Akkala Sami language

Akkala Sami is a Sami language that was spoken in the Sami villages of A´kkel (Russian Babinsky, Finnish Akkala), Ču´kksuâl (Russian Ekostrovsky) and Sââ´rvesjäu´rr (Russian Girvasozero, Finnish Hirvasjärvi), in the inland parts of the Kola Peninsula in Russia. Formerly erroneously regarded as a dialect of Kildin Sami, it has recently become recognized as an independent Sami language that is most closely related to its western neighbor Skolt Sami.

Akkala Sami is the most endangered eastern Sami language. On December 29, 2003, Marja Sergina – one of the last fluent native speakers of Akkala Sami – died.^[3][4] However, there are at least two people, both aged 70, with some knowledge of Akkala Sami.^[5] Remaining ethnic Akkala Samis live in the village Yona.

Although there exist a description of Akkala Sami phonology and morphology, a few published texts, and archived audio recordings,^[6] the Akkala Sami language remains among the most poorly documented Sami languages.

Sami dialects and settlements in Russia:

  Akkala (Russian Babinsky)

A-1 A´kkel (Russian Babinsky, Finnish Akkala)
A-2 Ču´kksuâl (Russian Ekostrovsky)
A-3 Yona
A-4 Sââ´rvesjäu´rr (Russian Girvasozero, Finnish Hirvasjärvi)

Morphology

The following overview is based on P. M. Zaykov's monograph.^[7] Zaykov's Uralic phonetic transcription is retained here. The middle dot ˑ denotes palatalization of the preceding consonant, analyzed by Zaykov as semisoft pronunciation.

Noun

Akkala Sami has 8 cases, singular and plural: nominative, genitive-accusative, partitive, dative-illative, locative, essive, comitative and abessive. Case and number are expressed by a combination of endings and consonant gradation:

• Nominative: no marker in the singular, weak grade in the plural.
• Genitive-accusative: weak grade in the singular, weak grade + -i in the plural.
• Partitive: this case exists only in the singular, and has the ending -tti͔.
• Dative-illative: strong grade + -a, -a͕ or -ɛ in the singular, weak grade + -i in the plural.
• Locative: weak grade + -st, -śtˑ in the singular, weak grade + -nˑ in the plural.
• Essive: this case exists only in the singular: strong grade + -nˑ.
• Comitative: weak grade + -nˑ in the singular, strong grade + -guim, -vuim or -vi̮i̭m in the plural.
• Abessive: weak grade + -ta in the singular.

Pronoun

The table below gives the declension of the personal pronouns monn ‘I’ and mij ‘we’. The pronouns tonn ‘you (sg.)’ and sonn ‘(s)he’ are declined like monn, the pronouns tij ‘you (pl.)’ and sij ‘they’ are declined like mij.

The interrogative pronouns mī ‘what?’ and tˑī, kī ‘who?’ are declined as follows:

The proximal demonstrative tˑa͕t ‘this’ and the medial demonstrative ti̮t ‘that’ are declined as follows:

Verb

Akkala Sami verbs have three persons and two numbers, singular and plural. There are three moods: indicative, imperative and conditional; the potential mood has disappeared. Below, the paradigm of the verbs va͕n̄ˑće ‘to walk’ and korrɛ ‘to knit’ is given in the present and imperfect tense:

The verb ĺiije ‘to be’ conjugates as follows:

Compound tenses such as perfect and pluperfect are formed with the verb ĺii̭je in the present or imperfect as auxiliary, and the participle of the main verb. Examples are ĺam tĭĕhtmi̮nč ‘I have known’ from tĭĕhttɛ ‘to know’, and ĺai tui̭jāma ‘(s)he had made’ from tui̭je ‘to make’.

The conditional mood has the marker -č, which is added to the weak grade of the stem: kuarčim ‘I would sew’, vizzčik ‘you (sg.) would become tired’.

As in other Sami languages, Akkala Sami makes use of a negative verb that conjugates according to person and number, while the main verb remains unchanged. The conjugation of the negative verb is shown here together with the verb aĺ̄ḱe ‘to begin’:

The 3rd person singular and plural of the verb ĺii̭je ‘to be’ have special contracted forms ɛĺĺa and jāĺa.

References