Abenaki is the cover term for a complex of dialects of one of the Eastern Algonquian languages, originally spoken in what is now Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. Modern Western Abenaki is currently spoken by a very small handful of elders in Odanak, Quebec. Eastern Abenaki was until quite recently spoken by elders of the Penobscot tribe in eastern Maine. Other dialects of Eastern Abenaki, such as Caniba and Aroosagunticook, now extinct, are documented in French-language materials from the colonial period.

Western and Eastern Abenaki share many similarities but are also different in striking ways, not only in vocabulary but also phonology.

Phonology

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The Abenaki Alphabet consists of 21 letters representing 19 phonemes (B and D are redundant): Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Nn Oo 8 Pp Ss Tt Uu Ww Zz

Vowels

Abenaki has 5 simple vowel phonemes and two phonemes for semivowels, one of which has two very distinct allophones.

IPA	Description	Transliteration
monophthongs and dipthongs
	Near-open front unrounded vowel
	Open-mid front unrounded vowel
	Close front unrounded vowel or Near-close near-front unrounded vowel
	nasalized o
	Open-mid back rounded vowel
semivowelss
	Palatal approximant + Close back rounded vowel
	diphthong of e or y + o	allophone of next to a consonant
	diphthong of o + w

/i/ is instantiated as /e/ at the end of a word and /i/ in the middle of a word.

Consonants

B is used interchangeably with P, and D is usually used likewise with T.

	bilabial	alveolar	post- alveolar	velar	glottal
plosive
nasal
fricative
affricate
lateral approximant

J is pronounced as /dz/, C is always Ch and pronounced as /ts/. In some cases D may represent a "soft" version of /t/.

Grammar

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Nouns

Nouns have two classes: animate or inanimate, and two numbers: single and plural.

Pronouns

Personal Pronouns

=

• nia - I
• gia - thou

=Demonstratives

• yo - this
• ni - that

Interrogatives

• awani - who
• gagwi - what

Verbs

Regular verbs are inflected for person and always end in a vowel.

Infinitive

The suffix -mek indicates an infinitive.

Present Tense

To inflect for first or second person in the present tense, the verb stem is prefixed with a N' in front of a consonant or a Nd' preceding a vowel.

The third person simply uses the verb stem unless the verb stem ends with an "i" or an "8" in which case the concluding vowel becomes an "o" or an "a" respectively.

Commands are formed by the you/I form of the present tense.

Morphology

References

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http://www.cowasuck.org/language.cfm

http://www.native-languages.org/abenaki.htm

http://www.answers.com/abenaki&r=67

Endangered languages | Indigenous languages of the Americas stubs