Shawnee language

Shawnee language
Shawnee language
Person	Shawnee people, Indigenous group from the Ohio River Valley with rich cultural heritage.
People	Shawnee (Sawanwa), an Algonquian language with few speakers remaining, preservation efforts underway.
Language	Historically in eastern U.S. (Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, Pennsylvania), now primarily in Oklahoma.

Shawnee
Shawnee
saawanwaatoweewe, sâwanwâtowêwe
Native to	United States
Region	Central and Northeast Oklahoma
Ethnicity	Shawnee
Native speakers	100-200 (2024)
Language family	Algic Algonquian Shawnee; ;
Writing system	Latin script
Language codes
ISO 639-3	sjw
Glottolog	shaw1249
ELP	Shawnee
	Distribution of the Shawnee language around 1650
	Shawnee is classified as Severely Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger
	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.

The Shawnee language is a Central Algonquian language, spoken in parts of central and northeastern Oklahoma by the Shawnee people. It was originally spoken by these people in a broad territory throughout the Eastern United States, mostly north of the Ohio River. They occupied territory in Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Pennsylvania.

Shawnee is closely related to other Algonquian languages, such as Mesquakie-Sauk (Sac and Fox) and Kickapoo. It has 260 speakers, according to a 2015 census,^[2] although the number is decreasing. It is a polysynthetic language that is described to have freedom in word ordering.^[3]

Status

Shawnee is severely threatened, as many speakers have shifted to English. The approximately 200 remaining speakers are older adults.^[2] Some of the decline in usage of Shawnee resulted from the United States' assimilation program carried out by Indian boarding schools, which abused, starved, and beat children who spoke their Native languages. This treatment often extended to the family of those children as well.

Of the 4,576 citizens of the Absentee Shawnee Tribe around the city of Shawnee, Oklahoma, more than 100 are speakers. Of the 3,652 citizens of the Eastern Shawnee Tribe in Ottawa County, only a few elders are speakers. Of the 2,226 citizens of the Shawnee Tribe, or Loyal Shawnee in northeastern Oklahoma around Whiteoak, there are fewer than 12 speakers.^[2] Because of the low speaker population and the percentage of elderly speakers, Shawnee is classified as an endangered language. Additionally, language development outside of the home has been limited. A dictionary and portions of the Bible translated from 1842 to 1929 were translated into Shawnee.^[2]

Language revitalization

Absentee-Shawnee Elder George Blanchard Sr., former governor of his tribe, teaches classes to Head Start and elementary school children, as well as evening classes for adults, at the Cultural Preservation Center in Seneca, Missouri. His work was profiled on the PBS show American Experience in 2009.^[4] The classes are intended to encourage speaking Shawnee among families at home. The Eastern Shawnee have also taught language classes.^[5] The Shawnee Tribe launched a language immersion program in 2020 with virtual and in-person classes.^[6]

Conversational Shawnee booklets, CDs, and a Learn Shawnee Language website are available.^[7]^[8]

Phonology

Vowels

Shawnee has six vowels,^[3] three of which are high, and three are low.

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i iː
Mid	e		o
Open		a aː

In Shawnee, /i/ tends to be realized as [ɪ], and /e/ tends to be pronounced [ɛ].^[3]

In (1) and (2), a near minimal pair has been found for Shawnee /i/ 'i' and /iː/ 'ii'. In (3) and (4), a minimal pair has been found for Shawnee /a/ 'a' and /aː/ 'aa'.

(1) ho-wiisi'-ta 'he was in charge'

(2) wi 'si 'dog'

(3) caaki yaama 'all this'

(4) caki 'small' ^[3]

However, no quantitative contrasts have been found in the vowels /e/ and /o/.

Consonants

Shawnee consonants are shown in the chart below.

	Labial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive	p	t	tʃ	k kː	ʔ
Fricative		θ	ʃ		h
Lateral		l
Nasal	m	n
Semivowel	w		j

/k/ and /kk/ contrast in the verbal affixes -ki (which marks third person singular animate objects) and -kki (which marks third person plural animate objects).

The Shawnee /θ/ is most often derived from Proto-Algonquian *s.^[9]^: 16

Some speakers of Shawnee pronounce /ʃ/ more like an alveolar [s]. This pronunciation is especially common among Loyal Band Shawnee speakers near Vinita, Oklahoma.

[ʔ] and [h] are allophones of the same phoneme: [ʔ] occurs in syllable final position, while [h] occurs at the beginning of a syllable.^[3]

Stress

Stress in Shawnee falls on the final syllable (ultima) of a word.

Consonant length^[3]

In Shawnee phonology, consonant length is contrastive. Words may not begin with vowels, and between a morpheme ending with a vowel and one starting with a vowel, a [y] is inserted. Shawnee does not allow word-final consonants and long vowels.

/k/ and /kk/ contrast in the following verbal affixes

ye-

SUB-

kkil

hide

-a

-DIR

-ki

−3S.AO

when (I) hide him

ye-

SUB-

kkil

hide

-a

-DIR

-kki

−3P.AO

when (I) hide them

These affixes (-ki, -kki) are object markers in the transitive animate subordinate mode. The subject is understood.

[h] Insertion^[3]

∅→[h]/#____V

A word may not begin with a vowel. Instead, an on-glide [h] is added. For example:

There are two variants of the article -oci, meaning 'from'. It can attach to nouns to form prepositional phrases, or it can also be a pre-verb. When it attaches to a noun, it is -ooci, and when attached to a pre-verb it is -hoci.

naamin-ooci

Norman-from

from Norman

oklahooma

Oklahoma

niila

1

hoci-lenawe

from-live

I'm from Oklahoma

/y/ Insertion^[3]

∅→[y]/V(:)_____ V(:)

When one of the vowels is long, Shawnee allows for the insertion of [y].

ni-[t]aay-a

I-REDUP-go

'I went (repeatedly)'

Word-final consonant deletion^[3]

C# → 0

A consonant is deleted at the end of a word.

In (a), a noun ends in a consonant when a locative suffix follows, but in (b), the consonant is deleted at word end.

(a)

wiikiw⁵⁵p

house

-ski

-LOC

'in the house'

(b)

wiikiwa

house

ho-

3-

staa

build

-ekw

-INV

-a

-DIR

-li

-3S.OBV

kapenalee

governor

-li

-3S.OBV

'The governor (obviative) built (him)

Word-final vowel shortening^[3]

V:# → V#

A long vowel is shortened at the end of a word.

Morphology

Morpho-phonology^[3]

Rule 1

t/V____V

[t] is inserted between two vowels at morpheme boundary.

As we know from the phonological rule stated above, a word may not begin with a vowel in Shawnee. From the morphophonological rule above, it can be assumed that [h]~[t].

example

-eecini(i) meaning 'Indian agent' appears as hina heecini or 'that Indian agent', and as ho-[t]eecinii-ma-waa-li, meaning 'he was their Indian agent'. The [t] of ho-[t]- fills the open slot that would otherwise have to be filled with [h].

Rule 2

V1-V2-----> V2
A short vowel preceding another short vowel at a morpheme boundary is deleted.

hina

that

+

-ene

-Xtimes

( > hinene)

at that time period, then

melo'kami

spring

-eke

-LOC

( > melo'kameke)

in spring

Rule 3

V:V------> V:

When a long vowel and a short vowel come together at a morpheme boundary, the short vowel is deleted.

ho-

3-

staa

build

-ekw

-INV

-a

-DIR

-li

-3S.OBV

( > ho-staa-koo-li)

he built (him) (a house)

kaa-

REDUP-

ki-

PERF-

noot-en

hear-by.hand

-aa

-TI

-maa

-TA

-ekw

-INV

-a

-DIR

( > kaakinootenaamaakwa)

(he) signed by hand (to me) (repeatedly)

Shawnee shares many grammatical features with other Algonquian languages. There are two third persons, proximate and obviative, and two noun classes (or genders), animate and inanimate. It is primarily agglutinating typologically, and is polysynthetic, resulting in a great deal of information being encoded on the verb. The most common word order is Verb-Subject.

Affixes

stem-(instrumental affix)-transitivizing affix-object affix

The instrumental affix is not obligatory, but if it is present, it determines the type of transitivizing affix that can follow it, (see numbering scheme below) or by the last stem in the theme.

Instrumental affixes are as follows

Instrumental suffix
pw 'by mouth'
n 'by hand'
h(0) 'by heat'
hh 'by mechanical instrument'
l 'by projectile'
(h)t 'by vocal noise'
šk 'by feet in locomotion'
hšk 'by feet as agent'
lhk 'by legs'

Possessive paradigm: animate nouns

Possessor	Singular noun	Plural noun
1s	ni- + ROOT	ni- + ROOT + ki
2s	ki- + ROOT	ki- + ROOT + ki
3s	ho- + ROOT	ho- + ROOT + ki
4s	ho- + ROOT + li	ho- + ROOT + waa + li
1p (excl)	ni- + ROOT + na	ni- + ROOT + naa + ki
2+1 (incl)	ki- + ROOT + na	ki- + ROOT + naa + ki
2p	ki- + ROOT + wa	ki- + ROOT + waa + ki
4p	ho- + ROOT + hi	ho- + ROOT + waa + hi

Possessive paradigm: inanimate nouns

-tθani (w)- 'bed'

Possessor	Singular noun	Plural noun
1s	ni- + tθani	ni- + tθaniw+ali
2s	ki- + tθani	ki- + tθaniw+ali
3s	ho- + tθani	ho- + tθaniw+ali
1p (excl)	ni- + tθane+na	ni- + tθane+na
2+1 (incl)	ki- + tθane+na	ki- + tθane+na
2p	ki- + tθani+wa	ki- + tθani+wa
3p	ho- + tθani+wa	ho- + tθani+wa
Locative	tθan + eki	(unattested)
Diminutive	tθan + ehi

Grammar and syntax^[3]

Word order

Shawnee has a fairly free word order, with VSO being the most common:

teki

NEG

koos

run.from

-i

-IMPER

-ma

-AO

'run you from him' (in the negative) 'you mustn't run away from him'

SOV, SVO, VOS, and OVS are also plausible.

Grammatical categories

Parts of speech in the Algonquian languages, Shawnee included, show a basic division between inflecting forms (nouns, verbs and pronouns), and non-inflecting invariant forms (also known as particles). Directional particles (piyeci meaning 'towards') incorporate into the verb itself. Although particles are invariant in form, they have different distributions and meanings that correspond to adverbs ([hi]noki meaning 'now', waapaki meaning 'today', lakokwe meaning 'so, certainly', mata meaning 'not') postpositions (heta'koθaki wayeeci meaning 'towards the east') and interjections (ce meaning 'so!').

Case

Examples (1) and (2) below show the grammatical interaction of obviation and inverse. The narrative begins in (1) in which grandfather is the grammatical subject [+AGENT] in discourse-focus [+PROXIMATE]. In (2), grandfather remains in discourse-focus [+PROXIMATE], but he is now the grammatical object [+OBJECT]. To align grammatical relations properly in (2), the inverse marker /-ekw-/ is used in the verb stem to signal that the governor is affecting grandfather. (The prefix /ho-/ on ho-stakooli refers to 'grandfather').^[2]

(1)

he-

SUB-

meci-

COMPLETED-

naat-aw'ky

much-land

-aa

-TA

-ci

−3SUB

hina

that

ni-me'soom'

1-grandfather

-θa

-PERSON

'afterwards my grandfather received land'

(2)

wiikiwa

house

ho-

3-

staa

build

-ekw

-INV

-a

-DIR

-li

-3S.OBV

kapenalee

governor

-li

-3S.OBV

'the governor built (him) a house' (/-li/ is the obviative marker)

Since the person building the house (the governor) is disjoint from the person who the house is being built for (the grandfather), this disjunction is marked by placing one participant in the obviative. Since grandfather is the focus in this narrative, the governor is assigned the obviative marking. Grammatically, kapenal-ee (-ee- < -ile- < -ileni- 'person') is the subject who is not in discourse-focus (marked by /-li/ 3s OBVIATIVE), showing that grammatical relations and obviation are independent categories.

Similar interactions of inverse and obviation are found below. In Shawnee, third person animate beings participate in obviation, including grammatically animate nouns that are semantically inanimate.

we

then

ni-

1-

cis

fear

-h

-CAUSE

-ekw

-INV

-a

-DIR-

hina

that

weepikwa

spider

'then that spider scared me'

ho-

3-

waap

look

-am

-TA

-aa

-DIR

-li

-3S.OBV

kisa'θwa

sun

-li

-3S.OBV

'he looked at the sun'

Locative affix /-eki/

The Shawnee /-eki/ meaning 'in' can be used with either gender. This locative affix criticizes onto the preceding noun, and thus it appears to be a case ending.

tekwakhwikan

box

-eki

-in

'in a box'

msi-wikiwaap

big-house

-eki

-in

'in a big house'

tθene

every

melo'kami

spring

-eki

-in

'every spring'

Modality

The independent and imperative orders are used in independent clauses. The imperative order involves an understood second person affecting first or third persons.

teke

NEG

ki-

2-

e'-

FUT-

memekw

run

-i

-IMPER

'you mustn't run'

teki-

NEG

koos

run.from

-i

-IMPER

-ma

-AO

'you mustn't run away from him'

teke-

NEG

wi'θen

eat

-i

-IMPER

kola'-waapaki

early-morning

'you mustn't eat early in the morning'

Independent Mode:
Inanimate Intransitive (II):

3s---> /-i/ ---> skwaaw-i 'it is red'

3p---> /-a/ ---> kinwaaw-a 'those are long'

Demonstrative pronouns

Refer to the examples below. Yaama meaning 'this' in examples 1 and 2 refers to someone in front of the speaker. The repetition of yaama in example 1 emphasizes the location of the referent in the immediate presence of the speaker.

(1)

yaama-

this-

kookwe-

strange-

nee

appearing

-θa

-PERSON

-yaama

-this

'this stranger (the one right in front of me)'

(2)

mata-

not

yaama-

this

ha'-

TIME-

pa-skoolii

go-school

-wi

-AI

ni-oosθe'

1-grandchild

−⁰a

-PERSON

'this grandchild of mine does not go to school'

Refer to the examples below. Hina functions as a third-person singular pronoun.

hina-

3

ha'θepati

racoon

ni-[t]e-si-naa-pe

1-call-thus-IN.OBJ-1p

'we called him (the Indian Agent) racoon'

we

now

ha'θepati

raccoon

-si

name

-θo

-PASSIVE

-hina

3

'then he (the Indian Agent) was named raccoon'

howe-si

good-AI

taakteli

doctor

-hina

3

'he was a good doctor'

Refer to the examples below. Hini fulfills the same functions as above for inanimate nouns. Locational and third-person singular pronominal uses are found in the following examples.

na'θaapi

even

ni-[t]aay-a

1-REDUP-go

hini

that

'I would even go there'

hini-

that

h-i-si-ci-howe

[h]-say-thus-3-now

'(when) he said that (to me)'

Person, number, and gender

Person

The choice of person affix may depend on the relative position of agent and object on the animacy hierarchy. According to Dixon,^[10] the animacy hierarchy extends from first-person pronoun, second-person pronoun, third-person pronoun, proper nouns, human common nouns, animate common nouns, and inanimate common nouns.

The affixes in the verb will reflect whether an animate agent is acting on someone or something lower in the animacy scale, or whether he or she is being acted upon by someone or something lower in the animacy scale.

Number

Shawnee nouns can be singular or plural. Inflectional affixes in the verb stem that cross-reference objects are often omitted if inanimate objects are involved. Even if an inflectional affix for the inanimate object is present, it usually does not distinguish number. For example, in the TI paradigm (animate›inanimate) when there is a second or third person plural subject, object markers are present in the verb stem, but they are number-indifferent. Overt object markers are omitted for most other subjects. In the inverse situation, (animate‹inanimate) the inanimate participants are not cross-referenced morphologically.^[11]

Gender

The basic distinction for gender in Shawnee is between animate actors and inanimate objects. Nouns are in two gender classes, inanimate and animate; the latter includes all persons, animals, spirits, and large trees, and some other objects such as tobacco, maize, apple, raspberry (but not strawberry), calf of^[spelling?] leg (but not thigh), stomach, spittle, feather, bird's tail, horn, kettle, pipe for smoking, snowshoe.^[12]

Grammatical gender in Shawnee is more accurately signaled by the phonology, not the semantics.

Nouns ending in /-a/ are animate, while nouns ending in /-i/ are inanimate.^[13] This phonological criterion is not absolute. Modification by a demonstrative (hina being animate and hini being inanimate, meaning 'that') and pluralization are conclusive tests.

In the singular, Shawnee animate nouns end in /-a/, and the obviative singular morpheme is /-li/.

Shawnee inanimate nouns are usually pluralized with stem +/-ali/.

This causes animate obviative singular and inanimate plural to look alike on the surface.

example

animate obviative singular

wiskilo'θa-li
bird

inanimate plural

niipit-ali
my teeth

Orthography

During the 19th century a short-lived Roman-based alphabet was designed for Shawnee by the missionary Jotham Meeker. It was never widely used.^[9]^: 36 Later, native Shawnee speaker Thomas ‘Wildcat’ Alford devised a highly phonemic and accurate orthography for his 1929 Shawnee translation of the four gospels of the New Testament, but it, too, never attained wide usage.

Vocabulary

English	Shawnee
beard	Kwenaloonaroll
general greeting (in the northeastern dialect)	Hatito
general greeting (in the southern dialect)	Ho
greetings	Bezon (general greeting) Bezon nikanaki (general greeting spoken to a friend) Howisakisiki (daytime greeting) Howisiwapani (morning greeting) Wasekiseki (morning greeting)
how are you?	Hakiwisilaasamamo, Waswasimamo}}
reply to Hakiwisilaasamamo and Waswasimamo	Niwisilasimamo

Notes

^ "maalaakwahi ke'neemepe: Shawnee Language Immersion Program (SLIP)". www.shawnee-nsn.gov. 2023-04-06. Retrieved 2023-07-07.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Cite error: The named reference e18 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l Andrew, Kenneth Ralph. Shawnee Grammar. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses; 1994
^ "Shawnee: A Matter of Funding". We Shall Remain. American Experience (in association with NAPT). 2009-04-13. PBS. Retrieved 2013-04-26.
^ "Shawnee Language Classes". Eastern Shawnee of Oklahoma. Archived from the original on 2016-05-20. Retrieved 2013-04-26.
^ "Shawnee Language Immersion Program of Oklahoma". American Indian Language Development Institute. Retrieved 26 November 2023.
^ "Say it in Shawnee!". Retrieved 2013-04-26.
^ "Learn Shawnee – Learn Shawnee Language". Retrieved 2013-04-26.
^ ^a ^b Mithun, Marianne (2001). The Languages of Native North America. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-29875-9.
^ Dixon 1979:85-6
^ Andrew, Kenneth Ralph. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses; 1994.
^ Bloomfield 1946:449–50; punctuation as in the original
^ Chrisley 1992:9

External links

[1] "maalaakwahi ke'neemepe: Shawnee Language Immersion Program (SLIP)". www.shawnee-nsn.gov. 2023-04-06. Retrieved 2023-07-07.

[e18-2] ^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Cite error: The named reference e18 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

[:0-3] ^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l Andrew, Kenneth Ralph. Shawnee Grammar. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses; 1994

[4] "Shawnee: A Matter of Funding". We Shall Remain. American Experience (in association with NAPT). 2009-04-13. PBS. Retrieved 2013-04-26.

[5] "Shawnee Language Classes". Eastern Shawnee of Oklahoma. Archived from the original on 2016-05-20. Retrieved 2013-04-26.

[6] "Shawnee Language Immersion Program of Oklahoma". American Indian Language Development Institute. Retrieved 26 November 2023.

[7] "Say it in Shawnee!". Retrieved 2013-04-26.

[8] "Learn Shawnee – Learn Shawnee Language". Retrieved 2013-04-26.

[mithun2001-9] Mithun, Marianne (2001). The Languages of Native North America. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-29875-9.

[10] Dixon 1979:85-6

[11] Andrew, Kenneth Ralph. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses; 1994.

[12] Bloomfield 1946:449–50; punctuation as in the original

[13] Chrisley 1992:9

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v t e Languages of Oklahoma
Italics indicate extinct languages * indicates extinct language in Oklahoma but still spoken elsewhere
Indigenous	Alabama* Arapaho Caddo Cayuga Cherokee Cheyenne Chickasaw Chiwere (Iowa and Otoe) Choctaw Comanche Delaware Hitchiti-Mikasuki Kansa Koasati Mescalero-Chiricahua Apache Mesquakie (Fox, Kickapoo, and Sauk) Muscogee Osage Ottawa Pawnee Plains Apache Ponca Potawatomi Quapaw Seneca Shawnee Tonkawa Wichita Wyandot Yuchi
Sign languages	American Sign Language Black American Sign Language Plains Sign Talk
Non-Indigenous	English German Spanish Vietnamese
Category

Status

Language revitalization

Phonology

Vowels

Consonants

Stress

Morphology

Morpho-phonology[3]

Rule 1

Rule 2

Rule 3

Affixes

Possessive paradigm: animate nouns

Possessive paradigm: inanimate nouns

Grammar and syntax[3]

Word order

Grammatical categories

Case

Locative affix /-eki/

Modality

Demonstrative pronouns

Person, number, and gender

Person

Number

Gender

Orthography

Vocabulary

Notes

Further reading

External links

Morpho-phonology^[3]

Grammar and syntax^[3]