Suwaash
Phonology
The following describes Amisheg (Standard Sowaazh) phonology.
Consonants
Amisheg has a large consonant inventory of 33 consonants:
| Labial | Dental | Retroflex | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m /m/ | n /n̪/ | ny /ɲ/ | ||||
| Stop | tenuis | b /p/ | d /t̪/ | g /k/ | ɂ /ʔ/ | ||
| aspirated | p /pʰ/ | t /t̪ʰ/ | k /kʰ/ | ||||
| ejective | t' /t̪ʼ/ | k' /kʼ/ | |||||
| Affricate | tenuis | j /t̪s̪/ | jh /tʂ/ | jy /tɕ/ | |||
| aspirated | c /t̪s̪ʰ/ | ch /tʂʰ/ | cy /tɕʰ/ | ||||
| ejective | c' /t̪s̪ʼ/ | ch' /tʂʼ/ | cy' /tɕʼ/ | ||||
| Fricative | fortis | s /s̪/ | sh /ʂ/ | sy /ɕ/ | kh /x/ | h /h/ | |
| lenis | z /s̪/ | zh /ʐ/ | zy /ʑ/ | gh /ɣ/ | |||
| Approximant | w /w/ | l /l/ | y /j/ | ||||
/mj pj pʰj lj/ are allowed before vowels.
Notes
All consonants in Amisheg are long, compared to English and other Sowaazh dialects: with plain stops the hold is longer, with aspirated stops the aspiration is longer, and with affricates the frication is longer. The voice onset time of the aspirated and ejective stops is twice as long as that found in most other languages.
Vowels
Amisheg has only 4 vowel qualities, although there is phonemic vowel length and nasality.
| Front | Back | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| short | long | short | long | |
| Close | i, į | ii, įį | u, ų | uu, ųų |
| Open | e, ę | ee, ęę | a, ą | aa, ąą |
Grammar
Suwaazh grammar is inspired by similarities between Sino-Tibetan and Navajo grammar. Like Navajo, Suwaazh is head-final and head-marking, but it is not nearly as polysynthetic.
Verbs
The root
A Suwaazh verb root consists of an obligatory initial, a vowel which may ablaut, and an optional final. Final consonants are restricted to ⟨b d j z~s jh zh~sh jy zy~sy g ɂ h l n⟩; the -n final may not follow a nasal vowel.