Shasta language

The Shasta language is an extinct Shastan language formerly spoken from northern California into southwestern Oregon. It was spoken in a number of dialects, possibly including Okwanuchu. By 1980, only two first language speakers, both elderly, were alive. Today, all ethnic Shasta people speak English as their first language. According to Golla, there were four distinct dialects of Shasta:[1]

Shasta
Native toUnited States
Regionprimarily northern California
EthnicityShasta people
Extinct1978, with the death of Clara Wicks
Hokan ?
Language codes
ISO 639-3sht
Glottologshas1239

Phonology

Consonants
Bilabial Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal
plain affricated
Stop ejective pʼ pʼ tʼ tʼː tsʼ t͡sː t͡ʃʼ t͡ʃː kʼ kʼː
unaspirated p pː t tː ts t͡sː t͡ʃ t͡ʃː k kː ʔ ʔː
Fricative s sː x xː h hː
Nasal m mː n nː
Approximant r j w

The length of a consonant distinguishes meaning in Shasta words. All stops, fricatives and nasals can occur as long or short in Shasta, but approximants /r j w/ only occur as short consonants.[2] Minimal pairs and near minimal pairs are shown below:

  • /t͡ʃákàráx/ a gnat vs. /t͡sàkːírʔ/ a board
  • /ʔátʼùʔ/ nothing vs. /ʔátʼːùʔ/ wild sunflower
  • /ʔìsíkʼːàʔ/ a person vs. /ʔìsːíkʼ/ cold

Vowels

Shasta has four vowels, /i e a u/, with contrastive length, and two tones: high and low.

Front Mid Back
Short Long Short Long Short Long
Close i iː u uː
Mid e eː
Open a aː

Orthography

Silver (1966) devised a system to write words in Shasta. Long phonemes are represented with the symbol ⟨ˑ⟩ following the character (e.g. ⟨cˑ⟩ and ⟨eˑ⟩ for/ t͡sː/ and /eː/, respectively); ejectives are indicated by an apostrophe written over the character (e.g. ⟨p̓⟩ for /pʼ/). The phoneme /j/ is represented by ⟨y⟩, and the glottal stop /ʔ/ is represented by the superscript IPA symbol ⟨ˀ⟩. The letters ⟨b d f g j l q v z⟩ are not used to represent Shasta sounds.

A a Aˑ aˑ C c Cˑ cˑ C̓ c̓ C̓ˑ c̓ˑ Č č Čˑ čˑ Č̓ č̓ Č̓ˑ č̓ˑ E e Eˑ eˑ H h Hˑ hˑ I i Iˑ iˑ K k Kˑ kˑ K̓ k̓ K̓ˑ k̓ˑ M m Mˑ mˑ
N n Nˑ nˑ P p Pˑ pˑ P̓ p̓ P̓ˑ p̓ˑ R r S s Sˑ sˑ T t Tˑ tˑ T̓ t̓ T̓ˑ t̓ˑ U u Uˑ uˑ W w X x Xˑ xˑ Y y ˀ ˀˑ

Tones

Shasta vowels can have low or high tones. High tones are marked by an acute accent ⟨′⟩ in the orthography devised by Silver (1966), whereas low tones are left unmarked. Examples for the vowel /u/ are given below:

IPA Orthography
/ú/ ú
/úː/ úˑ
/ù/ u
/ùː/ uˑ

References
  1. Golla, Victor (2011). California Indian languages. University of California Press. pp. 90–91. ISBN 9780520266674. OCLC 767533019.
  2. Silver, Shirley (1966). The Shasta Language (Ph.D. thesis). University of California. pp. 37–38.

    Bibliography
    • Golla, Victor (2011), California Indian languages, Berkeley: University of California Press
    • Mithun, Marianne (1999), The Languages of Native North America, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
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