Extinct Native American language formerly spoken in Oregon
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Alsea/ˈælsiː/ or Alsean (also Yakonan) and Yaquina were two closely related speech varieties spoken along the central Oregon coast until the early 1950s.[2] They are sometimes taken to be different languages, but it is difficult to be sure given the poor state of attestation; Mithun believes they were probably dialects of a single language.[3] They are commonly held to be components of a language isolate.[4]
Classification
Alsea is usually considered to belong to the Penutian phylum, and may form part of a Coast Oregon Penutian subgroup together with Siuslaw and the Coosan languages.[5] Numerous lexical resemblances between Alsea and the Northern Wintuan languages, however, are more likely the result of borrowing about 1,500 years ago when the (Northern) Wintuan speech community appears to have been located in Oregon. Alsea is also considered to be a language isolate.[6]
The name Alsea derives from the Coosan name for them, alsí or alsí·, and the Marys River Kalapuyan name for them, alsí·ya. Alsea was last recorded in 1942 from the last speaker, John Albert, by J. P. Harrington. Albert died in 1951.
The name Yaquina derives from the Alsean name for the Yaquina Bay and the Yaquina River region, yuqú·na. Yaquina was last recorded in 1884 by James Owen Dorsey.
/ɕ/, /tɕ/ and /tɕ’/ are spelled as s, c and c̓ in modern descriptions.[3][7] Their phonetic value has been described as "palatal",[8] or "between alveolar and palatal".[3]
^Buckley, Eugene (1989). "The Structure of the Alsea Verb Root: Papers from the 1989 Hokan-Penutian Workshop. Ed. Scott DeLancey". University of Oregon Papers in Linguistics. 2 (17).
^Grant, Anthony P. (1997). "Coast Oregon Penutian: Problems and Possibilities". International Journal of American Linguistics. 63 (1): 144–156. doi:10.1086/466316. JSTOR1265867. S2CID143822361.
