Introduction

East Cree words, even long ones, have one accent each. However, it may be difficult for you to hear the accent at all; or it may be difficult to hear where the accent is in certain words. The page on hearing accent provides some further details on this difficult topic.

When a vowel is accented in East Cree, it has higher pitch. Often, it is also louder.

Accent placement

Words with only one vowel have an accent on that vowel. In contrast, words with more than one vowel can be accented on the third-last, second-last or last vowel. (Of course, words with only two vowels have no third-last vowel to accent; they can only be accented on the first or last vowel.) (The transcriptions are broad; we have omitted vowel length, and consonant voicing.)

Accent falls on the only vowel

Accent falls on the third-last vowel

Accent falls on the second-last vowel

Accent falls on the last vowel

How to accent words

For most words, especially verbs, you can hear accent on either the second-last or third-last vowel:

These rules will also work for many nouns. However, if both the second-last and third-last vowel of the noun are lax (I, U, or A), then either vowel might be accented. The catch is that you have to memorize which vowel to accent in such cases. For example, you have no choice of which vowel to accent in KIPITAAU: in this particular word, you have to accent the third-last (or first) vowel. If you were to accent the second-last vowel in this word, or it would sound strange.

In contrast, for a word like USPITUN, you have to accent the second-last vowel; accenting the third-last (or first) vowel would sound strange:

Word-final accent

For the remaining discussion, we make a distinction between

Non-final accent was described above. It is different from final accent in one major respect: non-final accent does not change the meaning of the word; in contrast, final accent nearly always adds to the meaning of the word in some way. Examples are provided below. (In this section, examples were provided by DB.)

The difference between non-final and final accent can signal the difference between a singular and a plural noun:

Non-final accent (singular) Final accent (plural) Translation
asinii asiniih stone, stones
mischisin mischisinh shoe, shoes
muushkamii muushkamiih broth, broths
niipisii niipisiih willow, willows
waapuyan waapuyanh blanket, blankets

It can also signal the difference between a plain noun and an obviative noun (the latter occurring in a sentence):

Plain noun taawaahiikin drum (non-final accent)
Obviative noun taawaahiikin chiataamihu he was playing the drum (final accent on ‘drum’)

The switch between non-final and final accent can convey other differences in meaning, both in nouns and in verbs. Examples will be provided by your teacher.

Meaningful H sounds (with final accent)

There is one additional difference between words with non-final and final accent. The difference is most obvious in some words ending with a consonant. In such cases, you might hear a final H. Although it is difficult to hear, the singular word MISCHISIN in the following table does not have a final H sound, while the plural MISCHISINH does. (It ends with a more ‘breathy-sounding’ NH.) In contrast, however, both the singular and plural pronunciations of WAAPUYAN/WAAPUYANH end with an H-like sound; the only difference is the shift from non-final to final accent..

Non-final accent (singular) Final accent PLUS FINAL H? (plural) Translation
mischisin mischisinh shoe, shoes
waapuyan waapuyanh blanket, blankets

When it occurs with final accent, the H sound helps to signal differences in meaning. For this reason, words with final accent are spelled with a final H.

The examples of WAAPUYAN/WAAPUYANH illustrate that, by itself, the presence of an H-like sound at the end of the word is not a reliable indicator of a change in meaning. To underscore this point, both the singular words with non-final accent and the plural words with final accent in the following table end with an H sound. (There is no final H spelling in the singular words, just an H sound.)

Non-final accent (singular) Final accent PLUS FINAL H (plural) Translation
asinii asiniih stone, stones
muushkamii muushkamiih broth, broths
niipisii niipisiih willow, willows

Since the H sound does not help convey a difference in meaning in the singular words, it is not spelled in the singular words. In contrast, however, since it helps to signal a difference in meaning in the plural words, the H sound is also spelled out. See the page about H sounds for more information on when to spell H.

The main thing to remember at this point is that important differences in meaning are signalled by

To illustrate the above point more extensively, here are some interesting examples.

Although the following word ends with an H, it has non-final accent; no special meaning difference is conveyed by the presence of H alone. This word just happens to end with an H. (Similarly, in English, although the word ‘lens’ ends with an ’s’, ‘lens’ is not a plural word — it denotes one ‘lens’.)

Although you can hear an H sound at the end of WIIWIITIMAA, accent in this word is non-final (on the third-to-last vowel). The H sound, which is absent from the spelling in this case, does not carry a special meaning in the absence of final accent.

Finally, in words with only one vowel, the ‘last’ (or ‘first’, or ‘only’) vowel is accented. In this case, final accent does not necessarily signal a difference in meaning. For example, you can hear ‘final’ accent and even a final H-like (or [ʷ]) sound in the word KAAKW; however, the word has ‘final’ accent simply because it only has one vowel, and it has a final H-like sound because that is how W is pronounced at the end of this particular word. Similar observations can be made about the word KUUK.

See the page about H for more information about the role of H sounds in East Cree.

Next: more on H sounds

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