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Kansa

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Text Example

The Kanza language is currently spoken in Northern Oklahoma in Kay county. The ancestral territory was just to the north, in Kansas.

The writing system presented here is the orthography developed by the members of the Kanza Language Project, as it is shown on the WebKanza website. This site contains language lessons and sound files. I would also like to thank Benjamin Bruce for introducing me to the language, providing the community names, and advice about Kanza.

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.

The last fluent speakers of Kansa left this world in the 1980’s. Data from WebKanza.

Community Names:

Oklahoma: Níkashinga Zhúje Olímbe
Kaw City: Kaáⁿze Táⁿmaⁿ

Consonants

  bilabial alveolar alveolar affricate palato-alveolar lateral palatal velar rounded velar glottal
voiced stop
b
d
j
g
tense stop
p
t
č
k
’
aspirated stop
ph
čh
kh
ejective stop
p’
t’
ts’
k’
voiceless fricative
s
sh
x
h
voiced fricative
z
zh
γ
nasal / resonant
m
n
l
y
w

Vowels

  front front rounded back
high
i – ii
u - uu
high nasalised
iⁿ – iiⁿ
mid
e
o – oo
mid nasalised
oⁿ – ooⁿ
low
a – aa
low nasalised
aⁿ – aaⁿ

Notes

  • Primary stress is shown by the ácute accent, secondary stress by the gràve accent. When long vowels are stressed only the last vowel is accented, e.g.: ‹aá›.
  • Tense stops are voiceless at the beginning of words, and geminate (held longer) between vowels.
  • Nasal vowels are not written with the superscript ‹ⁿ› when prededing a stop consonant; in this case, nasality is indicated by a regular ‹n›, ‹angóta› [ɑ̃'gotɑ] or ‹m› when before a bilabial stop: ‹zhómbe› ['ʒõbe].

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Last Update: February 23, 2008