Sounds
In this article, the phonology of the Northern dialect is described, which differs somewhat from that of the Southern dialect spoken in Kansas.
There are five vowel phonemes (plus four diphthongs) and nineteen consonant phonemes.
<é>, which is often written as
The obstruents, as in many Algonquian languages, do not have a voicing distinction per se, but rather what is better termed a "strong"/"weak" distinction. "Strong" consonants, written as voiceless (
), are always voiceless, are often aspirated, and are longer in duration than the "weak" consonants, which are written as voiced () and are often voiced and are never aspirated. Nasals before another consonant become syllabic. /t/, /d/, and /n/ are dental: .
Read more about this topic: Potawatomi Language
Famous quotes containing the word sounds:
“Johann Strauss—Forty couples dancing ... one by one they slip from the hall ... sounds of kisses ... the lights go out”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)
“She sang a song that sounds like life; I mean it was sad. Délira knew no other types of songs. She didn’t sing loud, and the song had no words. It was sung with closed lips and it stayed down in one’s throat.... Life is what taught them, these Negresses, to sing as if they were choking back sobs. It is a song that always ends with a beginning anew because this song is the picture of misery, and tell me, does misery ever end?”
—Jacques Roumain (1907–1945)
“While we were thus engaged in the twilight, we heard faintly, from far down the stream, what sounded like two strokes of a woodchopper’s axe, echoing dully through the grim solitude.... When we told Joe of this, he exclaimed, “By George, I’ll bet that was a moose! They make a noise like that.” These sounds affected us strangely, and by their very resemblance to a familiar one, where they probably had so different an origin, enhanced the impression of solitude and wildness.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)