Skolt Sami language

History

On Finnish territory Skolt Sami was spoken in four villages prior to the Second World War. In Petsamo, Skolt Sami was spoken in Suonikylä and the village of Petsamo. This area was ceded to Russia in the Second World War, and the Skolts were evacuated to the villages of Inari, Sevettijärvi and Nellim in the Inari municipality.

On the Russian (then Soviet) side the dialect was spoken in the now defunct Sami settlements of Motovsky, Songelsky, Notozero (hence its Russian name – the Notozersky dialect). Some speakers still may live in the villages of Tuloma and Lovozero.

Status

Skolt Sami is spoken by approximately 400 people by the government as one of the official Sami languages used in Lapland and can thus be used by anyone conducting official business in that area. It is an official language in the municipality of Inari, and elementary schools there offer courses in the language, both for native speakers and for students learning it as a foreign language. Only a small number of youths do learn the language and continue to use it actively. Skolt Sami is thus a seriously endangered language, even more seriously than Inari Sami in the same municipality, which has a nearly equal number of speakers.

From 1978 to 1986, the Skolts had a quarterly called Sääʹmođđâz published in their own language. Since 2013 a new magazine called Tuõddri pee'rel has been published once a year.

In 1993, language immersion programs for children younger than 7 were created. At present, however, no funding has been forthcoming for these programs in years and as a result they are on hold. These programs were extremely important in creating the youngest generation of Skolt Sami speakers.

Like Inari Sami, Skolt Sami has recently borne witness to a new phenomenon, namely it is being used in rock songs sung by Tiina Sanila, who has published two full-length CDs in Skolt Sami to date.

In addition, 2005 saw the first time that it was possible to use Skolt Sámi in a Finnish matriculation examination, albeit as a foreign language.

The Finnish television sami language news Yle Ođđasat had Skolt Sami speaking newsreader for the first time at 26 August 2016. Otherwise Yle Ođđasat presents individual news stories in Skolt Sami every now and then.

Writing system

Skolt Sami uses the ISO basic Latin alphabet with the addition of some special characters:

The letters Q/q, W/w, X/x, Y/y and Ö/ö are also used, although only in foreign words or loans.

The caron marks postalveolars (Š [ʃ], Ž [ʒ], Č [tʃ], Ǯ [dʒ]) and palatal sounds (Ǧ [ɟ͡ʝ] and Ǩ [c͡ç]). The letters Đ and Ǥ mark fricatives [ð], [ɣ]. The letters Ʒ [dz] and Ǯ [dʒ] mark voiced affricates. Skolt Sami has a separate glyph, Ŋ, for the velar nasal [ŋ] ("eng"). Additionally, suprasegmental palatalization is marked by a prime (ʹ) added after the vowel.

A short period of voicelessness or h, known as preaspiration, before geminate consonants is observed, much as in Icelandic, but this is not marked, e.g. joʹǩǩe 'to the river' is pronounced [jo̟hk̟k̟e]. The epenthetic vowels are not phonemic or syllabic, and are thus not marked, e.g. mieʹll [miellɘ̯] 'sandbank' cf. mielle [mielle] 'to the mind'.

Phonology

Special features of this Sami language include a highly complex vowel system and a suprasegmental contrast of palatalized vs. non-palatalized stress groups; palatalized stress groups are indicated by a "softener mark", represented by the modifier letter prime (ʹ).

Vowels

The system of vowel phonemes is as follows; their orthographic representations are given in angle brackets.

Notes:

The difference between /e/ and /ɛ/ is not indicated in the standard orthography, where both of these sounds are spelled e.

Long and short vowels contrast phonologically: cf. leʹtt ‘vessel’ vs. leeʹtt ‘vessels’. All vowels can occur as both long and short.

The vowels can combine to form twelve opening diphthongs:

All diphthongs can occur as both long and short, although this is not indicated in spelling. Short diphthongs are distinguished from long ones by both length and stress placement: short diphthongs have a stressed second component, whereas long diphthongs have stress on the first component.

Diphthongs may also have two variants depending on whether they occur in a plain or palatalized environment. This has a clearer effect with diphthongs whose second element is back or central. Certain inflectional forms, including the addition of the palatalizing suprasegmental, also trigger a change in diphthong quality.

Consonants

The inventory of consonant phonemes is the following; their orthographic representations are given in angle brackets:

Unvoiced stops and affricates are pronounced preaspirated after vowels and sonorant consonants.

Voiced stops and affricates are usually pronounced just weakly voiced.

Older speakers realize the palatal affricates /c͡ç, ɟ͡ʝ/ as plosives [c, ɟ].

In initial position, /x/ is realized as glottal [h].

Consonants may be phonemically short or long (geminate) both word-medially or word-finally; both are exceedingly common. Long and short consonants also contrast in consonant clusters, cf. kuõskkâd 'to touch' : kuõskâm 'I touch'.

Suprasegmentals

There is one phonemic suprasegmental, the palatalizing suprasegmental that affects the pronunciation of an entire syllable. In written language the palatalizing suprasegmental is indicated with a free-standing acute accent between a stressed vowel and the following consonant, as follows:

The suprasegmental palatalization has three distinct phonetic effects:

The stressed vowel is pronounced as slightly more fronted in palatalized syllables than in non-palatalized ones.

When the palatalizing suprasegmental is present, the following consonant or consonant cluster is pronounced as weakly palatalized. It should be noted that suprasegmental palatalization is independent of segmental palatals: inherently palatal consonants (i.e. consonants with palatal place of articulation) such as the palatal glide /j/, the palatal nasal /ɲ/ (spelled ⟨nj⟩) and the palatal lateral approximant /ʎ/ (spelled ⟨lj⟩) can occur both in non-palatalized and suprasegmentally palatalized syllables.

If the word form is monosyllabic and ends in a consonant, a non-phonemic weakly voiced or unvoiced vowel is pronounced after the final consonant. This vowel is e-colored if suprasegmental palatalization is present, but a-colored if not.

Stress

Skolt Sami has four different types of stress for words:

Primary stress

Secondary stress

Tertiary stress

Zero stress

The first syllable of any word is always the primary stressed syllable in Skolt Sami as Skolt is a fixed-stress language. In words with two or more syllables, the final syllable is quite lightly stressed (tertiary stress) and the remaining syllable, if any, are stressed more heavily than the final syllable, but less than the first syllable (secondary stress).

Using the abessive and the comitative singular in a word appears to disrupt this system, however, in words of more than one syllable. The suffix, as can be expected, has tertiary stress, but the penultimate syllable also has tertiary stress, even though it would be expected to have secondary stress.

Zero stress can be said to be a feature of conjunctions, postpositions, particles and monosyllabic pronouns.

Grammar

Skolt Sami is a synthetic, highly inflected language that shares many grammatical features with the other Uralic languages. However, Skolt Sami is not a typical agglutinative language like many of the other Uralic languages are, as it has developed considerably into the direction of a fusional language, much like Estonian. Therefore, cases and other grammatical features are also marked by modifications to the root and not just marked with suffixes. Many of the suffixes in Skolt Sami are portmanteau morphemes that express several grammatical features at a time.

Cases

Skolt Sámi has 9 cases in the singular, although the genitive and accusative are often the same:

Nominative

Like the other Uralic languages, the nominative singular is unmarked and indicates the subject or a predicate. The nominative plural is also unmarked and always looks the same as the genitive singular.

Genitive

The genitive singular is unmarked and looks the same as the nominative plural. The genitive plural is marked by an -i. The genitive is used:

to indicate possession (Tuʹst lij muu ǩeʹrjj.: You have my book.)

to indicate number, if said the number is between 2 and 6. (Sieʹzzest lij kuõʹhtt põõrt. My father’s sister (my aunt) has two houses.)

with prepositions (rääi + [GEN]: by, beyond something)

with most postpositions. (Sij mõʹnne ääkkäd årra.: They went to your grandmother's (house). They went to visit your grandmother.)

The genitive has been replacing the partitive for some time and is nowadays more commonly used in its place.

Accusative

The accusative is the direct object case and it is unmarked in the singular. In the plural, its marker is -d, which is preceded by the plural marker -i, making it look the same as the plural illative. The accusative is also used to mark some adjuncts, e.g. obb tääʹlv (the entire winter).

Locative

The locative marker in the singular is -st and -n in the plural. This case is used to indicate:

where something is (Kuäʹđest lij ǩeʹrjj: There is a book in the kota.)

where it is coming from (Niõđ puõʹtte domoi Čeʹvetjääuʹrest. The girls came home from Sevettijärvi.)

who has possession of something (Suʹst lij čâustõk: He/she has a lasso.)

In addition, it is used with certain verbs:

to ask someone s.t. : kõõččâd [+loc]

Illative

The illative marker actually has three different markers in the singular to represent the same case: -a, -e and -u. The plural illative marker is -d, which is preceded by the plural marker -i, making it look the same as the plural accusative. This case is used to indicate:

where something is going

who is receiving something

the indirect object

Comitative

The comitative marker in the singular is -in and -vuiʹm in the plural. The comitative is used to state with whom or what something was done:

Njääʹlm sekstet leeiʹnin. The mouth is wiped with a piece of cloth.

Vuõʹlǧǧem paaʹrnivuiʹm ceerkvest. I left church with the children.

Vuõʹlǧǧem vueʹbbinan ceerkvest. I left church with my sister.

To form the comitative singular, use the genitive singular form of the word as the root and -in. To form the comitative plural, use the plural genitive root and -vuiʹm.

Abessive

The abessive marker is -tää in both the singular and the plural. It always has a tertiary stress.

Vuõʹlǧǧem paaʹrnitää ceerkvest. I left church without the children.

Sij mõʹnne niõđtää põʹrtte. They went in the house without the girl.

Sij mõʹnne niõđitää põʹrtte. They went in the house without the girls.

Essive

The dual form of the essive is still used with pronouns, but not with nouns and does not appear at all in the plural.

Partitive

The partitive is only used in the singular and can always be replaced by the genitive. The partitive marker is -d.

1. It appears after numbers larger than 6:

kääuʹc čâustõkkâd: eight lassos

This can be replaced with kääʹuc čâustõõǥǥ.

2. It is also used with certain postpositions:

kuäʹtted vuâstta: against a kota

This can be replaced with kuäʹđ vuâstta'

3. It can be used with the comparative to express that which is being compared:

Kåʹlled pueʹrab : better than gold

This would nowadays more than likely be replaced by pueʹrab ko kåʹll

Pronouns

The personal pronouns have three numbers: singular, plural and dual. The following table contains personal pronouns in the nominative and genitive/accusative cases.

The next table demonstrates the declension of a personal pronoun he/she (no gender distinction) in various cases:

Person

Skolt Sami verbs conjugate for four grammatical persons:

first person

second person

third person

fourth person, also called the indefinite person

Mood

Skolt Sami has 5 grammatical moods:

indicative

imperative (Pueʹtted sõrgg domoi! Come home soon!)

conditional

potential

optative

Grammatical number

Skolt Sami verbs conjugate for two grammatical numbers:

singular

plural

Unlike other Sami varieties, Skolt Sami verbs do not inflect for *dual number. Instead, verbs occurring with the dual personal pronouns appear in the corresponding plural form.

Tense

Skolt Sami has 2 simple tenses:

past (Puõʹttem škoouʹle jåhtta.: I came to school yesterday.)

non-past (Evvan puätt mu årra täʹbbe. John is coming to my house today.)

and 2 compound tenses:

perfect

pluperfect

Verbal nouns

Skolt Sami verbs have 6 nominal forms:

the infinitive

the gerund

the active participle (progressive)

the abessive

the present participle

the past participle

Negative verb

Skolt Sami, like Finnish, the other Sámi languages and Estonian, has a negative verb. In Skolt Sami, the negative verb conjugates according to mood (indicative, imperative and optative), person (1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th) and number (singular and plural).

Note that ij + leat is usually written as iʹlla, iʹlleäkku, iʹllää or iʹllä and ij + leat is usually written as jeäʹla or jeäʹlä.

Unlike the other Sami languages, Skolt Sami no longer has separate forms for the dual and plural of the negative verb and uses the plural forms for both instead.