SOAS Research Online

Abstract

Yukaghir is a small language family comprising two closely related languages, Kolyma Yukaghir and Tundra Yukaghir, previously analyzed as dialects of one language. Both are spoken in the northeastern part of Siberia. Mainstream linguistics maintains that the Yukaghir family is genetically isolate, but there have been various attempts to demonstrate that it is distantly related to other families, most commonly Uralic. This chapter primarily describes vowel harmony (VH) in Kolyma Yukaghir, but also provides a brief comparison with Tundra Yukaghir. It demonstrates that Kolyma Yukaghir has a residual palatal and rounding harmony that operates in native lexical roots. Outside of primary roots, high vowels are harmony-neutral, and there is only one non-high short vowel (ǝ). This vowel is subject to optional assimilation initiated by the vowels in the root. The velar and uvular consonants interact with VH within the prosodic stem.