BOAS] HANDBOOK OF AMERICAN INDIAN LANGUAGES 975 



The majorit}^ of the symbols here used are in accordance with the 

 signs employed by the Association phonetique internationale. - 1 prefer 

 the simple r instead of the ?r, and lo instead of b of the Association, 

 that the Eskimo words ma}' not look more ditticult than necessary; 

 nevertheless, r and id in the Eskimo language mean something ver}^ 

 different from the English r and w. The same is true of my signs for 

 the s- and a- sounds, and, of course, of all the uvularized vowels, all 

 of which only in part agree with sounds of any other language that 

 I know of. 



: indicates length of the preceding vowel or consonant; e. g., a:—aa 



or a; m.-^^mm or m. 

 I prefer in ordinary orthography to double the sign to indicate 



length of sound: thus, aa, mm., ss, etc. A single consonant is 



always to be considered short. 

 ' stands before the stressed syllable of a word. Degrees of stress are 



indicated thus: 'a, strong stress; "a, very strong stress; ^a or 



«, weak stress. 

 ^ indicates nasalization: a, ^, f. 



*', ** mean glides of the preceding vowel: a* [«"] or [ai], a" [a'] or [au]. 

 ^, *■ mean labialization and uvularization. 



Following is a detailed description of these sounds: 

 A uvularized a, or followed by a uvular, in my ordinary ^ transcription 



ar, or pronounced with the soft palate (the velum) strained 



and lifted. It is like a in English far, followed by the Eskimo 



fricative r (or q) ; see under r. 

 ArssAq a ball 



a as in French ame, patte (rarely like French pate, pas, or English 

 father). 

 Arnaa his woman, mother 

 ataa beneath it 



d about as in man; a short a modified by closed consonants and point- 

 consonants (or dentals) (Sweet, "A Primer of Phonetics," §§50 

 and 190). 



qilah skv 

 nanoq bear 

 jpimmat as he came 



iLe Maitre phonetique, 1905: Expos6 des principes de I'Association phonetique Internationale. — 

 Cf. Paul Passy, Petite Phonetique comparee (Leipsic et Berlin, 1906). 

 2 In my ordinary transcription I have tried to avoid diacritical marks. 



§2 



