Denaʼina (, ; also Tanaina), is the Athabaskan language of the region surrounding Cook Inlet. It is geographically unique in Alaska as the only Alaska Athabaskan language to include territory which borders salt water. Of the total Denaʼina population of about 900 people, only 75–95 members still speak Denaʼina.
Dialects Four dialects are usually distinguished:
Upper Inlet, spoken in Eklutna, Knik, Susitna, Tyonek Outer Inlet, spoken in Kenai, Kustatan, Seldovia Iliamna, spoken in Pedro Bay, Old Iliamna, Lake Iliamna area Inland, spoken in Nondalton, Lime Village
Documentation James Kari has done extensive work on the language since 1972, including his edition with Alan Boraas of the collected writings of Peter Kalifornsky in 1991. Joan M. Tenenbaum also conducted extensive field research on the language in the 1970s.
Name The word is composed of the , meaning 'person' and the human plural suffix . While the apostrophe which joins the two parts of this word ordinarily indicates a glottal stop, most speakers pronounce this with a diphthong, so that the second syllable of the word rhymes with English 'nine' (as in the older spelling Tanaina).
Geographic distribution Denaʼina is spoken in the region of south-central Alaska surrounding Cook Inlet.
Current status There are about 1,000 Denaʼina people. As of 2007, there are 75–90 speakers, and in 1970 there were only 10 speakers of the Kenai dialect.
Linguist Michael E. Krauss provides three levels of endangerment: safe; endangered, where the language is being learned by children but requires community effort to maintain it; and moribund, where the language is not being learned by children. According to this classification, the Denaʼina is a moribund language.
Revitalization efforts There are various efforts to revitalize the language.
The Denaʼina Archiving, Training and Access grant (DATA) aims to archive and provide access to Denaʼina materials. It also attempts to train community members in technology. Lake Clark National Park maintains a catalog of audio recordings of the language. Some books are being published on Denaʼina language and culture, and there is a yearly Denaʼina festival, followed by a three-week intensive course led by elders. At the Kenai Peninsula College, there is a language class on the Cook Inlet dialect. As of October 2014, there are only 15 students, all young adults, in the class, but this indicates momentum.Neyman, Jenny. (2014). "In a word: Revival — Language class speaks to effort to revitalize Denaʼina". The class's curriculum is formed from the collected grammars published by linguists. University of Alaska Anchorage offers Dena'ina Language classes every fall-Elementary Dena'ina Language I and every spring-Dena'ina Language II.
Contributing factors to the endangerment include the policy of early territorial schools to not let native students speak their own language, especially in regards to the Kenai dialect. This policy was often enforced via corporal punishment; the trauma caused elders, all within one generation, to avoid speaking the language.
Phonology Denaʼina is one of seven Alaska Athabaskan languages which does not distinguish phonemic tone.
Consonants The consonants of Denaʼina in practical orthography, with IPA equivalents.
Labial Dental Palatal Velar Uvular Glottal plain lateral sibilant Nasal Plosive andAffricate plain ( ) aspirated ejective Fricative voiceless ( ) voiced Approximant ( ) (w ⟨w⟩)
Vowels The 4 vowels of Denaʼina. Close vowels are more open in the environment of a uvular consonant.
Front Central Back Close Mid Open
Generally, the vowels i, a, and u are considered 'long' vowels and are fully pronounced in words, however the e is considered a reduced vowel similar to the English schwa.
Syllable structure
In the Inland dialect, syllables at the end of a semantic unit are often longer, lower in pitch, and have longer rhymes. The onset of a syllable has consonant clusters of up to three, such as CCCVC, though these are rare and more commonly, a syllable onset is one or two consonants.
Writing systems Dena'ina uses a variant of the Latin alphabet, though a Dena'ina artist, Argent Kvasnikoff, created a custom alphabet for the language.
Grammar Source: Morphology Denaʼina is a polysynthetic language where a single word can translate to an entire sentence in English. For example:
Verbs are the most complex part of speech in the Denaʼina language. They vary in verb paradigms which in turn vary by subject, object, or aspect.
The following example is of the verb "to be" in the imperfective aspect and in the Nondalton dialect.
+ , the verb "to be"imperfective aspectNondalton dialect Singular Plural 1st person 2nd person 3rd person areal
Grammatical categories
Denaʼina indicates classification with obligatory verb prefixes, and so the root verb appears at the end of the word. The verb will always specify a classification, in addition to often person, gender, or object prefixes that indicate elements of the noun. Number can also be indicated by suffixes on the noun; the singular person suffix on a noun is generally , whereas the plural suffix is generally or . Plurals for non-persons that are animate are indicated by the noun suffixes , , and . Inanimate plurals are unable to be indicated by a noun suffix, and instead attach to the verb.
For examples of person indication on the verb, see the chart under the morphology section above concerning the verb root . Denaʼina specifies between 1st person singular/plural, 2nd person singular/plural, 3rd person singular/plural, and areal.
Verbs fall into many categories that are broadly lumped into "active" and "neuter", where an active verb indicates movement, a state of being incomplete, something being made, or in the production of sound, and a neuter verb indicates a general state of being that is complete. Categories of classification that are affixed to a verb also can refer to certain characteristics of the object of that verb. Depending on the gender affix that follows the classificatory affix, the nature of the object can change, as indicated by the following chart:
Classificatory verbs Gender prefixes 1 Single compact object; ball, trap, hat, sun, beaver lodge egg, song, word berry, bread, roe, coiled rope, head rock, ring, mirror, box, whetstone house, plot of land, situation, weather 2 Elongated object; needle, sled, boat, bow, gun pole, plate, cane, quill, pencil stick dentalium necklace mirror x 3 Enclosed object; knife, full sack, rolled sleeping bag pillow, mattress, lake sack of berries, flour or fish eggs box of rocks q+d ravine, valley 4 Fabric-like object; blanket, net, paper, open sleeping bag, empty sack, skin without hair skin with hair, fur, caribou mat 5 Object in open vessel; sugar, water in container eggs or wood chips in bucket berries or roe in container rocks or coal in bucket x 6 Animate object; person, dog, doll, crucifix x x x x 7 Food; piece of meat, dry fish beaver's food pile roe x x 8 Mushy object; mud, rotted food, wet cloth, butter wet tea leaves fish eggs (not in container) x pile of refuse, area of soft ground 9 Plural objects; traps, boots, dogs eggs, plates, cups, words, tobacco, songs, waves sg. uncoiled rope, pl. coiled ropes, beads, berries, roe, snare rocks, whetstones, boxes houses, objects over area, freight 10 Multiple objects; sand, glacier ice chips of wood berries rocks earth, clouds
However, there are other categories of classification or instrumentation that indicate how an action was done or aspects about the outcome of the action. Many instrumental affixes have become causative over time. Causality is expressed by changing a classifier in the verb to "". Instrumental affixes that indicate the manner or motion of an action include the following: "", which refers to clubbing an object or leaving a depression in the snow; "", which refers to causing an object to leave, disappear, or die; "", which refers to affecting an object with the mouth; ",, and ", which all indicate that the object being referred to was used in an instrumental sense; " ()", which refers to a pointing motion; "", which refers to a wiping motion; and "", which refers to the use of a hand.
Space relations
Postpositions
Denaʼina shows space relations through the addition of morphemes that are either independent or bound, known as postpositions.
Independent postpositions follow a noun. For example, "miłni det" (without water) is composed of the noun "miłni" (water) and the postposition "det" (without). Bound postpositions follow a pronoun or a noun, but are said and written as one word, and are often related to directionals. Sheł ("with me") is composed of the pronoun sh ("me") and the postposition eł ("with"). Object + -ch' (towards the object, in the direction of the object) = "He is walking towards us" Object + -a (object spends time) = "He spent the whole summer day" Be = "him/her" (be + a = ba)
Postpositions can also be incorporated into a verb as a prefix.
Demonstratives
Space relations can also be marked by demonstratives pronouns, which indicate proximal/distal distinction.
– that – that/these things, non-human and distant – this/these things, non-human and close by – there in the distance – that person, human and distant – here, nearby – this person, human and close by – those persons, human and distant – these persons, human and close by
For example: = "those mountains" = "that person calls" = "this woman"
Adverbs
Adverbs of location and direction can also convey space relations.
nes – out from center nes yanił chet = "he shoved the boat out" en – off or away from ye'un = "away from it" ye'un ti'ilgguk = "he went out the door"
Directionals
The directional system in Denaʼina is based upon river flows, and are used with directional prefixes, roots, and suffixes.
Prefixes: ey – unmarked yu – distant du – near Roots: n'e or ni – upstream du or t'e – downstream Suffixes: ∅ – towards -ch' – towards, form -t – at, the place of
For example, yunit means "at a place far upstream", and is composed of the prefix "yu", root "ni", and suffix "t".
Time and tense
Temporal adverbs
Temporal adverbs convey information about when an action or intent of the verb occurred. – always – never – all day – still
For example: = "I worked all day" = "always fog"
Mode Mode indicates when the action happens. Normal mode is also referred to as tense, and is given by mode/aspect prefix positions in the verbs. The tense modes are the imperfect (present), perfect (past) and the future represented by 4 types of imperfectives—, , , —and 4 types of perfectives—, , , . There are also 4 modal variations: neuter, inceptive, optative-intentional, and negative.
Tense
Imperfective mode – action was started and is continuing at the present time imperfective and imperfective – generally means the action in moving toward completion imperfective – associated w/ motion verbs imperfective – generally means the action is static Perfect mode – action was started and completed in the past perfective – most common perfect structure in most aspects perfective – often used with motion verbs when action has reached terminal state perfective – generally means the actions have achieved a stable state perfective – used in transitional themes Future mode – action has yet to happen. Used with a future stem, a "" in the mode position, and a "()" in the inceptive position
Modal variations
Optative-intentional mode – expresses an intent to act Inceptive mode – "beginning to" in the imperfect and perfect modes Imperfect inceptive Perfective inceptive Neuter – applicable to neuter verbs, and "to be" neuter
Aspect