Alsea or Alsean (also Yakonan) was two closely related speech varieties spoken along the central Oregon coast until the early 1950s. 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.

Mithun, Marianne Marianne Mithun (born 1946) is an American linguist specializing in American Indian languages and language typology. She is professor of linguistics at the University of California at Santa Barbara, where she has held an academic position since 19 ...

. (1999). ''The languages of Native North America''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (hbk);

Varieties

# Alsea (Alséya) ''(†)'' # Yaquina (Yakwina, Yakona) ''(†)'' Both are now

extinct Extinction is the termination of a kind of organism or of a group of kinds (taxon), usually a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and ...

. 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. 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.

Linguistic Affiliation

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. 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.

Sounds

Consonants

Alsea had 34 consonants: , and are spelled as ''s'', ''c'' and ''c̓'' in modern descriptions. Their phonetic value has been described as "palatal", or "between alveolar and palatal".

Vowels

Three vowels are listed as /a, i, u/. Long vowel variants of /i, u/ are ː, oː A mid vowel /ə/ occurs as a phonetically inserted vowel sound.

Varieties

Linguistic Affiliation

Sounds

Consonants

Vowels

References

Further reading