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38-412: Various sources estimate there are fewer than 100 to 150 remaining active Aleut speakers. Because of this, Eastern and Atkan Aleut are classified as "critically endangered and extinct" and have an Expanded Graded Intergenerational Disruption Scale (EGIDS) rating of 7. The task of revitalizing Aleut has largely been left to local government and community organizations. The overwhelming majority of schools in

76-430: A uvular , /i/ is lowered to [e] , /a/ is backed to [ɑ] , and /u/ is lowered to [o] . In contact with a coronal , /a/ is raised to [e] or [ɛ] , and /u/ is fronted to [ʉ] . The mid-vowels [ɔ] and [ɛ] occur only in family names like Nevzorof and very recently introduced Russian loanwords. (C)(C)V(V) ± {C(C)(C)V(V)} ± C An Aleut word may contain one to about a dozen syllables, all syllables with

114-468: A laminal articulation. The voiced dental fricative is pronounced interdentally. The pronunciation of the sibilant /s/ varies from an alveolar articulation to a retracted articulation like a palato-alveolar consonant. There is no contrast between / s / and ʃ in Aleut. Many Aleut speakers experience difficulties with this distinction while learning English. Aleut has a basic three-vowel system including

152-590: A language's status in terms of endangerment or development. The table below shows the various levels on the scale: The EGIDS model has become widely known, cited in 555 publications as of August 2021. Bering Island Bering Island ( Russian : о́стров Бе́ринга , romanized :  óstrov Béringa ) is located off the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Bering Sea . At 95 km (59 mi) long by 15 km (9.3 mi) wide, it

190-637: A natural habitat for sea otters , and their population now appears stable, unlike on other Aleutian islands, and although they had been hunted to near extinction on the then-recently discovered Bering Island by 1854. Steller sea lions continue to summer on Bering Island, but the manatee-like Steller's sea cows , which fed on the kelp beds surrounding the island, were hunted to extinction by 1768. Bering Island has also long been famous for its seal rookeries, including northern fur seals , common seals and larga seals , although that population dropped to but 2 rookeries totaling 3,000 seals by 1913 (two years after

228-568: A planeload of Aleuts from Nikolskoye met another planeload of Alaskan Aleuts in Kamchatka's capital, and were surprised they could still communicate in the old Aleut language. Because of their isolation, like the now-Alaskan Pribilof Islands , the Aleuts have been used for studies of genetic drift. The area surrounding Bering Island is now a biosphere reserve, known for its diverse wildlife, and particularly marine mammals. The island's shores form

266-479: A vocalic nucleus. In Atkan and Attuan, there is a word-final CC due to apocopation . There also exist word initial CCC in loanwords. A word may begin or end in a vowel, both short and long, with few exceptions. Due to apocopation, short /u/ is not found in the final position. The same is true for short /i/ , except in some obsolete suffixes, such as -chi 'your' (pl.) which is realized as -chin and -chix in modern Eastern and Atkan Aleut. Vowels within

304-532: A wider variety of stress patterns. Stress may be attracted to another syllable by a long vowel or relatively sonorant consonant, or by a closed syllable. It is possible the stress can be determined by rhythmic factors so that one word will have different stress in different contexts, such as áĝadax̂ compared to àĝádax̂ , both meaning 'arrow'. Expanded Graded Intergenerational Disruption Scale The Expanded Graded Intergenerational Disruption Scale ( EGIDS ), developed by Lewis and Simons (2010), measures

342-532: A word are separated by at least one consonant. All single consonants can appear in an intervocalic position, with the following exceptions: Words begin with any consonant except / θ / and preaspirated consonants (with the exception of the preaspirated / ŋ̥ / in Atkan Aleut). Only in loanwords do / v / , / z / , and the borrowed consonants ( p, b, f, d, g, ɹ / ɾ ) appear word-initially. The word-initial CC can take many forms, with various restrictions on

380-612: Is a round island with a diameter of 800 m (2,600 ft). In 1741 Commander Vitus Bering , sailing in Svyatoy Pyotr ( St. Peter ) for the Russian Navy , was shipwrecked and died of scurvy on Bering Island, along with 28 of his men. His ship had been destroyed by storms as they returned from an expedition that discovered mainland Alaska as well as the Aleutian Islands for Russians. The survivors under

418-425: Is indeterminate and often difficult to define. Stress varies based on the relation to the beginning or end of the word form, the length of the vowels, the sonority of the consonants, open- or closeness of the syllables, or the number of syllables in sentential rhythm and intonation. Stress affects the length of both vowels and consonants. Stress underlies the distinctive syncopation characteristics of Eastern Aleut. In

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456-425: Is pronounced voiced or devoiced. Voiceless approximants and devoiced nasals are preaspirated . The preaspiration of approximants causes very little friction and may pronounced more as a breathy voice. The preaspiration of devoiced nasals starts with a voiceless airstream through the nose and may end voiced before a vowel. The preaspiration feature is represented orthographically with an ⟨h⟩ preceding

494-609: Is rare, but attested, such as hux̂xix 'rain pants', aliĝngix̂ 'wolf', asliming 'fit for me', iistalix 'to say; to tell; to call'. In CCC clusters, the middle consonant is either / t / , / tʃ / , / s / . For example, taxtxix̂ 'pulse', huxsx̂ilix 'to wrap up', chamchxix̂ 'short fishline'. The most common single consonants to appear word-final are / x / , / χ / , / m / , / n / , / ŋ / , and / j / . Through apocopation, word-final single consonants / l / and / s / occur, and word-final consonant clusters ending with / t / or / s / . The details of

532-571: Is the largest and westernmost of the Commander Islands , with an area of 1,667 km (1,036 mi). Most of Bering Island and several of the smaller islands in their entirety are now part of the Komandorsky Zapovednik nature preserve. Bering Island is treeless, desolate and experiences severe weather, including high winds, persistent fog and earthquakes. It had no year-round human residents until roughly 1826. Now,

570-558: The North Pacific Fur Seal Convention of 1911 ), particularly after the 20 year hunting lease of Hutchinson, Kohl and Company of San Francisco, which removed over 800,000 pelts. Whale species sighted in the surrounding waters include sperm whales , orcas , several species of beaked whales , humpback , and right whales . Porpoises also frequent these waters. Bering Island also has numerous seabirds. UNESCO noted that 203 bird species have been sighted on

608-622: The Aleutian islands to the United States in 1867, Bering Island was placed under the Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky jurisdiction. The population grew from 110 people in 1827 (17 Russians, 45 Aleuts and 48 mixed race) to more than 300 people in 1879 (100 Aleuts on Copper island alone, along with 332 mixed-race and about 10% Russian or other nationalities). In 1990, after 170 years of separation and loss of cultural traditions,

646-812: The Bering Aleut. The modern practical Aleut orthography was designed in 1972 for the Alaskan school system's bilingual program: The historic Aleut ( Cyrillic ) alphabet found in both Alaska and Russia has the standard pre-1918 Russian orthography as its basis, although a number of Russian letters were used only in loanwords. In addition, the extended Cyrillic letters г̑ (г with inverted breve), ҟ, ҥ, ў, х̑ (х with inverted breve) were used to represent distinctly Aleut sounds. A total of 24+ letters were used to represent distinctly Aleut words, including 6 vowels (а, и, й, у, ю, я) and 16 consonants (г, г̑, д, з, к, ԟ, л, м, н, ҥ, с, т, ў, х, х̑, ч). The letter ӄ has replaced

684-551: The Commander Islands, including 58 nesting there. Puffins are abundant, although the semi-flightless spectacled cormorant became extinct circa 1850. Two species of the Arctic foxes that tormented Bering's crew remain. Humans introduced reindeer , American mink and rats to the islands, with negative effects on native wildlife. Like the rest of Kamchatka Krai, Bering Island has a subarctic climate ( Dfc ), though

722-594: The Eastern Aleutian Islands as early as 4,000 years ago, followed by a gradual expansion westward over the next 1,500 years to the Near Islands . Another westward expansion may have occurred about 1,000 years ago, which may explain the lack of obvious diversification among the Aleut dialects, with Eastern Aleut features having spread westward. This second westward expansion is characterized as a period of cultural affinity with southeastern Alaska and

760-493: The Pacific Northwest Coast, which may explain linguistic features that Aleut shares with neighboring non-Eskimo languages, such as rules of plural formation. Due to colonization by Russian colonizers and traders in the 18th and 19th centuries, Aleut has a large portion of Russian loanwords. However, they do not affect the basic vocabulary and thus do not suggest undue influence on the language. In March 2021,

798-646: The Russian mainland, Steller then explored the Kamchatka peninsula and ultimately published De Bestiis Marinis (‘On the Beasts of the Sea’). However, his sympathies for the native peoples led to accusations that he was fomenting rebellion, so he was imprisoned and recalled to St. Petersburg , dying en route at age 37, although his diaries were later published to great acclaim and historic significance. In 1743 Emilian Basov landed on Bering Island to hunt sea otter, beginning

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836-476: The command of the Swedish born lieutenant Sven Waxell  [ ru ] were stranded on the island for 10 months, and managed to survive by killing seals and birds. They were able to build a boat out of their stranded wreck and managed to return to Petropavlovsk on the Kamchatka Peninsula in 1742 with sea otter furs and preserved meat from the newly discovered island. Another of the expedition's survivors

874-448: The distribution of consonants: Intervocalic CC can occur in normal structure or as the result of syncopation. In CC clusters of two voiced continuants, there is often a short transitional vowel. For example, qilĝix̂ 'umbilical cord' is pronounced [-lĝ-] similar to qiliĝi-n 'brain'. Almost all possible combinations of coronal and postlingual consonants are attested. The combination of two postlingual or two coronal consonants

912-544: The extensive syncopation characteristic of the Eastern Aleut dialect are described below. In the examples, the syncopated vowel will be shown in parentheses. A word medial short vowel may be syncopated between single consonants, except after an initial open short syllable and/or before a final open short syllable. For example, ìx̂am(a)nákux̂ 'it is good' and alqut(a)maan 'what for?'. The syncopation often creates consonant clusters beyond those prescribed by

950-528: The following discussion, the acute accent (á) indicates the stronger stress and the grave accent (à) indicates the weaker. In Eastern Aleut, stronger stress tends to fall on the penultimate syllable if it is short (has a short vowel), or on the last syllable if it is long (has a long vowel). The weaker stress commonly falls on the first syllable. For example, úlax̂ 'house', tùnúnax̂ 'talked', tùnulákan 'without talking', ìnaqáam 'he himself'. Eastern Aleut words with more than two syllables exhibit

988-540: The general rules of Aleut phonotactics. The resulting clusters include: In some frequently encountered syncopated forms, which otherwise result in irregular three consonant clusters, the middle uvular fricative is deleted along with the preceding vowel. For example, (h)iis(ax̂)talix 'saying' and (h)iil(ax̂)talix 'being said'. At slower speeds of speech, the syncopation may not be realized. Compare txin saakutikux̂txin 'you are getting skinny' beside ting saak(u)tikuqing 'I am getting skinny'. Aleut stress

1026-445: The given sound. For example, a devoiced, preaspirated labial nasal would be written ⟨hm⟩ . Voiced approximants and nasals may be partly devoiced in contact with a voiceless consonant and at the end of a word. The voiceless glottal approximant / h / functions as an initial aspiration before a vowel. In Atkan and Attuan, the prevocalic / h / aspiration contrasts with an audible but not written glottal stop initiation of

1064-465: The high front /i/ , low /a/ , and high back /u/ . Aleut vowels contrast with their long counterparts /iː/ , /aː/ , and /uː/ . Notably, Aleut /u/ is pronounced slightly lower than /i/ in the vowel space. The long vowel /aː/ is pronounced retracted in the vowel space creating a significant distinction relative to the vowel length of /a/ . The two high vowels are pronounced with the same vowel quality regardless of vowel length. In contact with

1102-544: The historically Aleut-speaking regions lack any language/culture courses in their curriculum, and those that do fail to produce fluent or even proficient speakers. The Eskimo and Aleut peoples were part of a migration from Asia across Beringia , the Bering land bridge between 4,000 and 6,000 years ago. During this period, the Proto-Eskimo-Aleut language was spoken, which broke up around 2000 BC. Differentiation of

1140-616: The island's documented human habitation as well as ecological destruction. Promyshlenniki began to island-hop across the Bering Sea to the Aleutian islands and ultimately Alaska. In 1825 the Russian-American Company transferred Aleut families from Attu Island to Bering Island to hunt, and another group of Aleut and mixed-race settlers followed the following year, thus establishing the first known permanent human habitation on Bering Island. After Russia sold Alaska and

1178-685: The last native speaker of the Bering dialect, Vera Timoshenko, died aged 93 in Nikolskoye , Bering Island , Kamchatka. Within the Eastern group are the dialects of the Alaskan Peninsula, Unalaska , Belkofski , Akutan , the Pribilof Islands , Kashega and Nikolski . The Pribilof dialect has more living speakers than any other dialect of Aleut. The Atkan grouping comprises the dialects of Atka and Bering Island . Attuan

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1216-674: The letter ԟ (Aleut Ka) for the voiceless uvular plosive /q/ in modern Aleut Cyrillic publications. The modern Aleut orthography (for Bering dialect): The consonant phonemes of the various Aleut dialects are represented below. Each cell indicates the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) representation of the phoneme; consonants existing only in loanwords are in parentheses. Some phonemes are unique to specific dialects of Aleut. The palato-alveolar affricate / tʃ / and uvular stop / q / are pronounced with strong aspiration. Attuan labial fricative / v /

1254-460: The ocean makes temperatures much less extreme than interior Siberia, with winters being about four degrees milder than in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky . The transition to the subpolar oceanic climate of southwest Alaska to the east is very apparent, especially in the extremely low sunshine hours, which average only around 2.8 h per day due to the consistent fog from the Aleutian Low and

1292-524: The two branches is thought to have happened in Alaska because of the linguistic diversity found in the Eskimo languages of Alaska relative to the entire geographic area where Eskimo languages are spoken (eastward through Canada to Greenland). After the split between the two branches, their development is thought to have occurred in relative isolation. Evidence suggests a culture associated with Aleut speakers on

1330-440: The village of Nikolskoye is home to 800 people, roughly three hundred of them identifying as Aleuts . The island's small population is involved mostly in fishing . Two and a half miles (4 km) off Bering Island's western shore lies small Toporkov Island (Ostrov Toporkov) 55°12′9″N 165°55′59″E  /  55.20250°N 165.93306°E  / 55.20250; 165.93306  ( Toporkov Island ) . It

1368-400: The vowel. Compare halal ('to turn the head') and alal ('to need'). This contrast has been lost in Eastern Aleut. Modern Eastern Aleut has a much simpler consonant inventory because the voice contrasts among nasals, sibilants and approximants have been lost. Consonants listed in the dental column have varied places of articulation. The stop, nasal, and lateral dentals commonly have

1406-465: Was Georg Wilhelm Steller , who eventually managed to convince his companions to eat seaweed (thus curing their scurvy). Steller explored Bering Island and cataloged its fauna, including Steller's sea cow , which became extinct within three decades due to being hunted for its meat. The island's highest point (2,464 feet (751 m)) is now named to honor the German-born naturalist. Upon returning to

1444-632: Was a distinct dialect showing influence from both Atkan and Eastern Aleut. Copper Island Aleut (also called Medny Aleut ) was a Russian-Attuan mixed language ( Copper Island ( Russian : Медный , Medny , Mednyj ) having been settled by Attuans). Despite the name, after 1969 Copper Island Aleut was spoken only on Bering Island, as Copper Islanders were evacuated there. After the death of the last native speaker in 2022, it became extinct. All dialects show lexical influence from Russian ; Copper Island Aleut has also adopted many Russian inflectional endings. The largest number of Russian loanwords can be seen in

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