Kiowa phonology

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Main article: Kiowa language

The most thorough treatment of the Kiowa sound system is by Laurel Watkins in a generative framework. A consideration of prosodic phenomena with acoustic analysis is in Sivertsen (1956). Earlier discussions of phonemics are Trager (1960), Merrifield (1959), Wonderly et al. (1954), and Harrington (1928).

1 Segments
- 1.1 Consonants
  - 1.1.1 Alternations
- 1.2 Vowels
2 Prosody
3 Notes
4 See also
5 Bibliography
6 External links

[edit] Segments

[edit] Consonants

The 23 consonants of Kiowa:

		Bilabial	Dental	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive and affricate	voiced	b	d			ɡ
	voiceless	p	t	ts		k	ʔ
	aspirated	pʰ	tʰ			kʰ
	ejective	p’	t’	ts’		k’
Fricative	voiceless			s			h
Fricative	voiced			z
Nasal		m	n
Approximant		(w)	l		j

The labio-velar glide [w] is only found in Comanche loanwords or in some interjections like [wéː] (an expression used to welcome travelers).^[1] A phonetic [w] offglide also occurs after the mid back vowel /o/.
The voiced stops /b, d, g/ vary between voiced and voiceless realizations: [b~p, d~t, g~k], although in careful speech (such as in citation forms) they are consistently voiced.
Voiceless /p, t/ when followed by another consonant (and, thus, also syllable-final) are typically reduced to a glottal stop [ʔ]. In careful speech, the bilabial and dental articulations are preserved. Example: bajf'ā́'u /batpɔ́ː/ "to eat (imperfective, 2nd person singular)" is [baʔpɔ́ː] in casual speech.
Ejectives /p’, t’, ts’, k’/ are strongly articulated.^[2]
Glottal stops.
- The glottal stop /ʔ/ is typically deleted in normal speech. However, in carefully articulated citation forms, the glottal stop is retained. For example, the word váuā́u /p’ɔ̃́ʔɔ̃́ː/ "wash" is usually pronounced [p’ɔ̃́ː] in connected speech.^[3]
- Phonetic glottal stops are also automatically inserted after morpheme-final short vowels before concatenation.
- Other phonetic glottal stops are allophones of syllable-final oral stops /p, t/ (see above)^[4] or a phonation effect of the falling tone.
When alveolar /s/ occurs before a palatal approximant [j], it assimilates to a post-alveolar articulation [ʃ]. Example: syân /siân/ "to be small (plural)" is phonetically [ʃɛ̃̂n].^[5]
The dental sonorants /n, l/ are palatalized [nʲ, lʲ] before the high front vowel /i/: bṓn'ī̂ /bṍːnîː/ "to see (imperfective hearsay)" as [bṍːwnʲĩ̂ː], tàl'ī́ /tʰàlíː/ "boy" as [tʰàlʲíː].
Lateral /l/ is slightly affricated at the end of syllables as [^dl]. At the end of utterances, the affricate is partially devoiced. Examples: gúld'ā̀'u /gúldɔ̀ː/ "to be red" as [gú^dldɔ̀ː], sál /sál/ "to be hot" as [sá^d̥l].
The nasality of the vowels spreads onto following offglides: káui /kʰɔ̃́j/ "bark, rind" is [kʰɔ̃́j̃].

[edit] Alternations

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[edit] Vowels

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Kiowa has six contrasting vowel qualities with three heights and a front-back distinction. Additionally, there is an oral-nasal contrast on all six vowels. For example, nasality is the only difference between ā́'u /ʔɔ́ː/ "to gamble" and ā́'u /ʔɔ̃́ː/ "to give".

Oral vowels
	Front	Back
High	i	u
Mid	e	o
Low	a	ɔ

Nasal vowels
	Front	Back
High	ĩ	ũ
Mid	ẽ	õ
Low	ã	ɔ̃

The oral-nasal contrast, however, is neutralized in the environment of nasal consonants, where only nasalized vowels occur. Watkins phonemicizes an oral vowel in these contexts: m'ā́ /máː/ "up" is phonetically [mã́ː], máun /mɔ́n/ "probably" is phonetically [mɔ̃́n].

Kiowa vowels have an underlying two-way length contrast (short vs. long). However, a number of phonological issues restrict the length contrast. (See the vowel length section for details.)

The high vowels /i, u/ are lowered to [ɪ, ʊ] when they occur before nasal consonants /m, n/: bímkàui /bímkʰɔ̀j/ "bag" is phonetically [bɪ̃́mkʰɔ̀j], gún /gún/ "to dance (perfective)" is phonetically [gʊ̃́n].
Long mid vowels /eː, oː/ are followed by homorganic offglides: hḗbà /héːbà/ "to enter" as [héːjbà], jṓcà /tóːkià/ "at the house" as [tóːwkjæ̀]. The offglides are considered sub-phonemic as they are predictable.
Low /ɔ/ is only slightly rounded — its position varying between lower-mid to low [ɔ~ɒ]. When it is short and in open syllables, it is centralized approaching central [ɞ]: dàufôm /dɔ̀pôm/ [dɞ̀pôm] "despicable".

The /a/ of the diphthong /ia/ is fronted and raised when long as [æː] and is raised further when it precedes a nasal consonant: q'ā́'h'ī́ /k’iã́ːhĩ́ː/ "man" → [k’jæ̃́ːhĩ́ː], qám /k’iám/ "to be lazy" → [k’jɛ̃́m].

[edit] Prosody

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[edit] Vowel length

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Vowel length is only contrastive in open syllables.

Closed syllables only have phonetic short vowels. Underlying long vowels are shortened in this position (note morphophonemic alternations).

Initial syllable shortening.

[edit] Tone

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Kiowa has three tones: high, low, falling. The falling tone has glottalized realizations (creaky voice, tense voice, with glottal stop) in some contexts.

There are a number of tone sandhi effects.

[edit] Syllable and phonotactics

Surface syllables in Kiowa must consist of a vowel nucleus. Syllable onsets are optional and can consist of single consonant or a consonant followed by a palatal glide [j]. A single vowel may be followed by an optional syllable coda consonant or the vowel may optionally be long. Thus, the following syllables are found in Kiowa: V, CV, CjV, VC, CVC, CjVC, Vː, CVː, CjVː. This can be succinctly represented as the syllable equation below.

$\left ( C \right ) \left ( j \right ) V \left ( \begin{Bmatrix} C \\ : \end{Bmatrix} \right ) + Tone$

A number of phonotactic restrictions are found limiting the possible combinations of sounds. These are discussed below.

Onset. All consonants can occurs as a single consonant onset except /l/ — in other words, /p, pʰ, p’, b, t, tʰ, t’, d, ts, ts’, k, kʰ, k’, ɡ, ʔ, s, z, h, m, n, j/ are possible.

Nucleus. The syllable nucleus can be any vowel, which can be either short or long.

Coda. The coda position may be filled only by /p, t, m, n, l, j/. Palatal /j/ only follows the vowels /u, o, ɔ, a/ (i.e. the palatal may not occur after non-low front vowels).^[6]

[edit] Stress

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[edit] Notes

^ The sounds that restricted to interjections are usually considered marginal. Compare the use of a voiceless bilabial fricative [ɸ] in whew! or a voiceless velar fricative [x] in ugh! in American English.
^ This is in contrast to the ejectives in the distantly related Taos, which are weakly articulated.
^ Watkins notes the stress may affect the retention of the glottal stop although stress and its affect require further research.
^ Note that /p, t/ are the only oral stops that occur in syllable-final position. (See the syllable section.)
^ The palatal glide [j] is a realization of the underlying diphthong /ia/. Thus, the form /siân/ → [sjân] → [ʃân] → [ʃɛ̃̂n].
^ A phonetic palatal glide does follow mid-front /e/, but this is not considered phonemic and parallels the similar [w] off-glide following mid-back /o/.

[edit] See also

Kiowa language

[edit] Bibliography

Harrington, John P. (1928). Vocabulary of the Kiowa language. Bureau of American Ethnology bulletin (No. 84). Washington, D.C.: U.S. Govt. Print. Off.
Merrifield, William R. (1959). The Kiowa verb prefix. International Journal of American Linguistics, 25, 168-176.
Sivertsen, Eva. (1956). Pitch problems in Kiowa. International Journal of American Linguistics, 22, 117-30.
Trager, Edith C. (1960). The Kiowa language: A grammatical study. University of Pennsylvania. (Doctoral dissertation, University of Pennsylvania).
Watkins, Laurel J.; & McKenzie, Parker. (1984). A grammar of Kiowa. Studies in the anthropology of North American Indians. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 0-8032-4727-3.
Wonderly, William; Gibson, Lornia; & Kirk, Paul. (1954). Number in Kiowa: Nouns, demonstratives, and adjectives. International Journal of American Linguistics, 20, 1-7.