Leutiktja language

Leutiktja (Leutiktja: tjéLeutiktja [cɛ.'ɮ.euɾ.ik.c:.ħɑ̥], Terryfs: løriks Leurics [lø.ʁɪks], Alhi: [placeholder]) is an Eastern Touban spoken primarily in the condominium of Ojanka/Fassaujə. It is the most divergent and most spoken Touban language, being spoken by an estimated 130,000 people as of 2011, virtually all Kjareleni, across Ojanka and to a lesser extent by emigre communities in Matkha and Xjetjeŋ. It is one of the most widely spoken Indigenous Ojankan-Fassaujən languages.

Leutiktja has a very small phonemic inventory, featuring 9 consonants and 5 × 2 vowels, though there are a large amount of phones due to rampant allophonic variation. Leutiktja is most known for chaining process in vowels employed in inflection, the process of changing vowels

Phonology and orthography

Phonology

The phonology of Leutiktja is very unusual, even compared to other Touban languages. It features 9 consonant phonemes, and two sets of five vowels, called pure vowels and chained vowels respectively, a direct translation of the name of the two sets in Leutiktja: natjaiei and naedlieoek. In a word stem, only pure vowels are allowed to occur; chained vowels only occur when inflecting; when a grammatical process requires a switch from pure to chained vowels, this is called "chaining". In addition, in a cluster of two or more vowels, pure vowels are pronounced separately, whilst chained vowels form diphthongs. For example, the word tjauiae [IPA: c:.'auiaeɹ̠̊˔:] means banana tree (in the nominative), and the word tjáuiae [IPA: c:.ə͡œ͜ɪ͡ə.'ɛ] means banana tree's (in the genitive).

Leutiktja consonants

	Bilabial	Alveolar	Palatal	Guttural
Nasal	m /m/	n /n/
Plosive		t /t/	tj /c/	k /k/
Fricative	ph /ɸ/	l /l~s/		h /h~x/
Approximant			y /j/

	Front		Back
	pure	chained	pure	chained
Close	i /i/	í, i̋ /ɪ/	u /u/	ú, ű /ʊ~ɯ/
Mid	e /e/	é, e̋ /ɛ/	o /o/	ó, ő /œ~ɔ/
Open	a /a/	á, a̋ /ə/

Allophony

There is an extreme amount of allophonic variation in Leutiktja.

Consonant cluster allophony

	m	n	t	tj	k	ph	h	l	y
m	mm [m:]				km [k͡pm]	phm [fɱ̊]
n		nn [n:]			kn [kn]	phn [pθ̠]
t	mt [mt]	nt [nt]	tt [t:]		kt [kt]	pht [ft]
tj	mtj [mc]	ntj [nc]		tjtj [c:]	ktj [kc]	phtj [fc]
k	mk [ŋ͡m]	nk [ŋ̊k]	tk [tk]	tjk [ck͡x]	kk [k:]	phk [fx]		lk [lkx] or [skx]	yk [kʲ]
ph	mph [mpɸ]	nph [nθ̠]		tjph [cf]		phph [ɸ:]			yph [ɸʲ]
h	mh [ᵐm]	nh [ⁿn]	th [tʰ]	tjh [cʰ]	kh [kʰ]	phh [ɸɸ]	hh [h:]
l	ml [mɬ] or [ms]	nl [ntɬ] or [ns]	tl [tɬ] or [ts]		kl [kʟ̝̊] or [ks]			ll [l:] or [s:]
y	my [mɥ]	ny [ɲ]	ty [c]		ky [kʲ]				yy [j:]

	Word initial	Between vowels	Word final	Terminating phonemes, word final	Chained vowel terminators, word final
m	m	mV̤	m̥	∅	∅
n	n	nV̤	n̥
t	t	ɾ	t
tj	c	ɟ	c	c'~ɟ
k	k	g	k	k'~ŋk
ph	ɸ	v	f	∅
h	ɦ	ɦ	h
l	l	ɮ	ɬ	l
y	j	j	ç	∅
i	i	∅	çɪ
u	u		ʍ
e	e		eɹ̠̊˔:		ɛ
o	o		ʍɔ	u	∅
a	a		ħɑ̥	∅	u

Syllable

Syllables in Leutiktja are organized somewhat differently than in other languages. A syllable in Leutiktja is traditionally composed of two parts, the onset and terminator. The onset can theoretically be a string of any number of sounds, and the terminator immediately ends the syllable. The consonants /c/, /k/, and /l/ are terminating phonemes, meaning that wherever in the syllable they occur, they immediately end the syllable. The pure vowel /o/, and the chained vowels /ɛ/ and /ə/ are also terminating phonemes.