Central Alaskan Yupʼik

The Central Alaskan Yupʼik people are the largest group among Alaska Natives. They speak the Central Alaskan Yupʼik language, which is part of the Eskimo–Aleut language family. This language is spoken in western and southwestern Alaska. As of 2010, it was the second most spoken aboriginal language in the United States after Navajo.

The Yupʼik language is special because it is polysynthetic, meaning it uses many suffixes to build words. This makes the language very rich in expression. It also has special ways of showing relationships between things in sentences, using an ergative pattern. The language can show singular, dual, and plural numbers, but it does not have words for genders or articles like "the" in English.

Language name

The Yup’ik language has many names. Because it is spoken in the central part of Alaska, it is often called Central Alaskan Yup’ik. The word Yup’ik is commonly used by the people who speak it, and it means “genuine person.” Some other names used in different areas include Cup’ig, Cup’ik, and Yugtun.

Main article: Yupik languages
Main article: Alaska Native Language Center

Geographic distribution and use

Yupʼik is spoken mainly in southwestern Alaska, from Norton Sound in the north to the Alaska Peninsula in the south. It is located between Alutiiq ~ Sugpiaq to the south and east and Central Siberian Yupik to the west on St. Lawrence Island. To the north, it is bordered by the Iñupiaq language, which is quite different from Yupʼik.

There are more than 23,000 Yupʼik people, and over 14,000 of them speak the language. Children still learn Yupʼik as their first language in 17 villages, mostly along the lower Kuskokwim River and Nelson Island. However, the way younger people speak Yupʼik is changing due to English, making it simpler and using more English words.

Dialects

The Yup'ik language has five main dialects: Norton Sound, General Central Yup'ik, Nunivak, Hooper Bay-Chevak, and the extinct Egegik dialect. All these dialects can be understood by each other, but they have some differences in sounds and words. This is partly because of an old tradition where people avoided using certain names.

The Yup'ik dialects and where they are spoken include:

• Yup'ik
  • Norton Sound; spoken around Norton Sound
    1. Unaliq sub-dialect; spoken in Elim, Golovin, and St. Michael
    2. Kotlik sub-dialect; spoken in Kotlik
  • General Central Yup'ik; spoken on Nelson Island, the Yukon-Kuskokwim delta, and Bristol Bay region of Alaska
    1. Core dialects; spoken on the lower Kuskokwim, the coast up to Nelson Island, and in Bristol Bay
       1. Lower Kuskokwim sub-dialect; spoken in many places such as Bethel, Goodnews Bay, and Kipnuk
       2. Bristol Bay sub-dialect; spoken in Aleknagik, Dillingham, and Togiak
    2. Peripheral dialects; spoken on the upper Kuskokwim, the Yukon, and around Lake Iliamna
       1. Yukon or Lower Yukon sub-dialect; spoken in Alakanuk, Emmonak, and Marshall or Fortuna Ledge
       2. Upper or Middle Kuskokwim sub-dialect; spoken in Aniak, Chuathbaluk, and McGrath
       3. Lake Iliamna sub-dialect; spoken in Egegik, Igiugig, and Iliamna
    3. Mixed dialects
       1. Nelson Island & Stebbins sub-dialect; spoken in Chefornak, Newtok, and Nightmute
       2. Nushagak River sub-dialect; spoken in Ekwok, Koliganek, and New Stuyahok
  • Egegik, once spoken in Egegik
  • Hooper Bay-Chevak
    1. Hooper Bay sub-dialect; spoken in Hooper Bay
    2. Chevak sub-dialect; spoken in Chevak
  • Nunivak; spoken in Mekoryuk

The Nunivak dialect is quite different from the mainland Yup'ik dialects. The main difference between Hooper Bay and Chevak dialects is how they say some words.

Even smaller parts of these dialects can have different sounds and words.

Writing and literature

A special way of writing called the Yugtun script was created for the Central Alaskan Yupʼik language by Uyaquq around 1900. Today, the language is mostly written with the Latin script that many people use around the world. Early work on the language was done by missionaries, which helped people learn to read and write.

In the 1960s, Irene Reed and others created a modern writing system for the language. This led to the first bilingual school programs in some Yupʼik villages in the early 1970s. Since then, many books have been published, including a dictionary, grammar guides, and stories by different writers, even a full novel by Anna Jacobson.

Orthography

Several different ways have been used to write the Yupʼik language. Today, the most common way was created by the Alaska Native Language Center. It uses the regular letters we use in English, with some special pairs of letters called digraphs.

Vowels can be made longer, like writing aa, ii, or uu. Sometimes letters are written together with an apostrophe, like in Yupʼik, to show special sounds. Apostrophes also help show when sounds change in certain ways. A hyphen is used to separate small word parts from the main word.

Phonology

Yup'ik has four vowel sounds: /a/, /i/, /u/, and /ə/. The vowel /ə/ is always short, while the others can be short or long. Long vowels happen when a vowel is stressed or when two vowels come together.

Yup'ik also has many consonant sounds. Some consonants can change their sound depending on what comes before or after them. For example, the sound /v/ can sometimes sound like [w] when it is between two full vowels.

There are also changes in how words sound based on where stress is placed. Stress usually falls on every second syllable, starting from the left. This can cause some vowels to become longer or some consonants to repeat. There are also special rules for when certain sounds appear together, which can change how stress is placed in a word.

Grammar

Yup'ik has a complex structure with many parts added to words to change their meaning. This makes words very long but also very informative, similar to whole sentences in English.

Yup'ik uses three main types of words: nouns, verbs, and particles. Each type can serve many roles in sentences. For example, Yup'ik uses special word endings instead of prepositions to show relationships between things, much like adjectives do in English.

Morphology

Yup'ik words are built from stems, which carry the core meaning, followed by postbases that change the word’s meaning or type, and endings that show grammatical details like mood, person, and number. Enclitics can also be added to show the speaker’s attitude.

Verb conjugation

Yup'ik verbs must show mood and agreement. There are independent moods for main clauses and connective moods for subordinate clauses. Verbs also agree with their subjects and objects in number and person.

Nouns

Yup'ik nouns change based on number, case, and possession. The language uses an ergative-absolutive system, where the subject of an intransitive verb and the object of a transitive verb share the same form, while the subject of a transitive verb has a different form.

Word order

Yup'ik allows more flexible word order than English because its rich system of word endings often makes it clear who is doing what. However, there is a general preference for Subject-Object-Verb order in certain situations.

Spatial deixis

Yup'ik has a detailed system for describing the location and orientation of things and events, including contrasts based on distance, direction, and proximity to the speaker or listener.

Yupʼik language education

In 1972, the Alaska State Legislature made a rule that if a school has at least 15 students who speak a language other than English at home, the school must have a teacher who can speak that language. This helped make sure that students could learn in their own language.

Later, in the mid-1970s, schools started special programs to help keep the Yupʼik language alive. In 1987-8, groups including Alaska Native people began working on a plan to teach Alaska Native languages in schools, letting parents decide how much their children should learn in their own language.

Today, there are Yupʼik language classes at the University of Alaska Anchorage and the University of Alaska Fairbanks. The University of Alaska Fairbanks even offers full degrees focused on Yupʼik language and culture. In 2018, a special program where children can learn only in Yupʼik started at a school in Anchorage.