Oowekyala facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Oowekyala
’Wuik̓ala
Region	Northern Central Coast Regional District, British Columbia, Canada
Ethnicity	Wuikinuxv people
Native speakers	6  (2014, FPCC)
Language family	Wakashan Northern Heiltsuk-Oowekyala Oowekyala

Oowekyala also Ooweekeeno and ’Wuik̓ala in the language itself, is a dialect (or a sublanguage) of Heiltsuk-Oowekyala, a Northern Wakashan language spoken around Rivers Inlet and Owikeno Lake in the Central Coast region of the Canadian province of British Columbia, spoken by the Wuikinuxv, whose government is the Wuikinuxv Nation.

The name is also spelled Wuikala, Wuikenukv, Oweekeno, Wikeno, Owikeno, Oowekeeno, Oweekano, Awikenox, Oowek'yala, Oweek'ala.

Sounds

Consonants

The 45 consonants of Oowekyala:

		Labial	Alveolar			Velar		Uvular		Glottal
			central	lateral	sibilant	plain	labial	plain	labial
Plosive	voiced
	voiceless
	ejective
Fricative
Sonorant	short
	long
	glottalized

Phonologically, affricates are treated as stops, and nasals and approximants are treated as sonorants. Additionally and are treated as sonorants.

Vowels

Oowekyala has phonemic short, long, and glottalized vowels.:

	Front			Central			Back
	short	long	glottalized	short	long	glottalized	short	long	glottalized
Close
Mid
Open

Syllables

Oowekyala, like Nuxálk (Bella Coola), allows long sequences of obstruents, as in the following 7-obstruent word:

 'the invisible one here-with-me will be short'   (Howe 2000: 5)

kxlqsłcxʷ - you struck a match for me