Talk:Mohawk language

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[edit] 1

It seems interesting that Mohawk, like many other North American languages, is very poor in labials. The Athabaskan languages are generally labial-poor (see, for instance, the Navajo phonemic inventory), as are Wichita and Tlingit. Are there any theories as to why this may be? thefamouseccles 10-05-2003 0813 GMT

I wouldn't take that theory too far -- Algonquian, Siouan and Muskogean have plenty of labials.

Is it possible that the graph nh refers to nasalization of a preceding vowel, and then /h/? QuartierLatin1968 06:08, 19 Oct 2004 (UTC)

No, the h doesn't change the preceding letter at all, but the h will change depending on whether the next letter is a vowel or consonant. I'm taking a Mohawk course and I'll add some information in the future. --Chlämens 20:43, 25 November 2005 (UTC)
The n in nh can very well refer to nasalization. In a word like kénhak (let it be), the n goes with the preceding vowel [gʌ̃hak]. In the word kenhó:tons (I close the door), the n is consonantal [gɛnhodũs]. This is a source of (rare) ambiguity in the orthography. Some people write h before an ambiguous consonantal n, as in kehnhó:tons. However, this additional h is not pronounced by all speakers. David Kanatawakhon Maracle, in his dictionary, underlines consonantal ns after e or o and before another consonant: keṉhotons. Languagegeek 21:40, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] “Mohawk” in Mohawk

If it does not have bilabials, what is the language called in Mohawk? I guess it's somewhere within onkwehonwehneha which appears in the list of phrases. Wikipeditor 10:57, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

It's Kanien'keha:ka ([ganjə̃ʔgeha:ga] in IPA) which is also the name for the Mohawk tribe. The word Mohawk as far as I know is an Algonquin insult which was picked up by the Dutch. --Chlämens 10:59, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
The langauge is Kanien’kéha [ganjʌ̃ʔg'ɛha], the -á:ka ending specifically indicates “the people”. Languagegeek 16:14, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
On the etymology of the English word Mohawk, there is a pun (in Abnaki at least) between Magoak (they are cowards), and Magwak (Iroquois people). I’m not sure that one could say that the term Magwak derives from Magoak though. Languagegeek 21:47, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
The Online Etymology Dictionary says "The tribe name Mohawk (1638) is said to mean "they eat living things" in Algonquian, probably a ref. to cannibalism." In Ojibwe (not the language the word would have been borrowed from, I don't think, but rather a related Algonquian language), the verb for "eat something animate" is amo. The suffix for *intransitive* third person plural actors ("they...") is -wag, so if amo were an intransitive verb, "they eat [animate things]" would be amowag. But...it's not intransitive, it's transitive, so I'm not sure what to make of that. Maybe the Algonquian language "Mohawk" was supposedly borrowed from behaves differently? --Miskwito 18:36, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Thank you all. I've added “Kanien’kéha” to the template. If you can settle on how to transcribe it using IPA, perhaps that (or an audio file, or both) would be nice to have in the article – only if it's no work for you, of course. Wikipeditor 21:04, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

ADDENDUM: In Lyle Campbell's American Indian Languages: The Historical Linguistics of Native America (1997, Oxford University Press), he says of the name, "'Mohawk' is an Algonquian name; of the various spellings that appeared in earlier sources, Roger Williams's <Mohowawogs'> was etymologically the most correct--with English -s 'plural' added to a Narragansett or Massachusett word for 'people-eaters' (compare the Unami Delaware cognate mhuwé·yɔk) (Goddard 1978:478)". This is on page 401. So...there you have it, I guess. --Miskwito 22:17, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

The IPA for Kanien’kéha is [ganjʌ̃ʔg'ɛha] or [ganjʌ̃ʔg'eha], the e vowel lies in between IPA [e] and [ɛ], to my ears it’s closer to the latter in this context. The en vowel is quite far back, so the [ʌ̃] is appropriate. Many speakers pronounce a as [ɑ]. I’d vote for [ganjʌ̃ʔg'ɛha] Languagegeek 09:27, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] No labials?

In one of my Mohawk books, <wh> is described as "wh is a soft f by letting breath through the lips", an example given is sentawha (peach). I have a sound sample of that word (though I don't remember where I found it), and it sounds like a voiceless bilabial fricative [ɸ], which was what I had suspected. When going over some of the more detailed pronounciation guides it does seem that Mohawk has a quite extensive consonant inventory in general. In addition to the voiced allophones, there seems to be an aspirated, palatalized, and a labialized set. The nasal also seems to occur palatalized or even palatal, and the "w" occurs devoiced. Am I fantasizing here or can someone confirm this? --Chlämens 00:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, there is lots of interesting phonology in the Mohawk language. Mohawk is written in a phonemic orthography, compared with Cayuga, where one can see the letters <g>~<k>, <d>~<t>, and <f>. In Mohawk, <wh> (in my experience) is pronounced [f]. <w> is pronounced [w̥] (voiceless) word finally. This shouldn’t strike one as unusual—sounds tend to become devoiced before [h] and word finally across languages. As for aspirated, palatalized, and labialized consonants: these are consequences of two phonemes occurring side by side. The /kh/ in <khá:le’> (again) is not a single aspirated phoneme, it is /k/ followed by /h/. This is a cluster /kh/, not an aspirate /kʰ/. Same goes for <ny> in <kanonhtónnyon> (I’m thinking). This is a combination of /n/ + /j/, not a single phoneme [ɲ]. There is some support for considering <kw> a single phoneme /kʷ/; /w/ does not appear after any other same-syllable consonant cluster apart from /k/, thus */sw/ and */tw/ are not permitted. Some interesting things happen to some sounds when followed by /j/; these vary according to dialect. In Eastern dialects, /t/ and /k/ > [dʒ] before /j/. In Central dialects, /t/ and /k/ > [k] before /j/, and /ts/ > [dʒ] before /j/. However, [dʒ] isn’t a phoneme as such, but a product of phonological rules which differ dialectically. If you're looking for labial allophones, <akáonha> (she) is often pronounced [agamha]. Languagegeek 14:41, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Consonant Table

Are the consonants in the "Dental" column really dental and not alveolar? If so, the dental diacritic should be added to all of them. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Limetom (talk • contribs) 00:06, 6 February 2008 (UTC)