Koyukon is an Athabaskan language spoken along the Koyukuk and middle Yukon River in western interior Alaska. It has about 300 speakers - generally older adults bilingual in English - from an ethnic population of 2,300.

Jules Jette, a French Canadian

French Canadian

French Canadian or Francophone Canadian, , generally refers to the descendents of French colonists who arrived in New France in the 17th and 18th centuries...

 Jesuit missionary

Missionary

A missionary is a member of a religious group sent into an area to do evangelism or ministries of service, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care and economic development. The word "mission" originates from 1598 when the Jesuits sent members abroad, derived from the Latin...

, began recording the language and culture of the Koyukon

Koyukon

The Koyukon are a group of Athabaskan people living in northern Alaska. Their traditional home is along the Koyukuk and Yukon rivers where they subsisted by hunting and trapping for thousands of years...

 people in 1898. Considered a fluent Koyukon speaker after spending years in the region, Jette died in 1927, leaving behind a significant quantity of notes on the Koyukon people, their culture and beliefs, and their language. Eliza Jones, an Alaskan native and member of the Koyukon tribe, came in contact with these manuscripts while studying, and later working, at the University of Alaska in the early 1970s. Working from Jette's notes, and in consultation with Koyukon tribal elders, Jones pieced together the Koyukon Athabaskan Dictionary, edited by James Kari

James Kari

James Kari is a linguist and Professor Emeritus with the Alaska Native Language Center at the University of Alaska Fairbanks , specializing in Athabascan languages of Alaska. In the past thirty-five years he has done extensive linguistic work in many Athabascan languages including Ahtna, Dena'ina,...

 and published by the Alaska Native Language Center at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, in 2000.

The Koyukon Athabaskan Dictionary is unusually comprehensive in terms of documentation of an American indigenous language, in part because Jette's notes were of excellent quality and depth, and because these notes were taken around a century ago, when the language was far more actively spoken and the culture more traditional. The title 'dictionary' is misleading as the document is as much encyclopedic dictionary as it is a record of the culture and traditions of the Koyukon people.

There are also some traditional stories set down as readers by Catherine Attla and published by the University of Alaska, Fairbanks.

Consonants

Sounds are given in IPA with the orthographic equivalent in angled brackets:

caption | Consonant phonemes of Koyukon

		Bilabial	Alveolar Alveolar consonant Alveolar consonants are articulated with the tongue against or close to the superior alveolar ridge, which is called that because it contains the alveoli of the superior teeth...			Palatal	Velar Velar consonant Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth, known also as the velum)....	Uvular	Glottal Glottal consonant Glottal consonants, also called laryngeal consonants, are consonants articulated with the glottis. Many phoneticians consider them, or at least the so-called fricative, to be transitional states of the glottis without a point of articulation as other consonants have; in fact, some do not consider...
			Central Central consonant A central or medial consonant is a consonant sound that is produced when air flows across the center of the mouth over the tongue. The class contrasts with lateral consonants, in which air flows over the sides of the tongue rather than down its center....	Sibilant Sibilant consonant A sibilant is a manner of articulation of fricative and affricate consonants, made by directing a stream of air with the tongue towards the sharp edge of the teeth, which are held close together. Examples of sibilants are the consonants at the beginning of the English words sip, zip, ship, chip,...	Lateral Lateral consonant A lateral is an el-like consonant, in which airstream proceeds along the sides of the tongue, but is blocked by the tongue from going through the middle of the mouth....
Plosives and affricates Affricate consonant Affricates are consonants that begin as stops but release as a fricative rather than directly into the following vowel.- Samples :...	Plain	p ⟨b⟩	t ⟨d⟩	ts ⟨dz⟩	tɬ ⟨dl⟩		k ⟨g⟩	q ⟨gg⟩	ʔ ⟨'⟩
	Aspirated Aspiration (phonetics) In phonetics, aspiration is the strong burst of air that accompanies either the release or, in the case of preaspiration, the closure of some obstruents. To feel or see the difference between aspirated and unaspirated sounds, one can put a hand or a lit candle in front of one's mouth, and say pin ...		tʰ ⟨t⟩	tsʰ ⟨ts⟩	tɬʰ ⟨tl⟩		kʰ ⟨k⟩	qʰ ⟨kk⟩
	Ejective Ejective consonant In phonetics, ejective consonants are voiceless consonants that are pronounced with simultaneous closure of the glottis. In the phonology of a particular language, ejectives may contrast with aspirated or tenuis consonants...		tʼ	tsʼ	tɬʼ ⟨tl'⟩		kʼ	qʼ ⟨kk'⟩
Fricatives Fricative consonant Fricatives are consonants produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. These may be the lower lip against the upper teeth, in the case of ; the back of the tongue against the soft palate, in the case of German , the final consonant of Bach; or...	Voiced Voice (phonetics) Voice or voicing is a term used in phonetics and phonology to characterize speech sounds, with sounds described as either voiceless or voiced. The term, however, is used to refer to two separate concepts. Voicing can refer to the articulatory process in which the vocal cords vibrate...			z			ɣ ⟨gh⟩
	Voiceless Voice (phonetics) Voice or voicing is a term used in phonetics and phonology to characterize speech sounds, with sounds described as either voiceless or voiced. The term, however, is used to refer to two separate concepts. Voicing can refer to the articulatory process in which the vocal cords vibrate...			s			x		h
Sonorant Sonorant In phonetics and phonology, a sonorant is a speech sound that is produced without turbulent airflow in the vocal tract; fricatives and plosives are not sonorants. Vowels are sonorants, as are consonants like and . Other consonants, like or , restrict the airflow enough to cause turbulence, and... s	Voiced Voice (phonetics) Voice or voicing is a term used in phonetics and phonology to characterize speech sounds, with sounds described as either voiceless or voiced. The term, however, is used to refer to two separate concepts. Voicing can refer to the articulatory process in which the vocal cords vibrate...	m	n		l	j ⟨y⟩
	Voiceless Voice (phonetics) Voice or voicing is a term used in phonetics and phonology to characterize speech sounds, with sounds described as either voiceless or voiced. The term, however, is used to refer to two separate concepts. Voicing can refer to the articulatory process in which the vocal cords vibrate...		n̥ ⟨nh⟩		l̥ ⟨ł⟩	ȷ̊ ⟨yh⟩

Plosives and affricates, other than the labial b and the glottal , distinguish plain, aspirated

Aspiration (phonetics)

In phonetics, aspiration is the strong burst of air that accompanies either the release or, in the case of preaspiration, the closure of some obstruents. To feel or see the difference between aspirated and unaspirated sounds, one can put a hand or a lit candle in front of one's mouth, and say pin ...

 and ejective

Ejective consonant

In phonetics, ejective consonants are voiceless consonants that are pronounced with simultaneous closure of the glottis. In the phonology of a particular language, ejectives may contrast with aspirated or tenuis consonants...

 forms. Other consonants include labial and alveolar nasal

Nasal consonant

A nasal consonant is a type of consonant produced with a lowered velum in the mouth, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. Examples of nasal consonants in English are and , in words such as nose and mouth.- Definition :...

s; alveolar, velar and glottal fricatives; and alveolar and palatal approximants. Again other than the labial m and the glottal h, these distinguish forms with and without voice

Voice (phonetics)

Voice or voicing is a term used in phonetics and phonology to characterize speech sounds, with sounds described as either voiceless or voiced. The term, however, is used to refer to two separate concepts. Voicing can refer to the articulatory process in which the vocal cords vibrate...

.

Vowels

There are four full vowels in Koyukon:

• i
• u
• æ
• ɔ

And there are three reduced vowels:

• ʊ ⟨u⟩
• ə
• ɞ <ʉ>

Resources

• Ethnologue entry for Koyukon
• Service Book in the Dialect of the Qlīyukuwhūtana Indians: Portions of the Book of Common Prayer in Upper Koyukon (1908) digitized by Richard Mammana
• Alaska Native Language Center
• Word-Lists of the Athabaskan, Yup'ik and Alutiiq Languages by Lt. Laurence Zagoskin, 1847 (containing Koyukon on pages 3–8)