Skerre

Skerre
Pronunciation	[/skɛr/]
Created by	Doug Ball
Date	1994
Language family	Skerre Skerre

Skerre, [skɛr], is a constructed language whose invention began in 1994 and continues to the present. The language has been inspired by many natural languages over its history, but the language presented herein is perhaps most inspired by Philippine languages like Tagalog, Oceanic languages like Tongan and Nêlêmwa, Pacific Northwest Coast languages like Coast Tsimshian, Lushootseed, and Siuslaw, and Caddoan languages like Wichita.

Introduction

The fictitious speakers of Skerre are small in number and live in the forests of the foothills of the western side of the Western Interior range. They are hunter-gatherers. Dialect variation among the different bands is not significant and is largely confined to lexical differences. The language appears to be an isolate, with no known congeners.

Phonology

Orthography

Skerre is written using the roman alphabet. The symbols employed follow expected IPA values, excepting that /kʷ/ is qu, /ɾ/ is r, /j/ is y, and /ɑ/ is a. (Additionally, /t͡s/ is always written without the tiebar.) Long vowels are written as double vowels.

Morphology

Skerre is a mildly synthetic language, though a number of important grammatical categories are expressed through function words. The syntax is strongly head-initial, with heads appearing before all kinds of dependents.

Nouns

Skerre has no grammatical gender and, in fact, nouns have no obligatory inflection. They can be simple, compound, or derived, with a fair number falling in the last category.