Changes in Orthoraphy

From now on, my orthography for tones is as follows:

High Even: vowel without diacritic, e.g. at "I"
Rising/Falling: double vowel, e.g. suul "sled"
Falling: down-tone marker, e.g. sèl "reindeer"
Glottalized: apostrophe, e.g. a't "bone, relative"

Lesson Plan 4: Qusqa anetaŋ? B'utis de'ŋ!

Lesson Plan 4: Qusqa anetaŋ? B'utis de'ŋ!

(note: henceforth I will not use diacritics to mark high-even tone.  In a monosyllabic word with no diacritic, assume high-even tone)

Objective: Students continue to use locative, talk about family membners and objects in a qu's.

Preparation: Teacher and students should bring to class a photo of their families.

Vocab:

• Utis de'ŋ: family
• Am: mother
• Ob: father
• dɨl(git): child (diminutive suffix)
• Hu'ŋ: daughter
• Hɨ'b: son (historically ke't referred to one's children)
• Biséèb: sibling (add hig- or qim- to refer to brother or sister, and qà- "big, very" or hɨna- "small" to specify older vs. younger, e.g. hɨna higbiséèb "younger brother")
• Tib: dog (plural: tab)
• Allel: female guardian spirit doll
• Daŋŋols: image of dead ancestor
• Bo'k: fire (fem.)
• Bakŋ: fireplace
• La'm: chair
• Oŋnas: bed
• Untij: birchbark container
• Tɨ'n: kettle, pot
• Bi': generic thing

Classroom Procedure:

1. Ture akus? review.  Go over plurals, demonstratives one more time. (10 mins)
2. Review "who" constructions.  There are four different words for "who" so this is important to review. (5-10 mins)
3. Teacher shows picture of his/her family.  Introduce each member using familial terms, names, etc.  Students practice with each other. (10 mins)
4. Teacher draws qu's on board, with different family members inside.  Elicit correct responses from students. (10 mins)
5. Teacher does same thing with Ket household (or qu's-hold) objects in different combinations. (10 mins)

Homework:

1. There is a lot of vocabulary here, so practice by repeating each new word enough to fill one line on a sheet of paper.

2. Iriŋilketin kine ostɨkanbes.

• What is that big thing over there?
• In the birchbark teepee is my family and dog.
• My father is in bed.
• The birchbark box is in our little earthen shelter.
• My older sister and dogs are in the forest.

Lesson Plan #3: Ture akus? Ture biseŋ?

Objective: Students identify vocab with "this is..." construction, and begin to use locative case.

Vocab:

• Qu's: tent, birchbark teepee
• Āks: tree
• Aselen: summer houseboat
• Iŋŋus: house
• Baŋŋus: winter earthen shelter (ba'ŋ "earth" + qu's)
• Súùl: Sled
• Sēs: river
• Ulbaŋ: Shore (ūl "water" + ba'ŋ)
• Hɨssej: forest
• Ēs: sky (also "god", "heaven")
• Qà: big, very
• Hɨna: small

Grammar:

• In this lesson you will learn the locative postposition, formed simply by adding -qa to the noun you want to modify.  So, we can have constructions like qusqa "at home".  As a stylistic option with non-sentient nouns, we can use an addessive ending, but for now let's stick to locative.
• New interrogative: biseŋ "where".  Similar construction: kiseŋ "here", tuseŋ, qaseŋ "there".  E.g. "Ū biseŋ-gu?" "Āt qusqa"  "where are you?" "I'm at home". "Bū biseŋ-du?" "Bū qaseŋ-du." "Where is he/she?" "He/she's over there."

Classroom procedure:

1. Review greetings, introductions, time of day (15-20 mins.)
2. Show picture with river, qu's, aseleŋ, a sled, a river, the sun, the sky, and a forest.  Teacher elicits identification of each item with "ture akus?" (5 mins)
3. New construction: asking location.  Teacher should elicit locative sentences from students regarding pictures drawn on board, e.g.
   T: Aselen biseŋ?
   S: Aselen ulbaŋ-qa.
   (5-10 mins)

Homework:

Translate the following sentences into English:

1. Etna baŋŋus qà.

2. Ture əkna asel.

3. Ulbanqa asel haj qu's.

4. Súùl hɨssej-ka?

5. Ēsqa i'.

Iriŋilketin kine ostɨkanbes!. (Translate these into Ket)

1. My teacher is at the river.

2. The sled is in the earthen shelter.

3. Are you at home?

4. Where is your houseboat?

5. Is there a little tent by the shore?

Lesson Plan #2: Aqta i'!

Lesson 2: Aqta i'!

Objective: Students build on introductions, by learning plural endings, learn greetings corresponding to time of day. Also, they should learn the grammatical construction for “what is this” and “this is...”

Vocab:

• Qonoks: morning
• I': day, afternoon, sun
• Bīs: evening
• Sī: night
• Hig-: male (person)
• Qīm, qim-: woman, female (person)
• Dɨ̄l: child
• Haj: and

Grammar:

• Plurals can be formed by adding “-n” for animates, or “-ŋ” for inanimates. For example, Qiman aqtasan “the women are the beautiful ones”, or Qu'ŋ qàŋ “the tents are big”. Following is a chart of plural personal pronouns.

Subject/direct object	Possessive
Ətn	Ətna, na-
Əkn	Əkna, na-
Būŋ	Buŋna, na-

• Ket Demonstratives

Kir (masc.), Kire (fem., inan.), Kine (plural)	This/these right here
Tur, Ture, Tune	That/those at a moderate distance (generic)
Qar, Qare, Qane	That/those far away

To use demonstrative pronouns for people, we should add the words ke't, qim, or dɨl. For example, Ture qim sirakats “that woman is a teacher”.

• New Interrogatives:

Akus Bitse Besa Anáà Anetaŋ

What Who (masc) Who (feminine) Who (either, but defaults to masculine) Who (plural)

Classroom Procedure:

1. Students review greetings and old vocab (10 mins).
2. Teacher models introductions, e.g.
   T: Ture-ke't bitse?
   S1: Ture-ke't (name) or Būd ī (name)
   Students should practice on each other. (5-10 mins).
3. Teacher shows morning, day, and night scenes while saying “ture qonoks”, etc. Teacher should then ask students questions and greet them by time of day, e.g.:
   T: Ture akus?
   S1: Ture qonoks.
   T: Ture akus? Ture sī-du?
   S2: Bə̄n. Ture i'.
   T: E'! Aqta i'!
   S2: Aqta i'.
   (5-10 mins)

So we see that we can greet people by the time of day by adding the word for morning, etc. to aqta. However, these are calques from Russian, and not part of Ket's pre-contact lexicon.

To say “good night” (e.g. when going to bed) we can make the construction qonoks bandinga “see you in the morning”.

Homework: 

Part 1:
Read these Wikipedia articles:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ket_people
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ket_language
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Den%C3%A9%E2%80%93Yeniseian_languages

Part 2:
1. What questions do you have so far regarding Ket culture and/or language?
2. Do you support the Dene-Yeniseian hypothesis?  Why or why not?  After detailing your own position, examine the other side.  What evidence do they bring forward?

Lesson Plan #1: Bəjoo!

Lesson 1: Bəjoo!

Objectives: Ss learn basic Ket greetings and learn to introduce themselves.

Vocab:

E': yes

Bə̄n: no

Aqta: good, beautiful
Sēl: (it is) bad

Bə'j: friend

Sirakats: scholar

Ke't: person, man

De'ŋ: people

Bila: how

ī: name

Ostɨganna qa': Ket language literally “tongue of the Ostyaks”

Qajadingta bandinga: See you later

Grammar:
Adjectives: Adjectival constructions can be made with the endings -s "the (adj) one" and -am "it is (adj)".  If simply describing a noun, no end is needed.  For example, consider tur ke't aqta sirakats "that man is a good teacher", sirakats aqtas "the teacher is a good one", and simply aqtam "it is good".  Aqtam can be used by itself, similar to Russian "horosho" or English "ok" or "good".  Keep an eye out for -s endings, as this can be used as a universal nominalizer.  Sirakats, for example, uses -s to mean "the one associated with learning" and can mean a student or a teacher.  In the classroom context, however, it should refer to the teacher.

Singular Pronouns:

Subject/Direct Object	Possessive (second forms colloquial)
āt	āp, b'
ū	ūk, k'
bū	būd, d'

Gender: Most of the Ket nominal inventory is inanimate, but animate nouns are divided into masculine (generic and male people, economically important animals) and feminine (women, economically unimportant animals). Exceptions will be noted with vocab terms.

Vocative postpositions: The first of the thirteen Ket postpositional forms to learn is the vocative. We use this when greeting people or getting their attention. The ending is the same for singular and plural.

Masculine	Feminine
-oo, e.g. bəjoo! “hey there, friend!”, a generic greeting.	-aa, əə, e.g. aməə! “Hey there, mother!”

Asking questions: Basic questions use interrogatives like bila “how”, -gu “are you...”, or -du “am I.../is he/she/it...”

Lesson:

A good place to begin a language is with greetings and introductions. However, greetings in Ket are difficult because you must first know how to use vocative postpositions (see above). Here are several examples:

Siragatsoo!	“Hey, teacher!”
Qajvuŋoo!	“Hey, Qajvuŋ!” (Ket male name)
Saqaa!	“Hey, Sa'q!” (Ket female name)
Deŋoo!	“Hey, everyone!” (lit. people)

If you do not know your conversation partner's name, a useful thing to say is Bəjoo “hey, friend”. To ask for his/her name, we make the following construction: ūk ī bila? Or literally, “your name how?”

To respond, we respond with “āp ī (your name)”.

Students should now try to make some sentences talking about people in the classroom, e.g. “Ū b'sirakats. Ūk ī Kənukun”

The construction qajadingt bandinga can be broken down as "later-until", so roughly it's "see you later" in English.

Homework:

1. Fill in the following pronoun chart:
   Subject/Direct Object
   _______-I
   _______-You
   _______-Him/her/it
   Possessive
   _______-My
   _______-Your
   _______-His/her/its
2. Conversation:
   You are nomadizing through the Siberian taiga, òn itaŋaŋ qusdiŋal (many days' travel from home!).  Suddenly, from the bush emerges a Ket hunter!  Happy to see another person, he greets you.  Translate and reply to each of his sentences.
   
   Hunter: Bəjoo!  Ūk ī bila?
              ___________________________
   You:_____________________________
   Hunter: B'ī Kənukun.  Ū ostyganna qa'd sirakats-gu? (qa'd=”of the language”)
             ________________________________________
   You:_____________________________
   Hunter: Aqtam!  Ostɨganna qa' aqtas!  Qajadiŋta bandiŋa!
              _______________________________________
   You:_________________________________________

Lesson Plan #0: Pronunciation, Tones and Names

Lesson #0: Pronunciation and Tones

As a kind of "final project" to wrap up the unit on Ket I'll be posting lesson plans for a hypothetical 101-level Ket course.

Pronunciation:

Ket is a hard language to pronounce but with some practice it becomes easy.  Following are tables of Ket phonemes.  When allophones are shown, they are ordered from word-initial, to intervocalic, to word-final.  Please memorize allophones, as actual pronunciation may differ from the orthography used here. (e.g. bikit "foreigner" pronounced [biɣit].  Irregular allophonic usage will be marked.

Consonants:

Bilabial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Glottal
b [b, v, p]	s	j	k [k, ɣ, g]	q [qχ, ʁ, q]	h [h, χ]
m	t, d [d, ɾ]		ŋ
	n
	l [tɬ, ɮ, ɬ]

...and vowels:

Front	Central/Back Unrounded	Central/Back Rounded
i	ɨ [ɨ, ɯ]	u
e [e, ɛ]	o [o, ɔ]	ə [ə, ʌ, ɤ]
a [æ, a, ɑ]

Ket also uses a Cyrillic alphabet in printed works. However, let's stick to the Latin one for now.

Tonal System:

Ket has four tones:

High Even	qoj	“uncle, aunt”
Glottalized	qo'j	“wish”
Rising-Falling	qooj	“neighboring”
Falling	qòj	bear

When we agglutinate morphemes together, we drop tones, unless marked otherwise.

Make sure you have your tones right! After all, you'd hate to call someone's aunt a bear.

Names

Source for tables: Vajda 2013

I get to learn Ket!

For those of you interested in the Ket Language and people, here are a few useful links.  Two are Wikipedia and the third is a very educational video my professor made.

1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ket_people
2: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ket_language
3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fw-25zQEc_s

Correction: I seem to have let on that there were more cognates between Ket and Na-Dene than there truly are.  This is exacerbated by the difficulty in spotting cognates in words that on the surface appear completely different!