| Tuscarora | |
|---|---|
| Skarù·ręʔ | |
| Native to | United States |
| Region | Six Nations of the Grand River First Nation in southernOntario,Tuscarora Reservation in northwesternNew York, and easternNorth Carolina |
| Ethnicity | 17,000Tuscarora people (1997)[1] |
| Extinct | 2 December 2020, with the death of Kenneth Patterson |
| Revival | 2020s[2] |
Iroquoian
| |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | tus |
| Glottolog | tusc1257 |
| ELP | Tuscarora |
 Pre-contact distribution of Tuscarora | |
 Tuscarora is classified as Critically Endangered by theUNESCOAtlas of the World's Languages in Danger | |
| This article containsIPA phonetic symbols. Without properrendering support, you may seequestion marks, boxes, or other symbols instead ofUnicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, seeHelp:IPA. | |
Tuscarora (Tuscarora:Skarù·ręʔ) is theIroquoian language of theTuscarora people, spoken in southernOntario inCanada, as well asNorth Carolina and northwesternNew York aroundNiagara Falls in theUnited States, before becoming dormant in late 2020. The historic homeland of the Tuscarora was in eastern North Carolina, in and around theGoldsboro,Kinston, andSmithfield areas.
The nameTuscarora (/ˌtʌskəˈrɔːrə/TUS-kə-ROHR-ə)[3] means "hemp people," after theIndian hemp (hemp dogbane,Apocynum cannabinum), which they use in many aspects of their society.Skarureh refers to the long shirt worn as part of the men's regalia, and so the name literally means "long shirt people."
Following the death of the last fluentfirst language speaker Howard “Howdy” Hill on July 27, 2018,[4] Tuscarora becamedormant. In the mid-1970s, 50 people spoke it on theTuscarora Reservation (Lewiston, New York) and theSix Nations of the Grand River First Nation (nearBrantford, Ontario). TheTuscarora School in Lewiston has striven to keep Tuscarora alive as aheritage language by teaching children from pre-kindergarten to sixth grade.
The language can appear complex to those unfamiliar with it more in terms of itsgrammar than its sound system. Many ideas can be expressed in a single word. Most words involve several components that must be considered. The language is mostly written using symbols from theRoman alphabet, with some variations, additions, anddiacritics.
Tuscarora is a Northern Iroquoian language. This branch of Iroquois includesMohawk,Oneida,Onondaga,Seneca, andCayuga along with Tuscarora and its historic neighbor,Nottoway.
Wallace Chafe posits that a larger language, reconstructed asProto-Northern-Iroquois, broke off intoProto-Tuscarora-Cayuga, and then broke off onto its own, having no further contact with Cayuga or any of the others.[5]
However, Lounsbury (1961:17) classed Tuscarora, along with Laurentian, Huron-Wyandot, and Cherokee as the "peripheral" Iroquoian languages—in distinction to the five "inner languages" of the Iroquois proper. Blair Rudes, who did extensive scholarship on Tuscarora and wrote a Tuscarora dictionary, concurred with Lounsbury, adding Nottoway and Susquehannock (which Lounsbury ignored in his comparisons) to the list of "peripheral" Iroquoian languages.[6]
Tuscarora has four oral vowels, one nasal vowel, and one diphthong. The vowels can be either short or long, which makes a total of eightoral vowels,/iɛɔuiːɛːɔːuː/, and twonasal vowels,/ə̃ə̃ː/. Nasal vowels are indicated with anogonek, long vowels with either a following colon⟨ : ⟩ or aninterpunct⟨ · ⟩, and stressed vowels are marked with anacute accent⟨ú⟩. The pronunciation of unstressed short vowels varies between dialects, as shown in the following tables:
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i/i/i:/iː/ | u/u/u:/uː/ | |
| Close-mid | ę/ə̃/ę:/ə̃ː/ | ||
| Open-mid | e/ɛ/e:/ɛː/ | a/ɔ/a:/ɔː/ |
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i/ɪ/í/i/i:/iː/ ę/ɪ̃/ | ú/u/u:/uː/ | |
| Close-mid | ę́/ə̃/ę:/ə̃ː/ | u/o/ | |
| Open-mid | e/ɛ/e:/ɛː/ | á/ɔ/a:/ɔː/ | |
| Open | é/æ/ a/a/ |
Thus, in the official Tuscarora writing system, the vowels area e í u ę.[7] The marginal phonemesą ando occur in loanwords.[8]
The Tuscarora language has ten symbols representing consonants, including three stops (/k/,/t/, and/ʔ/), three fricatives (/s/,/θ/, and/h/), a nasal (/n/), a rhotic (/ɾ/), and two glides (/w/ and/j/). These last four can be grouped together under the category of resonants. (Mithun Williams, 1976) The range of sounds, though, is more extensive, with palatalization, aspiration, and other variants of the sounds, that usually come when two sounds are set next to each other.
| Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | n[n] | ||||
| Stop | t[t] | (čt͡ʃ) | k[k] | ′/ʔ[ʔ] | |
| Fricative | θ[θ] | s[s] | h[h] | ||
| Rhotic | r[ɾ] | ||||
| Approximant | y[j] | w[w] |
There may also be the phonemes/b/ (written asp) and/f/ (written asf), although they probably occur only in loan words. The phonemic consonant cluster/sj/ is realized as apostalveolar fricative[ʃ]. The marginal phonemesl andm occur in loanwords.[8]
Tuscarora has three stops:/t/,/k/, and/ʔ/; in their most basic forms:[t],[k], and[ʔ].[kʷ] could be considered separate, although it is very similar to/k/+/w/, and can be counted as a variant phonetic realization of these two sounds. Each sound has specific changes that take place when situated in certain positions. These are among the phonetic (automatic) rules listed below. Since, in certain cases, the sounds[ɡ] and[d] are realized, a more extended list of the stops would be[t],[d],[k],[ɡ], and[ʔ]. In the written system, however, onlyt, k, and ′are used./k/ is aspirated when it directly precedes another/k/.
The language has two or three fricatives:/s/,/θ/, and/h/./s/ and/θ/ are distinguished only in some dialects of Tuscarora.[9] Both are pronounced[s], but in some situations,/s/ is pronounced[ʃ]./h/ is generally[h]. There is an affricate,/ts/.[is this the same as t͡ʃ?]
Resonants are/n/,/ɾ/,/w/,/j/. A rule (below) specifies pre-aspiration under certain circumstances. The resonants can also become voiceless fricatives (as specified below). A voiceless/n/ is described as "a silent movement of the tongue accompanied by an audible escape of breath through the nose."[10] When/ɾ/ becomes a voiceless fricative, it often sounds similar to/s/.
/s/ followed by/j/ or sometimes/i/ often becomes[ʃ].
Used here is a type oflinguistic notation. Aloud, the first bullet point would read, "/s/ becomes[ʃ] when preceded by/t/."
The basic construction of averb consists of
in that order. All verbs contain at least a pronominalprefix and a verb base.
These are the very first prefixes in a verb. Prepronominal prefixes can indicate
In addition, these can mark such distinctions as dualic, contrastive, partitive, and iterative. According toMarianne Mithun Williams, it is possible to find some semantic similarities from the functions of prepronominal prefixes, but not such that each morpheme is completely explained in this way.
As it sounds, pronominal prefixes identifypronouns with regards to the verb, including person, number, and gender. Since allverbs must have at least a subject, the pronominal prefixes identify the subject, and if the verb istransitive, these prefixes also identify the object. For example:
Tuscarora word:rà:weh
Translation: He is talking.
Breakdown: masculine + 'talk' + serial
Therà is the masculine pronominal prefix, indicating that a male person is the subject of the sentence.
On account of various changes in the evolution of the language, not all of the possible combinations of distinctions in person, number, and gender are made, and some pronominal prefixes or combinations thereof can represent several acceptable meanings.
The verb base is, generally, exactly what it sounds like: it is the barest form of the verb. This is a verb stem that consists solely of one verb root.
Verb stems can be made of more than just a verb root. More complex stems are formed by adding modifiers. Roots might be combined with many different kinds ofmorphemes to create complicated stems. Possibilities include reflexive, inchoative, reversive, intensifier, and distributive morphemes, instrumental, causative, or dative case markers, and also incorporated noun stems. The base may be further complicated by ambulative or purposive morphemes.[11]
Aspect suffixes are temporal indicators, and are used with allindicative verbs. "Aspect" is with respect to duration or frequency; "tense" is with respect to the point in time at which the verb's action takes place.[11] Three different aspects can be distinguished, and each distinguished aspect can be furthermore inflected for three different tenses. These are, respectively, punctual, serial, or perfective, and past, future, or indefinite.[11]
Nouns, like verbs, are composed of several parts. These are, in this order:
Nouns can be divided two ways, formally and functionally, and four ways, into formal nouns, other functional nouns, possessive constructions, and attributive suffixes.
The pronominal prefix is very much like that in verbs. It refers to who or what is being identified. The prefixes vary according to the gender, number, and "humanness" of the noun. Genders include:
The prefixes are:
Most stems are simple noun roots that are morphologically unanalyzable. These can be referred to as "simplex stems." More complex stems can be derived from verbs this is commonly done as:
(verb stem) + (nominalizing morpheme).
The process can be repeated multiple times, making more complex stems, but it is rarely the case that it is repeated too many times.
Most nouns end in the morpheme-eh. Some end in-aʔ,-ęʔ, or-ʔ.
In addition to the formal nouns mentioned above, clauses, verbs, and unanalyzable particles can also be classified as nominals. Clausal nominals are such things as sentential subjects and compliments. Verbal nominals usually describe their referents.
Unanalyzable particles arise from three main sources, which overlap somewhat.
Onomatopoeia, from Tuscarora or other languages, is less common than other words from other languages or verbal descriptions that turned to nominals. In many cases, a pronominal prefix has dropped off, so that only the minimal stem remains.
Ownership is divided intoalienable and inalienable possession; each has its own construction. An example of inalienable possession would be someone's body part—this cannot be disputed. An example of alienable possession would be a piece of paper held by someone.
Attributive suffixes come in many forms:
Adiminutive indicates something smaller; an augmentive makes something bigger. A simple example would be a diminutive suffix added to the word "cat" to form a word meaning "small cat." A more abstract example would be the diminutive of "trumpet" forming "pipe." Both diminutives and augmentives have suffixes that indicate both smallness and plurality. A (certain) diminutive can be added to any functional nominal. Augmentives usually combine with other morphemes, forming more specific stems.
Attributive suffixes can be added to any word that functions as a nominal, even if it is a verb or particle.
The basic word order in Tuscarora isSVO (subject–verb–object), but this can vary somewhat and still form grammatical sentences, depending on who the agents and patients are. For example:[12]If two nouns of the same relative "status" are together in a sentence, the SVO word order is followed. Such is the case, for example, in a noun-predicate-noun sentence in which both nouns arethird personzoic (non-human) singular. If one is of a "superior" status, it can be indicated by a pronominal prefix, such ashra, and as such SVO, VSO,and OSV are all grammatically correct. The example given inGrammar Tuscarora is:
wí:rę:n
William
wahrákęʔ
he-saw-it
tsi:r
dog.
wí:rę:n wahrákęʔ tsi:r
William he-saw-it dog.
wahrákęʔ
he-saw-it
wí:rę:n
William
tsi:r
dog.
wahrákęʔ wí:rę:n tsi:r
he-saw-it William dog.
tsi:r
dog
wí:rę:n
William
wahrákęʔ
he-saw-it.
tsi:r wí:rę:n wahrákęʔ
dog William he-saw-it.
In all cases, the translation is "William saw a dog."Mithun writes:"[I]t is necessary but not sufficient to consider the syntacticcase roles of major constituents. In fact, the order of sentence elements is describable in terms offunctional deviation from a syntactically defined basic order." (Emphasis added.)
A sentence that is ambiguous due to containing too many ambiguous arguments is:
tsya:ts
George
wahrá:nę:t
he-fed-it
kę:tsyęh
fish
tsya:ts wahrá:nę:t kę:tsyęh
George he-fed-it fish
This could be translated either as "George fed the fish" or "George fed it fish."
Tuscarora appears to be anominative-accusative language.Tuscarora has acase system in which syntactic case is indicated in the verb. The main verb of the sentence can indicate, for example, "aorist+1st-person+objective+human+'transitive-verb'+punctual+dative." (In this case, a sentence could be a single word long, as below in Noun Incorporation.)Objective anddative are indicated bymorphemes.
Tuscarora definitely incorporates nouns into verbs, as is evident from many examples on this page. This is typical of apolysynthetic language. In Tuscarora, one long verb can be an entire sentence, including subject and object. In fact, theoretically any number of arguments could be incorporated into a verb. It is done by raising nominals realized as noun stems. Datives are not incorporated.
Examples are as follows:[11]
n
+
+
ę
+
+
k
+
+
h
+
+
ey
+
+
aʔ
+
+
tsiʔr
'fire'
+
+
aʔn
'set'
+
ihr
n + ę + k + h + ey + aʔ + tsiʔr + aʔn + ihr
DUC + FUT + 1 + OBJ + HUM + REFL + 'fire' + 'set'
"I'll set my fire on him." or "I'll sting him." Mismatch in the number of words between lines: 17 word(s) in line 1, 15 word(s) in line 2 (help);
waʔ
+
+
k
+
+
h
+
+
e
+
+
taʔnar
'bread'
+
+
a
joiner
+
+
tyáʔt
'buy'
+
+
waʔ + k + h + e + taʔnar + a + tyáʔt + hahθ
AOR + 1 + OBJ + HUM + 'bread' + joiner + 'buy' + DAT-PUNCT
"I bought her some bread."
+
+
ʔn-aʔ-tshár
'door'
+
+
h
'cover'
+
+
ę
yo + ʔn-aʔ-tshár + h + ę
NHUM-OBJ + 'door' + 'cover' + PFV
"The door is closed."
(FromGrammar Tuscarora byMarianne Mithun Williams)
tswé:ʔn
[tʃwæʔṇ]
'hello'
stá:kwi:ʔ
[stɒ´ːkwiːʔ]
'high'
kè:rih
[kjæ´ːrih]
'I think'
ótkwareh
'blood'
otá:ʔnareh
'bread'
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Other | |
