. It is spoken by nearly all the Atikamekw, and therefore it is among the indigenous languages least threatened with extinction according to some studies.^[2] The Atikamekw reflex of Proto-Algonquian liquid ("L" sound) *l is [ɾ] (spelled 'r'). The corresponding sound in other Cree dialects is [n], [j], [l], or [ð] (it is consistently one of these depending on the dialect). Another way in which Atikamekw is distinctive among dialects of Cree is in having many loanwords from the Anishinaabe language.

Classification

Atikamekw is a language belonging to the Cree–Montagnais–Naskapi linguistic continuum, which is part of the Central branch of the Algonquian languages of the Algic family of languages. It is sometimes classified as a dialect of Cree.

Phonology

Consonants

The consonants of Atikamekw are listed below in the standard orthography and with IPA equivalents in brackets:

	Bilabial	Alveolar	Post- alveolar	Velar	Glottal
Nasal	m /m/	n /n/
Stop	p /p/	t /t/	tc /tʃ/	k /k/
Fricative		s /s/	c /ʃ/		h /h/
Tap		r /r/
Approximant				w /w/

Vowels

The vowels of Atikamekw are listed below:

	Front		Back
	long	short	long	short
Close	î /iː/	i /i/
Mid	ê /eː/		ô /oː/	o /o/
Open			â /aː/	a /a/

Vowel length (shown above with a circumflex accent) is typically not indicated in the written language.

Notes

^ Atikamekw at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
^ "Cultures et traditions" (in French). Conseil des Atikamekw d'Opitciwan. Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2010-03-09. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)

References

Béland, Jean-Pierre. 1978. Atikamekw Morphology & Lexicon. Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California, Berkeley.

External links

[e18-1] Atikamekw at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)

[CeT-2] "Cultures et traditions" (in French). Conseil des Atikamekw d'Opitciwan. Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2010-03-09. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)

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