Blackfoot language

The **Blackfoot language**, also called **Siksiká** (its denomination in ISO 639-3, English: /ˈsɪksəkə/ *SIK-sə-kə*; Siksiká [sɪksiká], syllabics ᓱᖽᐧᖿ), often anglicised as ***Siksika***, is an Algonquian language spoken by the Blackfoot or *Niitsitapi* people, who currently live in the northwestern plains of North America. There are four dialects, three of which are spoken in Alberta, Canada, and one of which is spoken in the United States: *Siksiká* (Blackfoot), to the southeast of Calgary, Alberta; *Kainai* (Blood, Many Chiefs), spoken in Alberta between Cardston and Lethbridge; *Aapátohsipikani* (Northern Piegan), to the west of Fort MacLeod which is Brocket (Piikani) and *Aamsskáápipikani* (Southern Piegan), in northwestern Montana. The name *Blackfoot* probably comes from the blackened soles of the leather shoes that the people wore.

There is a distinct difference between Old Blackfoot (also called High Blackfoot), the dialect spoken by many older speakers, and New Blackfoot (also called Modern Blackfoot), the dialect spoken by younger speakers. Among the Algonquian languages, Blackfoot is relatively divergent in phonology and lexicon. The language has a fairly small phoneme inventory, consisting of 11 basic consonants and three basic vowels that have contrastive length counterparts. Blackfoot is a pitch accent language. Blackfoot language has been declining in the number of native speakers and is classified as either a threatened or endangered language.

Like the other Algonquian languages, Blackfoot is considered to be a polysynthetic language due to its large morpheme inventory and word internal complexity. A majority of Blackfoot morphemes have a one–to–one correspondence between form and meaning, a defining feature of agglutinative languages. However, Blackfoot does display some fusional characteristics as there are morphemes that are polysemous. Both noun and verb stems cannot be used bare but must be inflected. Due to its morphological complexity, Blackfoot has a flexible word order.

The Blackfoot language has experienced a substantial decrease in speakers since the 1960s and is classified as "severely endangered" by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger. In Canada, this loss has been attributed largely to residential schools, where Indigenous students were often punished severely for speaking their first languages. Widespread language loss can also be attributed to the Sixties Scoop, through which thousands of Indigenous children were taken from their families, often without parental consent, and relocated by the government into non-Indigenous families. As a result of these losses, the Blackfoot community has launched numerous language revitalization efforts, include the Piikani Traditional Knowledge Services and many more.

## Phonology

### Consonants

Blackfoot has nineteen consonants, of which all but /ʔ/, /x/, /j/ and /w/ form pairs distinguished by length. One of the two affricates /k͡s/ is unusual for being heterorganic.

### Vowels

#### Monophthongs

Blackfoot has a vowel system with three monophthongs, /i o a/.

The short monophthongs exhibit allophonic changes as well. The vowels /a/ and /o/ are raised to [ʌ] and [ʊ] respectively when followed by a long consonant. The vowel /i/ becomes [ɪ] in closed syllables.

#### Diphthongs

There are three additional diphthongs in Blackfoot. The first diphthong *ai* is pronounced [ɛ] before a long consonant, [ei] (or [ai], in the dialect of the Blackfoot Reserve) before /i/ or /ʔ/, and elsewhere is pronounced [æ] in the Blood Reserve dialect or [ei] in the Blackfoot Reserve dialect. The second diphthong *ao* is pronounced [au] before /ʔ/ and [ɔ] elsewhere. The third diphthong *oi* may be pronounced [y] before a long consonant and as [oi] elsewhere.

### Length

Length is contrastive in Blackfoot for both vowels and consonants. Vowel length refers to the duration of a vowel and not a change in quality. The vowel /oo/ is therefore the same sound as /o/ only differing in the length of time over which it is produced.

 *áak**oo**kaawa* |  |  | 'she will sponsor a Sundance'

Consonants can also be lengthened with the exception of /ʔ/, /x/, /j/ and /w/.

 *sokáʼp**ss**iwa* |  |  | 'he is good'

### Pitch accent

Blackfoot is a pitch accent language and it is a contrastive feature in the language. Every word will have at least one high pitched vowel or diphthong but may have more than one. Note that high pitch here is used relative to the contiguous syllables. Blackfoot utterances experience a gradual drop in pitch therefore if an utterance contains a set of accented vowels the first will be higher in pitch than the second but the second will be higher in pitch than the syllables directly surrounding it. Pitch is illustrated in the Latin-based orthography with an acute accent.

 *máátaissikópiiwa* |  |  | 's/he's not resting'

### Phonological rules

Blackfoot is rich with morpho-phonological changes. Below is a limited sample of phonological rules.

#### Semi-vowel loss

Glides are deleted after another consonant, except a glottal stop, or word initially but kept in other conditions.

#### Accent spread

Accent will spread from an accented vowel to the following vowel across morpheme boundaries.

 *atsikí-istsi* | →

#### Vowel devoicing

At the end of a word, non-high pitched vowels are devoiced, regardless of length.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Blackfoot Pronunciation and Spelling Guide. *Native-Languages.org*.
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Frantz 2017, pp. 1–2
3. ↑ Frantz 2017, p. 2
4. ↑ Frantz 2017, p. 155
5. ↑ Frantz 2017, p. 157
6. ↑ Frantz 2017, p. 5