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User:Jomeara421/Ottawa Consonants from Ott lg

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Consonants[edit]

In the following section consonants are written using the conventional symbol from the Ottawa writing system, with the symbol from the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) following where the two vary, or to draw attention to a particular property of the sound in question.[1]

Ottawa consonant inventory
Bilabial Dental /
Alveolar
Alveopalatal Palatal Velar Glottal
StopLenis b d g
Stop - Fortis p [pːʰ] t [tːʰ] k [kːʰ]
StopGlottal h [ʔ]
Fricative - Lenis z zh [ʒ]
Fricative - Fortis s [sː] sh [ʃː]
Affricate - Lenis j [ʤ]
Affricate - Fortis ch [ʧːʰ]
Nasal m n
Approximant (Glide) y [j] w

The stop, fricative, and affricate consonants are divided into two sets, referred to as fortis and lenis. Each fortis consonant is matched to a corresponding lenis consonant with the same place of articulation and manner of articulation.[2][3]

The fortis consonants are:[4]

(i) stops p, t, k; (ii) affricate ch [ʧːʰ]; and (iii) fricatives s, sh [ʃː]

The fortis consonants are voiceless and phonetically long.[5] The fortis stops and affricates are aspirated in most positions: [pːʰ], [tːʰ], [kːʰ], [ʧːʰ]. When following another consonant, however, they are unaspirated or weakly articulated.[6]

Fortis consonants
Fortis Aspirated Fortis Unspirated
Sound Phonetic Word English Phonetic Word English
p [pːʰ] pin 'potato' [p] shpaa 'high'
t [tːʰ] tawag 'ear' [t] shtigwaan 'head'
k [kːʰ] kik 'kettle' [k] dooskon 'elbow'

The lenis consonants are:[4]

(i) stops b, d, g; (ii) affricate j [ʤ]; (iii) fricatives z, zh [ʒ]

The lenis consonants are typically voiced between vowels and word-initially before a vowel, but are devoiced in word-final position. The lenis consonants are often subject to other phonological processes when adjacent to fortis consonants.[7]


The nasal consonants are:[4]

m, n

The approximant consonants, sometimes also referred to as semivowels or glides, are:[4]

w, y [j]

Labialized stop consonants [gʷ] and [kʷ] also occur in the speech of some speakers. Labialization is not normally indicated in writing, but a subscript dot is utilized in a widely used dictionary of Ottawa and Eastern Ojibwe to mark labialization: ɡ̣taaji 's/he is afraid' and aaḳzi 's/he is sick.'[8]

The Ottawa phoneme inventory also includes three sounds from English, which occur only in loanwords: f, r, l.[9]

  1. ^ Valentine, J. Randolph, 2001, 50
  2. ^ Nichols, John and Earl Nyholm, 1995, p. xxxvi
  3. ^ Valentine, J. Randolph, 2001, p. 48-49
  4. ^ a b c d Valentine, J. Randolph, p. 50
  5. ^ Rhodes, Richard, 1985
  6. ^ Rhodes, Richard, 1985, p. xlvii
  7. ^ Valentine, J. Randolph, 2001, pp. 74-81
  8. ^ Rhodes, Richard, 1985, pp. xvlvi, xlvii
  9. ^ Rhodes, Richard, 1985, pp. xlv, xlvii, liii