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Klallam Grammar Main Menu Klallam Grammar Alphabet and Sounds Basics Grammar Introduction: How to Use This Grammar 1 Transitive and Intransitive Verbs 2 Past and Future Tense 3 Basic Speech Acts 4 Nouns and Articles 5 Possessive Pronouns 6 Adjectives 7 Object Pronouns 8 The Preposition and Word Order 9 Negative Words 10 More Negative Words 11 Self and Each Other 12 Questions: ‘Who?’ and ‘What?’ 13 Subordinate Subjects in Questions 14 Questions: ‘Whose?’ 15 Focus Pronouns and Answering Questions 16 Comparison 17 Conjunction: ‘And/with,’ ‘but/without,’ and ‘or’ 18 Questions: ‘When?’ 19 Time Expressions 20 More Time Expressions 21 Time Prefixes 22 Questions: ‘Where?’ 23 Some Place Expressions 24 Source, Way, and Destination 25 Serial Verbs 26 Questions: ‘How?’ and ‘How much?’ 27 While Clauses 28 Adverbial Expressions 29 Intensifier Auxiliaries 30 Conditional Clauses 31 Passive Sentences and Shifting Vowels 32 Lexical Suffixes 33 Collective Plural 34 Possessed Verbs 35 So Then ... 36 Reporting Verbs and Direct Quotes 37 Indirect Quotes 38 Questions: ‘Why?’ 39 Because 40 Cause 41 Speech Act Particles 42 The Actual: To Be Continuing 43 State, Result, and Duration 44 Participant Roles and Middle Voice 45 Recipient, Beneficiary, and Source Objects 46 Reflexive, Noncontrol Middle, and Contingent 47 Activity Suffixes 48 Relative Clauses 49 Verbal Prefixes 50 Movement and Development Suffixes 51 Nominalizing Prefixes 52 Adverbial Prefixes 53 More Demonstrative Articles 54 Objects of Intent, Emotion, Direction, and Success 55 More Reduplication Patterns 56 Interjections 57 Rare Suffixes 58 A Fully Annotated Text 59 Texts to Annotate 60 Conclusion Appendices Klallam Dictionary Klallam-English and English-Klallam sections only

Klallam Vowels

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i, e, ə, a, u These are the vowel sounds of Klallam.
i is the same as the i in English ‘machine.’
e is rare in Klallam and occurs before ʔ and sometimes before y or y̓. It is the same as the e in English ‘bet.’
ə is called a ‘schwa.’ It is pronounced like the a and o of English ‘above’ or like the u in English ‘cut.’ It also can sound like the vowels of English ‘hook’ or ‘hit’ or ‘hot,’ depending on what sounds it is next to.
u is usually pronounced like the u in English ‘tune’ or the oo in English ‘hoot.’ It also sometimes sounds more like the vowel of English ‘boat’ especially when it comes before ʔ.
a is usually slightly longer than the other vowels. It is pronounced like the vowel in English ‘call.’ Each of the vowels is shown below with an accent mark. (Note that ‘a’ is just the italics version of ‘a.’ They are not different vowels.)