Thompson language

Interior Salishan language From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Thompson (endonym: nɬeʔkepmxcín)^[2]^[3] – also known as Nlaka'pamuctsin,^[4] Nlaka'pamux,^[5] or Nthlakampx^[6] – is an Interior Salishan language spoken by the Nlaka'pamux people (also known as the Thompson people). It is spoken in the Fraser Canyon, Thompson Canyon, and Nicola Country of the Canadian province of British Columbia and was formerly spoken in the North Cascades region of Whatcom and Chelan counties of Washington State 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.

NativetoCanada, United States

RegionBritish Columbia, Washington

Ethnicity3,105 Nlaka'pamux

Native speakers

105 (2022 FPCC)^[1]

Quick facts Native to, Region ...

Thompson
Thompson River Salish
nɬeʔkepmxcín
Native to	Canada, United States
Region	British Columbia, Washington
Ethnicity	3,105 Nlaka'pamux
Native speakers	105 (2022 FPCC)^[1]
Language family	Salishan Interior Salish Northern Thompson
Writing system	Duployan shorthand (historical) Latin (current)
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

Thompson is a consonant-heavy language. The consonants can be divided into two subgroups: obstruents, which restrict airflow, and sonorants or resonants, which do not.^[7] The sonorants are often syllabic consonants, which can form syllables on their own without vowels.

Consonants

More information Bilabial, Alveolar ...

		Bilabial	Alveolar			Palatal	Velar		Uvular		Pharyngeal		Glottal
		Bilabial	median	sibilant	lateral	Palatal	plain	lab.	plain	lab.	plain	lab.	Glottal
Plosive/ Affricate	plain	p	t	ts		tʃ	k	kʷ	q	qʷ			ʔ
Plosive/ Affricate	ejective	pʼ	tʼ	tsʼ	tɬʼ		kʼ	kʷʼ	qʼ	qʷʼ			ʔ
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
Sonorant	glottalized	ˀm	ˀn		ˀl	ˀj		ˀw

Vowels

More information Front, Central ...

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

Stress is used with an acute accent; á.^[8]^[9]

Writing systems

nɬeʔképmxcin consonant chart
p̓	(t̓)	ƛ̓	c̓	c̓	k̓	k̓ʷ	q̓	q̓ʷ	ʔ
p	t	ɬ	c̣	c	k	kʷ	q	qʷ	ʔ
		ɬ	ṣ	s	x	xʷ	x̣	x̣ʷ	h
m	n	l	z	y	ɣ	w	ʕ	ʕʷ
m̓	n̓	l̓	z̓	y̓	ɣ̓	w̓	ʕ̓	ʕ̓ʷ

One of the writing systems used for Thompson uses the North American Phonetic Alphabet (NAPA) writing system.^[3]

The above consonant chart is based on the one found in "The Thompson Language" by Laurence C. Thompson & M. Terry Thompson.^[3]

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 Thompson come from a lack of clear morphological markers (e.g., morphemes) that differentiate nouns and verbs.^[10]^[11] Instead, generative linguists discuss morphology and syntax in Salishan based on a framework of predicates and particles.^[11] 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.^[12]^[13]

Lexical suffixes

One morphological feature of Thompson is lexical suffixes.^[11] 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.^[7] 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.”^[7]

More information Suffix, Suffix meaning ...

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				thumb
꞊xn	foot, leg			s/kiyèʔ꞊qín'꞊xn	big toe
꞊xn	foot, leg	√k'əm	focal area	n/k'm꞊énk꞊xn	sole of foot
꞊ene(ʔ)k	belly, under side	√k'əm	focal area	n/k'm꞊énk꞊xn

References

[1]
Thompson at Ethnologue (21st ed., 2018)
[2]
Thompson & Thompson 1996, p. 147
[3]
Egesdal, Steven M.; Thompson, M. Terry; Jimmie, Mandy N. (2011). nɬeʔkèpmxcín: Thompson River Salish speech. Whatcom museum publications. Bellingham, WA: Whatcom Museum. ISBN 978-1-879763-22-7.
[4]
McHalsie, Albert Jules; Schaepe, David M.; Lutz, John Sutton; Carlson, Keith Thor, eds. (2018). Towards a new ethnohistory: community-engaged scholarship among the People of the River. Winnipeg, Manitoba: University of Manitoba Press. ISBN 978-0-88755-549-7.
[5]
Walkem, Brenda Shirley (2023). Investigating protein sources that the land and water provide to the Nlaka'pamux People. Master's Thesis (Thesis). University of British Columbia. doi:10.14288/1.0431110.
[6]
Best, Catherine T.; Goldstein, Louis M.; Nam, Hosung; Tyler, Michael D. (2016). "Articulating What Infants Attune to in Native Speech". Ecological Psychology. 28 (4): 216–261. doi:10.1080/10407413.2016.1230372. ISSN 1040-7413. PMC 5351798. PMID 28367052.
[7]
Thompson, Laurence C.; Thompson, M. Terry (1992). The Thompson Language. University of Montana Press.
[8]
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.
[9]
"Nłeʔkepmxcin - Nlha7kápmx Thompson". Retrieved 2017-06-15.
[10]
Campbell, Lyle (1997). American Indian Languages: The Historical Linguistics of Native America. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. p. 117.
[11]
Mithun, Marianne (1999). The Languages of Native North America. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. p. 64.
[12]
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.
[13]
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.

Sources

Thompson, Laurence C.; Thompson, M. Terry (1996). Thompson River Salish Dictionary: nɬeʔkepmxcín. University of Montana Occasional Papers in Linguistics. doi:10.14288/1.0423560.