Language Page

Please download a Languagegeek.com font to view these pages properly.

Tlingit Keyboards are available here

Text Example

The Tlingit language is spoken along the Alaska panhandle. There is a major dialect of the language, Interior Tlingit, which is spoken in Yukon Territory.

There are two writing systems, one in use in Alaska, the other in Yukon. The Alaska orthography is unique in the region for its means of writing long vowels by following the English tradition. Thus, short ‹u› is long ‹oo›, short ‹i› is long ‹ee›. High tone is always shown, low tone is optional in the Alaska Script. The Interior Tlingit alphabet differs in that it writes an ‹h› following a consonant instead of the underline. Also, in this dialect, there is a distinction between the lateral /l/ and the lateral fricative /ł/. In Alaska, only the latter exists, so there is no need for a special ‹ł› character. In the Yukon, long vowels are marked by accents, not by digraphs. Finally, Tlingit is most unique in that the period ‹.› is a letter of the alphabet, representing a glottal stop.

Note: There are several Roman Orthography conventions on this site that may require further explanation. On the charts below, there is lots of phonetic terminology that may not be familiar to everyone.

According to the 1990 U.S. Census, there are 1088 Tlingit speakers in the United States. The Canadian Census counts 175 Tlingit speakers in 2006, down from from 230 in 2001. However Krauss (1997) gives the numbers of speakers as 500 and 75 respectively.

ISO 639-3 language code: tli

Community Names

Yaakwdáat (Yakutat)
Klukwan
Jilḵut (Chilkoot)
Xunaa (Hoonah)
T’aaḵú (Taku)
Ḵák’w (Basket Bay)
S’awdáan (Sumdum)
Xutsnoowú (Angoon)
Sheet’ká (Sitka)
Ḵéix̱’ (Kake)
Kuyú
Shtax’héen (Stikine, Old Wrangell)
Tuxekan
Lawáak (Klawock)
T’ang̱aas (Tongass)

(Alaska names from Bringhurst 1999)

The Alaska Orthography: Consonants

	dental	lateral	dental affricate	palato-alveolar	velar	velar rounded	uvular	uvular rounded	glottal
voiceless stop	d	dl	dz	j	g	gw	g̱	g̱w	.
aspirated stop	t	tl	ts	ch	k	kw	ḵ	ḵw
ejective stop	t’	tl’	ts’	ch’	k’	k’w	ḵ’	ḵ’w
voiceless fricative		l	s	sh	x	xw	x̱	x̱w	h
glottalised fricative		l’	s’		x’	x’w	x̱’	x̱’w
nasal	n
resonant				y	y̱	w

The Alaska Orthography: Vowels

	front	central	back
high	i / ee		u / oo
mid	e / ei
low		a / aa

Notes

The long vowels are written with special digraphs, and reflect more of an English spelling than phonetic, but the system is consistant.
High tone is á, low tone is unmarked. The Tongass dialect has fading a`, clipped a’, sustained a·
The glottal stop ‹.› is not written at the beginning of words.

The Yukon Orthography: Consonants

	bilabial	dental	lateral	dental affricate	palato-alveolar	velar	velar rounded	uvular	uvular rounded	glottal	glottal rounded
voiceless stop		d	dl	dz	j	g	gw	gh	ghw	.	.w
aspiriated stop		t	tl	ts	ch	k	kw	kh	khw
ejective stop		t’	tl’	ts’	ch’	k’	k’w	kh’	kh’w
voiceless fricative			ł	s	sh	x	xw	xh	xhw	h	hw
glottalised fricative			ł’	s’		x’	x’w	xh’	xh’w
nasal	m	n
resonant			l		y		w

The Yukon Orthography: Vowels

	front	central	back
high	i		u
mid	e
low		a

Notes

A short-high tone is á, short-low tone is unmarked. The long-high tone is â, and the long-low is à.
The glottal stop ‹.› is not written at the beginning of words.

Last Update: October 24, 2008