Sekani or Tse’khene is a Northern Athabaskan language spoken by 135 of the Sekani people of north-central British Columbia, Canada. Most of them are only semispeakers, and it is considered critically endangered.
Phonology
Consonants
Sekani has 33 consonants:
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center"
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! rowspan="2" colspan="2" |
! rowspan="2" | Bilabial
! colspan="3" | Alveolar
! rowspan="2" | Post-<br />Alveolar
! colspan="2" | Velar
! rowspan="2" | Glottal
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! <small>plain</small> || <small>sibilant</small> || <small>lateral</small>
! <small>plain</small> || <small>labial</small>
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! rowspan="3" | Stop
! <small>voiceless</small>
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! <small>aspirated</small>
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! <small>ejective</small>
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! colspan="2" | Nasal
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! rowspan="2" | Fricative-<br />Approximant
! <small>voiceless</small>
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! <small>voiced</small>
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Vowels
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! Front
! Central
! Back
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! High
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! Mid
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! Low
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Tone
Sekani has two tones: low and high. High tone is the more common tone. Syllables phonologically marked for tone are low. For example, means , while means .
Nasalization
Nasalization of vowels is phonemic. The root means , while the root means .
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center"
|+ Kwadacha Tsek'ene alphabet
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! rowspan=2|Letter !! colspan=2|IPA
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! Syll. init. !! Syll. final
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In addition, represents , represents , represents , and represents .
Vocabulary
These words are from the FirstVoices dictionary for Kwadacha Tsek'ene dialect.