Thompson language

The Thompson language, properly known as Nlaka'pamuctsin, also known as the Nlaka'pamux ('Nthlakampx') language, is an Interior Salishan language spoken in the Fraser Canyon, Thompson Canyon, Nicola Country of the Canadian province of British Columbia, and formerly in the North Cascades region of Whatcom and Chelan counties of the state of Washington in the United States. A dialect distinctive to the Nicola Valley is called Scw'exmx, which is the name of the subgroup of the Nlaka'pamux who live there.

Thompson
Nłeʔkepmxcín
Native to	Canada, United States
Region	British Columbia, Washington
Ethnicity	3,105 Nlaka'pamux
Native speakers	130 (2014 FPCC)^[1]
Language family	Salishan Interior Salish Northern Thompson
Writing system	Duployan shorthand (historical)
Language codes
ISO 639-3	thp
Glottolog	thom1243
ELP	Nłeʔkepmxcín (Thompson)
Thompson is classified as Severely Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger

Phonology

Nlaka'pamuctsin is a consonant-heavy language. The consonants can be divided into two subgroups: obstruents, which restrict airflow, and sonorants or resonants, which do not.^[2] The sonorants are often syllabic consonants, which can form syllables on their own without vowels.

Consonants

		Bilabial	Alveolar			Palatal	Velar		Uvular		Pharyngeal		Glottal
			central	sibilant	lateral		plain	lab.	plain	lab.	plain	lab.
Plosive/ Affricate	plain	p	t	ts		tʃ	k	kʷ	q	qʷ			ʔ
	ejective	pʼ	tʼ	tsʼ	tɬʼ		kʼ	kʷʼ	qʼ	qʷʼ
Fricative	plain			s	ɬ	ʃ	x	xʷ	χ	χʷ			h
	voiced			z							ʕ	ʕʷ
	glottalized			ˀz							ˀʕ	ˀʕʷ
Sonorant	plain	m	n		l	j		w
	glottalized	ˀm	ˀn		ˀl	ˀj		ˀw

Vowels

	Front		Central		Back
	nor.	ret.	nor.	ret.
Close	i ~ i̠				u
Mid	e		ə ~ ə̠		o
Open			a

Stress is used with an acute accent; á.^[3][4]

Morphology and syntax

Researchers working in the Generative tradition have speculated that Salishan languages lack lexical categories such as nouns and verbs. Evidence for such an absence of contrast between parts of speech in Nlaka'pamuctsin come from a lack of clear morphological markers (e.g. morphemes) that differentiate nouns and verbs.^[5][6] Instead, generative linguists discuss morphology and syntax in Salishan based on a framework of predicates and particles.^[6] However, more contemporary work suggests a changing understanding of Salishan grammar. Some Salishanists believe that functional categories are not prescriptive of lexical categories. Work in Functional linguistics suggests that other factors beyond morphological evidence code lexical categories in languages. In Salishan, the distinction would be less overt than in some other languages.^[7][8]

Lexical suffixes

One morphological feature of Nlaka'pamuctsin is lexical suffixes.^[6] These are words that add nuance to predicates and can be affixed to the ends of root words to add their general meaning to that word.^[2] Thompson and Thompson assert that as a result of English language influence, speakers are using these more complex predicates less and less in favor of simpler predicates with complements and adjuncts, resulting in “a general decline in the exploitation of the rich synthetic resources of the language.”^[2]

Suffix	Suffix meaning	Root	Root meaning	Suffixed form
꞊uyəm’x^w	earth, land, place; in vicinity; (earth) oven; baked goods	/q’íx̣-t	strong, secure	/q’íx̣꞊ym’x^w	firm, hard ground
		√c’əɬ	cold	/c’ɬ꞊úym’x^w	it is a cold country
		k^w[ʔá]l’	turn green	/k^wa[ʔ]l’꞊úym’x^w	the grass turns green
		√c’áp	ferment	n/c’áp꞊ym’x^w	sour-dough, yeast bread
꞊ekst	hand, arm	√kiyèʔ	ahead, in front, principal, the eldest	s/kiyèʔ꞊qín'꞊kst	thumb
꞊qin	head
꞊xn	foot, leg			s/kiyèʔ꞊qín'꞊xn	big toe
		√k'əm	focal area	n/k'm꞊énk꞊xn	sole of foot
꞊ene(ʔ)k	belly, under side

See also

• Chief Nicola

References

1. Thompson at Ethnologue (21st ed., 2018)  
2. Thompson, Lawrence C.; Thompson, M. Terry (1992). The Thompson Language. University of Montana Press.
3. Koch, Karsten A. (2011). "A Phonetic Study of Intonation and Focus in Nłeʔkepmxcin (Thompson River Salish)". Prosodic Categories: Production, Perception and Comprehension. Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory. pp. 111–143. doi:10.1007/978-94-007-0137-3_6. ISBN 978-94-007-0136-6.
4. "Nłeʔkepmxcin - Nlha7kápmx Thompson". Retrieved 2017-06-15.
5. Campbell, Lyle (1997). American Indian Languages: The Historical Linguistics of Native America. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. p. 117.
6. Mithun, Marianne (1999). The Languages of Native North America. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. p. 64.
7. Haag, Marcia (October 1998). "Word-Level Evidence for Lexical Categories in Salishan Languages". International Journal of American Linguistics. 64 (4): 379–393. doi:10.1086/466367.
8. Koch, Karsten; Matthewson, Lisa (2009). "The Lexical category debate in Salish and its relevance for Tagalog". Theoretical Linguistics. 35 (1): 125–137. doi:10.1515/thli.2009.007.

External links

• Native.Languages.org entry
• Nlekepmxcin keyboard from languagegeek.com
• (archive of SchoolNet page)
• Portions of the Book of Common Prayer in Nlaka'pamux or Thompson