Skolt Sámi

For other uses, see Skolt Sami (disambiguation).

Skolt Sami
sääˊmǩiõll, or Nuõrttsää’m
Region	Finland and Russia
Native speakers	~400
Language family	Uralic Sami Eastern Mainland Skolt Sami
Writing system	Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-2	sms
ISO 639-3	sms
ELP	Skolt Saami
Skolt Sami is 6 on this regional map of Sami languages.

Skolt Sami (sääˊmǩiõll) is a Uralic, Sami language spoken by approximately 400 speakers in Finland, mainly in Sevettijärvi, and approximately 20–30 speakers of the Njuõˊttjäuˊrr (Notozero) dialect in an area surrounding Lake Lovozero in Russia. Skolt Sami used to also be spoken on the Neiden area of Norway, although it has died out there. It is written using a Roman orthography that was made official in 1973.

History

Skolt Sami was spoken in four villages on Finnish territory prior to the Second World War. In Petsamo, Skolt Sami was spoken in Suonikylä and the village of Petsamo. This area was ceded to Russia in the Second World War, and the Skolts were evacuated to the villages of Inari, Sevettijärvi and Nellim in the Inari municipality.

Status

Skolt Sami is spoken by approximately 400 individuals, nearly all of whom live in Finland; very few speakers remain today on the Russian side. On the Finnish side of the border, the language is recognized by the government as one of the official Sami languages used in Lapland and can thus be used by anyone conducting official business in that area. It is an official language in the municipality of Inari, and elementary schools there offer courses in the language, both for native speakers and for students learning it as a foreign language. Only a small number of youths do learn the language and continue to use it actively. Skolt Sami is thus a seriously endangered language, even more seriously than Inari Sami in the same municipality, which has a nearly equal number of speakers.

From 1978 to 1986, the Skolts had a quarterly called Sää´mođđâz published in their own language. To date, this is the only magazine or newspaper that has appeared in Skolt Sámi.

In 1993, language immersion programs for children younger than 7 were created. At present, however, no funding has been forthcoming for these programs in years and as a result they are on hold. These programs were extremely important in creating the youngest generation of Skolt Sami speakers.

Like Inari Sami, Skolt Sami has recently borne witness to a new phenomenon, namely it is being used in rock songs sung by Tiina Sanila, who has published two full-length CDs in Skolt Sami to date.

In addition, 2005 saw the first time that it was possible to use Skolt Sámi in a Finnish matriculation examination, albeit as a foreign language.

Writing system

Skolt Sami uses the standard Latin alphabet with the addition of some special characters:

А а	Â â	B b	C c	Č č	Ʒ ʒ	Ǯ ǯ	D d
Đ đ	E e	F f	G g	Ǧ ǧ	Ǥ ǥ	H h	I i
J j	K k	Ǩ ǩ	L l	M m	N n	Ŋ ŋ	O o
Õ õ	P p	R r	S s	Š š	T t	U u	V v
Z z	Ž ž	Å å	Ä ä	ˊ

The letters Q/q, W/w, X/x, Y/y and Ö/ö are also used, although only in foreign words or loans.

The caron marks postalveolars (Š [ʃ], Ž [ʒ], Č [tʃ], Ǯ [dʒ]) and palatal sounds (Ǧ [ɟ͡ʝ] and Ǩ [c͡ç]). The letters Đ and Ǥ mark fricatives [ð], [ɣ]. The letters Ʒ [dz] and Ǯ [dʒ] mark voiced affricates. Skolt Sami has a separate glyph, Ŋ, for the velar nasal [ŋ] ("eng"). Additionally, suprasegmental palatalization is marked by a free-standing acute accent (´) added after the vowel.

A short period of voicelessness or h, known as preaspiration, before geminate consonants is observed, but this is not marked, e.g., joˊkke ‘to the river’ is pronounced [jo̟hk̟k̟e]. The epenthetic vowels are not phonemic or syllabic, and are thus not marked, e.g., mieˊll [miellɘ̯] ‘sandbank’ cf. mielle [mielle] ‘to the mind’.

Phonology

Special features of this Sami language include a highly complex vowel system and a suprasegmental contrast of palatalized vs. non-palatalized stress groups; palatalized stress groups are indicated by a “softener mark”, represented by the free-standing acute accent (ˊ).

Vowels

The system of vowel phonemes is as follows; their orthographic representations are given in brackets.

	front	central	back
close	i (i)		u (u)
close-mid	e (e)	ɘ (õ)	o (o)
open-mid	ɛ (e)	ɐ (â)	ɔ (å)
open	a (ä)		ɑ (a)

Notes:

• The difference between /e/ and /ɛ/ is not indicated in the standard orthography, where both of these sounds are spelled e.
• /ɘ/ is pronounced much like Estonian õ.

Long and short vowels contrast phonologically: cf. leˊtt ‘vessel’ vs. leeˊtt ‘vessels’. All vowels can occur as both long and short.

The vowels can combine to form twelve opening diphthongs:

	front	front to central	back to front	back to central	back
close to close-mid	ie (ie)	iɘ (iõ)	ue (ue)	uɘ (uõ)
close to open-mid	iɛ (ie)	iɐ (iâ)	uɛ (ue)	uɐ (uâ)	uɔ (uå)
close to open			ua (uä)
close-mid to open-mid		eɐ (eâ)
close-mid to open	ea (ea)

All diphthongs can occur as both long and short, although this is not indicated in spelling. Short diphthongs are distinguished from long ones by both length and stress placement: short diphthongs have a stressed second component, whereas long diphthongs have stress on the first component.

Consonants

The inventory of consonant phonemes is the following; their orthographic representations are given in brackets:

		labial	dental / alveolar		postalveolar	palatal	velar
			plain	sibilant	sibilant
Nasal		m (m)	n (n)			ɲ (nj)	ŋ (ŋ)
Stop and affricate	unvoiced1	p (p)	t (t)	t͡s (c)	t͡ʃ (č)	c͡ç (ǩ)	k (k)
	voiced2	b (b)	d (d)	d͡z (ʒ)	d͡ʒ (ǯ)	ɟ͡ʝ (ǧ)	g (g)
Fricative	unvoiced	f (f)		s (s)	ʃ (š)		x (h)
	voiced	v (v)	ð (đ)	z (z)	ʒ (ž)	ʝ (j)	ɣ (ǥ)
Trill			r (r)
Lateral			l (l)			ʎ (lj)
Approximant		w (u)				j (i)

¹Unvoiced stops and affricates are pronounced preaspirated after vowels and sonorant consonants.

²Voiced stops and affricates are usually pronounced just weakly voiced.

³/x/ has the allophone [h] in initial position.

Consonants may be phonemically short or long (geminate) both word-medially or word-finally; both are exceedingly common. Long and short consonants also contrast in consonant clusters, cf. kuõskkâd 'to touch' : kuõskâm 'I touch'.

Suprasegmentals

There is one phonemic suprasegmental, the palatalizing suprasegmental that affects the pronunciation of an entire syllable. In written language the palatalizing suprasegmental is indicated with a free-standing acute accent between a stressed vowel and the following consonant, as follows:

vääˊrr 'mountain, hill' (suprasegmental palatalization present)

cf. väärr 'trip' (no suprasegmental palatalization)

The suprasegmental palatalization has three distinct phonetic effects:

• The stressed vowel is pronounced as slightly more fronted in palatalized syllables than in non-palatalized ones.
• When the palatalizing suprasegmental is present, the following consonant or consonant cluster is pronounced as weakly palatalized. It should be noted that suprasegmental palatalization is independent of segmental palatals: inherently palatal consonants (i.e. consonants with palatal place of articulation) such as the palatal glide /j/, the palatal nasal /ń/ (spelled <nj>) and the palatal lateral approximant /ĺ/ (spelled <lj>) can occur both in non-palatalized and suprasegmentally palatalized syllables.
• If the word form is monosyllabic and ends in a consonant, a non-phonemic weakly voiced or unvoiced vowel is pronounced after the final consonant. This vowel is e-colored if suprasegmental palatalization is present, but a-colored if not.

Stress

Skolt Sami has four different types of stress for words:

• Primary stress
• Secondary stress
• Tertiary stress
• Zero stress

The first syllable of any word is always the primary stressed syllable in Skolt Sami as Skolt is a fixed-stress language. In words with two or more syllables, the final syllable is quite lightly stressed (tertiary stress) and the remaining syllable, if any, are stressed more heavily than the final syllable, but less than the first syllable (secondary stress).

Using the abessive and the comitative singular in a word appears to disrupt this system, however, in words of more than one syllable. The suffix, as can be expected, has teratiary stress, but the penult syllable also has tertiary stress, even though it would be expected to have secondary stress.

Zero stress can be said to be a feature of conjunctions, postpositions, particles and monosyllabic pronouns.

Grammar

Skolt Sami is a synthetic, highly inflected language that shares many grammatical features with the other Uralic languages. However, Skolt Sami is not a typical agglutinative language like many of the other Uralic languages are, as it has developed considerably into the direction of a fusional language, much like Estonian. Therefore, cases and other grammatical features are also marked by modifications to the root and not just marked with suffixes. Many of the suffixes in Skolt Sami are portmanteau morphemes that express several grammatical features at a time.

Cases

Skolt Sámi has 9 cases in the singular, although the genitive and accusative are often the same:

Nominative

Like the other Uralic languages, the nominative singular is unmarked and indicates the subject or a predicate. The nominative plural is also unmarked and always looks the same as the genitive singular.

Genitive

The genitive singular is unmarked and looks the same as the nominative plural. The genitive plural is marked by an -i. The genitive is used:

• to indicate possession (Tuˊst lij muu ǩeˊrjj.: You have my book.)
• to indicate number, if said the number is between 2 and 6. (Sieˊzzest lij kuõˊhtt põõrt. My father’s sister (my aunt) has two houses.)
• with prepositions (rääi + [GEN]: by, beyond something)
• with most postpositions. (Sij mõˊnne ääkkäd årra.: They went to your grandmother’s (house). They went to visit your grandmother.)

The genitive has been replacing the partitive for some time and is nowadays more commonly used in its place.

Accusative

The accusative is the direct object case and it is unmarked in the singular. In the plural, its marker is -d, which is preceded by the plural marker -i, making it look the same as the plural illative. The accusative is also used to mark some adjuncts, e.g., obb tääˊlv (the entire winter).

Locative

The locative marker in the singular is -st and -n in the plural. This case is used to indicate:

• where something is (Kuäˊđest lij ǩeˊrjj: There is a book in the kota.)
• where it is coming from (Niõđ puõˊtte domoi Čeˊvetjääuˊrest. The girls came home from Sevettijärvi.)
• who has possession of something (Suˊst lij čâustõk: He/she has a lasso.)

In addition, it is used with certain verbs:

• to ask someone s.t. : kõõččâd [+loc]

Illative

The illative marker actually has three different markers in the singular to represent the same case: -a, -e and -u. The plural illative marker is -d, which is preceded by the plural marker -i, making it look the same as the plural accusative. This case is used to indicate:

• where something is going
• who is receiving something
• the indirect object

Comitative

The comitative marker in the singular is -in and -vuiˊm in the plural. The comitative is used to state with whom or what something was done:

• Njääˊlm sekstet leeiˊnin. The mouth is wiped with a piece of cloth.
• Vuõˊlğğem paaˊrnivuiˊm ceerkvest. I left church with the children.
• Vuõˊlğğem vueˊbbinan ceerkvest. I left church with my sister.

To form the comitative singular, use the genitive singular form of the word as the root and -in. To form the comitative plural, use the plural genitive root and -vuiˊm.

Abessive

The abessive marker is -tää in both the singular and the plural. It always has a tertiary stress.

• Vuõˊlğğem paaˊrnitää ceerkvest. I left church without the children.
• Sij mõˊnne niõđtää põˊrtte. They went in the house without the girl.
• Sij mõˊnne niõđitää põˊrtte. They went in the house without the girls.

Essive

The dual form of the essive is still used with pronouns, but not with nouns and does not appear at all in the plural.

Partitive

The partitive is only used in the singular and can always be replaced by the genitive. The partitive marker is -d.

1. It appears after numbers larger than 6:

• kääuˊc čâustõkkâd: eight lassos

This can be replaced with kääˊuc čâustõõǥǥ.

2. It is also used with certain postpositions:

• kuäˊtted vuâstta: against a kota

This can be replaced with kuä'đ vuâstta'

3. It can be used with the comparative to express that which is being compared:

• Kåˊlled pueˊrab : better than gold

This would nowadays more than likely be replaced by pueˊrab ko kåˊll

Pronouns

The personal pronouns have three numbers - singular, plural and dual. The following table contains personal pronouns in the nominative and genitive/accusative cases.

	English	nominative	English	genitive
First person (singular)	I	mon	my	muu
Second person (singular)	you (thou)	ton	your, yours	tuu
Third person (singular)	he, she	son	his, her	suu
First person (dual)	we (two)	muäna	our	muännai
Second person (dual)	you (two)	tuäna	your	tuännai
Third person (dual)	they (two)	suäna	theirs	suännai
First person (plural)	we	mij	our	mij
Second person (plural)	you	tij	your	tij
Third person (plural)	they	sij	their	sij

The next table demonstrates the declension of a personal pronoun he/she (no gender distinction) in various cases:

	Singular	Dual	Plural
Nominative	son	suäna	sij
Genitive	suu	suännai	sij
Accusative	suu	suännaid	siˊjjid
Illative	suˊnne	suännaid	siˊjjid
Locative	suˊst	suännast	siiˊst
Comitative	suin	suännain	siˊjjivuiˊm
Abessive	suutää	suännaitää	siˊjjitää
Essive	suuˊnen	suännan	--
Partitive	suuˊđed	--	--

Verbs

Person

Skolt Sami verbs conjugate for four grammatical persons:

• first person
• second person
• third person
• fourth person, also called the indefinite person

Mood

Skolt Sami has 5 grammatical moods:

• indicative
• imperative (Pueˊtted sõrgg domoi! Come home soon!)
• conditional
• potential
• optative

Grammatical number

Skolt Sami verbs conjugate for two grammatical numbers:

• singular
• plural

Unlike other Sami varieties, Skolt Sami verbs do not inflect for *dual number. Instead, verbs occurring with the dual personal pronouns appear in the corresponding plural form.

Tense

Skolt Sami has 2 simple tenses:

• past (Puõˊttem škoouˊle jåhtta.: I came to school yesterday.)
• non-past (Evvan puätt mu årra täˊbbe. John is coming to my house today.)

and 2 compound tenses:

• perfect
• pluperfect

Verbal nouns

Skolt Sami verbs have 6 nominal forms:

• the infinitive
• the gerund
• the active participle (progressive)
• the abessive
• the present participle
• the past participle

Negative verb

Skolt Sami, like Finnish, the other Sámi languages and Estonian, has a negative verb. In Skolt Sami, the negative verb conjugates according to mood (indicative, imperative and optative), person (1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th) and number (singular, dual and plural).

    Ind. pres.                Imperative         Optative
    sg.      du/pl.           sg.    du/pl.       sg.    du/pl.                        
1   jiõm     jeäˊp         1  -      -         1  ?      jeällap   
    jim      jep               
2   jiõk     jeäˊped       2  jieˊl  jieˊlled  2  jieˊl  jieˊlled
    jik      jeˊped           jeˊl   jeˊlled      jeˊl   jeˊlled
3   ij       jiâ, jeä, jie 3  -      -         3  jeälas jeällaz
4       jeäˊt
             

Note that ij + leat is usually written as iˊlla, iˊlleäkku, iˊllää or iˊllä and ij + leat is usually written as jeäˊla or jeäˊlä.

Unlike the other Sami languages, Skolt Sami no longer has separate forms for the dual and plural of the negative verb and uses the plural forms for both instead.

References

• Korhonen, Mikko. Mosnikoff, Jouni. Sammallahti, Pekka. Koltansaamen opas. Castreanumin toimitteita, Helsinki 1973.
• Mosnikoff, Jouni and Pekka Sammallahti. Uˊcc sääm-lääˊdd sääˊnnǩeârjaž = Pieni koltansaame-suomi sanakirja. Jorgaleaddji 1988.
• Mosnikoff, Jouni and Pekka Sammallahti. Suomi-koltansaame sanakirja = Lääˊdd-sääˊm sääˊnnǩeˊrjj. Ohcejohka : Girjegiisá 1991.
• Moshnikoff, Satu. Muu vuõssmõs sääˊmǩeˊrjj 1987.
• Sámi Language Act

External links

• Kimberli Mäkäräinen A very small Skolt Sámi - English vocabulary (<500 words)
• Northern Sámi - Inari Sámi - Skolt Sámi - English dictionary (requires a password nowadays)
• Names of birds found in Sápmi in a number of languages, including Skolt Sámi and English. Search function only works with Finnish input though.
• Sääˊmjieˊllem Sámi Museum site on the history of the Skolt Sámi in Finland
• Zita McRobbie-Utasi A number of linguistic articles on Skolt Sámi.
• Erkki Lumisalmi talks in Skolt Sámi (mp3)