Comanche (, endonym ) is a Uto-Aztecan language spoken by the Comanche, who split from the Shoshone soon after the Comanche had acquired horses around 1705. The Comanche language and the Shoshoni language are quite similar, but certain consonant changes in Comanche have inhibited mutual intelligibility.
The name Comanche comes from the Ute word "enemy, stranger".Edward Sapir. 1931. Southern Paiute Dictionary. Reprinted in 1992 in: The Collected Works of Edward Sapir, X, Southern Paiute and Ute Linguistics and Ethnography. Ed. William Bright. Berlin: Mouton deGruyter. Their own name for the language is , which means "language of the people".Lila Wistrand Robinson & James Armagost. 1990. Comanche Dictionary and Grammar. Summer Institute of Linguistics and The University of Texas at Arlington Publications in Linguistics Publication 92. Dallas, Texas: The Summer Institute of Linguistics and The University of Texas at Arlington.
Use and revitalization efforts Although efforts are now being made to ensure its survival, most speakers of the language are elderly. In the late 19th century, Comanche children were placed in indigenous boarding schools where they were discouraged from speaking their native language, and even severely punished for doing so. The second generation then grew up speaking English, because of the belief that it was better for them not to know Comanche.
The Comanche language was briefly prominent during World War II. A group of 17 young men referred to as the Comanche Code Talkers were trained, and used by the U.S. Army to send messages conveying sensitive information in the Comanche language so that it could not be deciphered by the enemy.
In July 2013, The Boston Globe reported that there were roughly 25–30 native speakers of the language. The Comanche Language and Cultural Preservation Committee offers dictionaries and language-learning materials. Comanche language courses were available at the now-closed Comanche Nation College. The college previously conducted a language-recording project, as the language is "mostly oral", and emphasized instruction for tribal members. On the language-learning platform Memrise, the Comanche Nation Language Department has published learning materials.
there were fewer than nine fluent native speakers of Comanche, many of the group having succumbed to old age, health problems, or the COVID-19 pandemic.
Phonology
Vowels Comanche has a typical Numic vowel inventory of six vowels. In addition, there is the common diphthong . Historically, there was a certain amount of free variation between and (as shown by comparison with Shoshoni cognates), but the variation is no longer so common and most morphemes have become fixed on either or . In the following chart, the basic symbols given are in the IPA, whereas the equivalent symbols in the conventional orthography are given to the right of them.
Front Central Back short long short long short long High (close) Mid Low (open)
Vowel length and voicing Comanche distinguishes vowels by length. Vowels can be either long or short. Long vowels are never devoiced and in the orthography they are represented as (aa, ee, ii, oo, uu, ʉʉ). An example of a long vowel is the (ee) in [wakaréʔeː] 'turtle'. Short vowels can be lengthened when they are stressed.
Short vowels can be either voiced or voiceless. Unstressed short vowels are usually devoiced when /s/ or /h/ follows and optionally when word-final. Voiceless vowels are non-phonemic and therefore not represented in this chart. In the conventional orthography, these vowels are marked with an underline: .
Consonants Comanche has a typical Numic consonant inventory. As with the vowel charts, the basic symbols given in this chart are in the IPA, whereas the equivalent symbols in the conventional orthography are given to the right of them.
Labial Dental Palatal Velar Glottal plain labial Nasal Plosive Affricate Fricative Approximant
Stress Comanche stress most commonly falls on the first syllable. Exceptions to this rule, such as in the words 'Osage people', and 'ouch!', are marked with an acute accent.
For the purposes of stress placement, the diphthongs /ai/, /oi/, and /ui/ act as one vowel with one mora. Additionally, possessive pronouns, which serve as proclitics, do not affect the stress of a word, so that + 'my sister' retains its stress on the /a/ in
Secondary stress is placed on the second syllable of a two-syllable word; the third syllable of a word with three, four, or five syllables; and the fourth syllable of a word with six syllables.
Primary stress: Primary stress is "marked when it is non-initial stress". In addition, "when a pronoun is suffixed by, for instance a postposition, the pronoun does take primary – and initial – stress". An example is 'my mother' (my-mother). In the following data where primary stress appears, it will be shown with an "acute accent". Primary stress is found in words or compounds of three, five, and six syllables. However, when primary stress is marked in a third syllable, it can also be considered an example of secondary stress according to Canonge, but an "exception to this case is when both a proclitic and prefix are used". An example of third-syllable stress is 'stopped and lay down'. Words with "five syllables have primary stress on the first syllable". An example is 'stress'. Words with six syllables also have primary stress on the first syllable. An example is 'roasts for'. Non-initial stress: Non-initial stress can be found in any syllable of a word that is not in the initial position; it can also fall on a long vowel. The "initial syllable never weakens to the point of voicelessness". However, some exceptions to non-initial stress are animal and plant names, because some of them end with a stressed long vowel plus which is represented by . "Loans are common sources of words with non-initial stress", an example being 'policeman'. A word with two stresses is 'ant' (analysis unknown). Alternating stress: Alternating stress occurs when there are words with three, four, five, and six syllables. In addition, alternating stress arises "when nouns of compound are coequal, a root or stem has one-syllable suffix". Also, prefixes or not stem-changes do not receive an initial stress because the alternating stress "begins on the second syllable as in the following word of six syllables, following the pattern of five-syllable words", for example: 'went to cut down'. Examples of alternating stress are: {| class="wikitable" ! 4 ! 5 ! 6
| 'housefly' | 'louse' | 'buckle, button' |} An example of three words is 'twelve' (lit. 'two-??').
Stress shift: Stress shift occurs when "verbs often exhibit stylistic stress shift when occurring at the end of a breathing group". In addition, stress moves "one syllable to the right if that syllable is voiced; otherwise it skips over the voiceless vowels to the next syllable". An example is 'jumped'. According to Charney, stress shift is caused by a suffixed -n which prompts a "rightward shift of stress in form with the shape CVHCV or CVhV". {| class=wikitable ! CVHCV ! CVhv
| ma-toH-tíkwa-n | pahi-n |- | 'he hit him' | 'he fell'. |} By using the form CVHCV or CVhV, we can see that -h "is presented as a second or a precipitated consonant". However, "stress does not shift rightwards when the verb root does not contain [h]. An example is 'they moved camp'.
Phonological processes Free variation: although not often reflected in the orthography, certain sounds occur in free variation. For instance, can be pronounced as a (for example: ma yaa ), and a labialized can be voiced (as in : it is written , even though it is more accurately , just as the labialized is written in Comanche as rather than ). In contemporary times, preaspiration and preglottalization may occur in free variation with a long vowel: / ('devil's horn'). Spirantization: spirantization can occur in the phonemes and when they are preceded by vowels. becomes the voiced bilabial fricative, , usually written as a b, and becomes the voiced alveolar tap, , written as an r. An intervening does not block this spirantization process, as seen in 'on the son' (the sound is written here as b, and is allophonic with the Comanche ). In the past, there was a process of nasalization in Comanche which has since been lost and which blocked spirantization; certain words that would otherwise exhibit spirantization in modern Comanche do not, therefore, as a result of the historical presence of what would have been a preceding nasal ( 'your head' would historically have been ). Metathesis: A fairly regular process of metathesis occurs, sporadically with voiceless consonants and regularly with voiced consonants. It is accompanied by the deletion of a vowel: > > ('they', dual). In modern Comanche, voiceless, unaspirated stops followed by a long (written ) and an may be realized as aspirated equivalents at the expense of the subsequent long vowel and : > ('milk'). Preaspiration and Preglottalization: Certain consonants undergo preaspiration word medially, namely, and the voiceless, unaspirated stops , , and (rendered in the IPA as , , , , respectively). It is usually written with an before the consonant, as in 'cupboard' or 'soldier'. Similarly, many of the same consonants can also undergo preglottalization, which is written with before the consonant (resulting in the digraphs , , , and ), as in 'creek' or 'gun'. Organic and Inorganic Devoicing: each Comanche vowel has an allophonic voiceless (or "whispered") equivalent. The devoicing process in Comanche follows a predictable pattern, and can be broken down into two categories—organic (compulsory) and inorganic (optional). A vowel which precedes an /s/ or an /h/ undergoes induced organic devoicing, provided that the vowel is unstressed, short, and not part of a cluster (contrast , 'this one also', which undergoes organic devoicing, with the similar word , 'these ones also', which does not because the vowel is not short). Two adjacent syllables cannot both have organic voiceless vowels. In such a situation, the second vowel does not devoice. The second type of devoicing that can occur in Comanche is inorganic devoicing. Short vowels that are not part of a cluster may be optionally devoiced at the end of a breath group, and this may apply even if the preceding vowel has undergone organic devoicing. Additionally, an inorganic, voiceless vowel conditions optional lengthening of a voiced penultimate vowel if there is no intervening preaspirated consonant (for example, 'wing' and 'leg').
Writing system The Comanche Alphabet was developed by Dr. Alice Anderton, a linguistic anthropologist, and was adopted as the official Comanche Alphabet by the Comanche Nation in 1994. The alphabet is as follows: Letter Pronunciation Letter Pronunciation Letter Pronunciation a /a/ m /m/ t /t/ [t] b /p/ n /n/ u /u/ e /e/ o /o/ ʉ /ə/ h/h/p/p/ [p]w/w/i/i/r/t/ y/j/k/k/s/s/
Notes:
Long vowels are indicated by doubling the vowel: aa, ee, ii, oo, uu, ʉʉ. Voiceless vowels are indicated by an underline: a̱, e̱, i̱, o̱, u̱, ʉ̱. When the stress does not fall on the first syllable of the word, it is marked with an acute accent ´: 'coyote'. The glottal stop is sometimes written as ?. The phonemes and are written as ts and kw, respectively.
Morphology Like many languages of the Americas, Comanche can be classified as a polysynthetic language.
Nouns Comanche nouns are inflected for case and number, and the language possesses a dual number. Like many Uto-Aztecan languages, nouns may take an absolutive suffix. Many cases are also marked using postpositions.