Last Updated: 2020-06-26
COMPROMISED: graphemes normally representing voiced stops and /z/ are not present in the orthography - ambiguity when voiceless stops and /s/ transcribe to voiced counterparts (underlying vs. surface level)
Background
Language Family: Carib / Northern / East-West Guiana / Macushi-Kapon / Kapon
- Akawaio is spoken in Guyana.
Phonology
- Although voiced consonants are said to be originally conditioned (voiceless to voiced) intervocalically or between vowels and nasals, they are considered phonemes of the language (Gildea 2012, 450; Edwards 1978, 78).
Consonants
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Place of Articulation
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Manner of Articulation
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Labial
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Alveolar
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Palatal
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Velar
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Stops
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p b
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t d
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k ɡ
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Fricatives
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s z
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Nasals
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m
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n
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Flaps
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ɾ
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Approximants
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w
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j
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Note: For phonemes that share a cell, those on the left are voiceless and those on the right are voiced.
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Vowels
- Instead of using /ʌ/ to represent the mid-central unrounded vowel as in Edwards (1978), I have opted for /ɘ/ (p. 77). /ə/ is not a suitable option given that all underlying vowels in Akawaio occur in stressed syllables.
- Diphthongs are present in Akawaio; however, because they are often interpreted as being separated by off-glides, or part of separate syllables, I have chosen not to include them below (ibid).
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Front
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Central
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Back
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High
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i
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ɨ
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u
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Mid
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e
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ɘ
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o
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Low
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a
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Alphabet
- Apostrophes indicate glottal stops (Stegeman and Hunter 2014); however, the glottal stop is not phonemic (see Lenition Rules below). It will be transcribed to /k/.
- The orthography doesn’t represent the voiced stops (Stegeman and Hunter 2014, 2), and it is unclear when the voiceless stops should transcribe to the voiced stops (i.e. there is too much ambiguity around whether the resulting (voiced consonant) transcription is underlying or a surface representation - see Lenition Rules below), thus the language is compromised. I have chosen to transcribe ⟨p⟩, ⟨t⟩, ⟨k⟩, and ⟨s⟩ to their voiceless variants by default given their originating status in the language, but this means that /b/, /d/, /ɡ/, and /z/ are not represented by the rules.
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Grapheme
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Phoneme
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a
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/a/
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e
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/e/
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i
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/i/
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ɨ
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/ɨ/
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k
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/k/
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m
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/m/
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n
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/n/
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o
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/o/
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p
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/p/
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r
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/ɾ/
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s
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/s/
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t
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/t/
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u
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/u/
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ʉ
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/ɘ/
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w
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/w/
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y
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/j/
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’
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/k/
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Lenition Rules
- /k/ debuccalizes to [ʔ] syllable-finally (Edwards 1978, 79).
- Voiceless stops and /s/ become voiced intervocalically (Edwards 1978, 81).
- Voiced stops optionally spirantize (Gildea 2012, 450).
- Unstressed vowels are often deleted, especially word-initially (Edwards 1978, 82).
Misc. Rules
- /n/ is realized as [ŋ] word-finally and syllable finally, preceding velar consonants and /w/ (Edwards 1978, 79).
- /k/ becomes palatalized or labialized when preceding /i/ or /u/, respectively (ibid.).
- /s/ and /z/ are realized as [tʃ] and [dʒ], respectively, preceding /i/ (ibid.).
References
Edwards, Walter F. 1978. “Some Synchronic and Diachronic Aspects of Akawaio Phonology.” Anthropological Linguistics 20 (2). Bloomington: 77–84.
Stegeman, Ray, and Rita Hunter. 2014. Akawaio-English Dictionary. SIL International.