Mohawk language

Mohawk is a Native American language spoken in the United States and Canada. It is part of the Iroquoian family.

Phonology

Based on sound files available at http://www.ohwejagehka.com/lang.htm, the phoneme inventory appears to be as follows (using IPA notation):

Consonants

1. There are no bilabials (unless one counts /w/ as labial rather than velar).
2. It is unclear whether aspiration is phonemic or a realization of C + /h/; probably the latter as ‘nh’ is /n/ + /h/, and ‘sh’ is /s/ + /h/ (not IPA /ʃ/).
3. Listening to the syllabification of careful speech suggests that orthographic "ts" is indeed an affricate, since "tsh" corresponds to IPA /tʃ/ — though it raises the question of why not use a single symbol for each of these? (After all, with such a small inventory, there are lots of Latin letters available!)

Vowels

1. Length is contrastive.
2. Nasalization is contrastive.
3. There appear to be a high and low tone. (See tonal language.)

External links

• Mohawk – English Dictionary