2 The Sound System

CONSONANTS (p, k, ', h, l, m, n, w)

2.1 Both p and k are voiceless stops, the first bilabial, the other velar, pronounced about as in English but with less aspiration. (For substitution of t for k, see section 2.8.1.)

The glottal stop, ', is made by closing the glottis or space between the vocal cords, the result being something like the hiatus in English oh-oh. In Hawaiian the glottal stop is a consonant, the second most common in the language. It distinguishes such pairs as:

It differs from other consonants in two ways:

(1) It is always heard before utterance-initial a, e, and i, but this is not considered significant because its occurrence in this position is predictable. A Hawaiian greets a friend ' 'Aloha,' but if he uses this word within a sentence, the glottal stop is no longer heard: ua aloha '[he] did [or does] have compassion'. Since the glottal does not occur in this word within a sentence, it is entered in the Dictionary aloha, and is so written in the present grammar.

(2) Words borrowed from English that begin with vowels a, e, i, o, and sometimes u are pronounced in Hawaiian with initial glottal stops, as 'Alapaki 'Albert', 'elepani 'elephant', 'Inia In-

10

Consonants 2.1

dia', and 'okomopila 'automobile'. The initial glottal is written in these words in the present grammar.

In spite of the fact that the glottal stop has its own special symbol (a question mark without the bottom dot) in even the most elementary phonetics book, and although it is a phoneme in innumerable of the world's languages, it remains a source of mystery to many, who refuse to think of it as a Hawaiian consonant phoneme. One often hears and reads that the Hawaiian glottal stop represents a k in other Polynesian languages, as in Tuamotu tiki 'image' cognate with Hawaiian ki'i. One might as logically say that Hawaiian k represents t in Tuamotu. Actually, Hawaiian k and the glottal stop correspond to Tuamotu t and k; but that information is irrelevant in a description of Hawaiian sounds.

In early Hawaiian works, such as the translations of the Bible and the early grammars and dictionaries, the glottal stop was indicated by an apostrophe in such important words as ko'u 'mine' and kou 'yours'. A reversed apostrophe was apparently first used in Hawaiian by Judd, Pukui, and Stokes in 1943. Pratt's Samoan dictionary of 1862 uses the reversed apostrophe, as do later religious works in Samoan. Churchward's Tongan grammar (1953) and dictionary (1959) use a reversed apostrophe. Newspapers in Hawai'i today are beginning to use the ordinary apostrophe, which is quite acceptable. The possibility of confusing the apostrophe representing the Hawaiian glottal stop with the apostrophe representing the English possessive is almost nil.

The Hawaiian names for the glottal stop are 'u'ina (literally, 'snap') and 'okina ('break'). English writers have called the sound 'guttural break' and 'hamzah'—this based on its usage in Arabic as a symbol for the sound, whereas the preferable term 'glottal stop' represents the actual sound.

The fact that most Hawaiian written before World War II does not contain any symbol for the glottal stop or for vowel length (see section 2.2) greatly complicates translation of texts and etymological analysis. The occasional but haphazard use of symbols such as a hyphen helps a little, but such writing as Ka-u, a district on Hawai'i Island, pa-u 'sarong', or ka-i, a kind of taro, indicates that the final vowel is long, but does not tell us whether the first vowel is long or short, or whether the two vowels are separated by glottal stops; such information is provided by the Dictionary spellings Ka'ū, pā'ū, kāī.

11

2.1 THE SOUND SYSTEM

Context helps in deciphering, but in place names there is usually no context. So how, in the absence of context and of diacritical marks, could one distinguish between the district on Hawai'i called Ka'ū and a place in that district called Kau? How would one distinguish between 'Alae ('mudhen'), the name of a crater and of a place on Hawai'i, and 'Ala'ē ('strange fragrance'), the name of another place—when both are commonly written Alae?

A helpful clue in understanding texts in which the glottal stop is not indicated is that before initial a and e the definite article is always ke, but before 'a- either ke or its alternate ka may occur (see also section 10.2):

In a few words the glottal stop and k alternate. Common variants of lau kī 'ti leaf', lau kō 'sugarcane leaf', and lau kalo 'taro leaf' are lā'ī lā‘ō, and lā'alo. These variations are not dialectal. Numerous nonproductive causative prefixes are kāand 'ā- (section 6.3); they are prefixed to different bases. Similarly, prefixes expressing quality or state are kū- and 'ū-. The common word mo'o 'lizard' is moko in the place name Moko-li'i, literally 'little lizard'. Section 2.8.2 includes historical speculation about these variants.

The consonants h, l, m, and n are pronounced about as in English, except that n is dental-alveolar, and some Ni'ihau people occasionally replace l by an r-like sound.

The consonants w and v are variants (or alternants) of the same sound. A pattern seems to emerge, as shown in table 1. Speakers from Kaua'i and Ni'ihau tend to use the w variant always, whereas speakers from Hawai'i use the v variant; either is permissible.

Translators will find in old texts considerable inconsistency as to use of w or its omission. One finds kaua and kauwa (Dictionary kauā) for 'outcast'; ui and uwiuwi (Dictionary 'uwī'uwī) for 'squeak'; kauila and kauwila (Dictionary kauila), a kind of tree; koali and kowali (Dictionary koali), 'morning glory'; uala and uwala (Dictionary 'uala) 'sweet potato'. In every case, the w that is sometimes written and sometimes omitted follows u or o .

12

Consonants 2.1

TABLE 1

The Vexing Hawaiian w

2.2 HE SOUND SYSTEM

A consonant occurs only before a vowel; thus two consonants never occur in succession and a syllable always ends with a vowel.

VOWELS (i, ī, e, ē, a, ā, u, ū, o, ō)

2.2 In the description to follow, the terms front, central, and back refer to the position of the tongue in the mouth, as do the terms lower and raised. The Hawaiian vowels are front unrounded i and e, central a, and back rounded u and o. Values vary with stress. Unstressed i and u are slightly lower than stressed i and u. Stressed a suggests at times the sound of a in father but for some speakers it is slightly raised. Unstressed a usually suggests the a in sofa. According to Helene Newbrand (1951:9-10) e contiguous to l and n is usually similar to the e in bell; otherwise it suggests ay in pay except that the English off-glide is lacking (that is, it is not diphthongized): hē 'caterpillar' contrasts with hei 'snare'. Similarly kō 'sugarcane' contrasts with kou, a tree species. Long ē and ō are usually difficult for mainland Americans to pronounce because they do not exist in English without the off-glides.

All vowels occur with and without the macron, a symbol indicating both stress (or accent) and length, the amount of length depending on neighboring sounds and position within the utterance. (Long i seems less long than other long vowels.)

A glottal stop seems to shorten a preceding vowel, or at least it has done so in the history of the language. For example, the Proto Central Polynesian (PCP) singular a-possessives were *tāku 'my', *tāu 'your', and *tāna 'his'. When the earlier k was replaced in Hawaiian by the glottal stop, and t by k, the glottal stop shortened the 'my' form to ka'u. (The other forms are kāu and kāna, with ā retained.) Similarly, the focus forms are na'u, nāu, and nana. Significantly, the shape C/?/'V does not occur in the language except in longer words (mā'ona).

Stressed vowels, even those unmarked by a macron, may be slightly longer than unstressed ones. Isamu Abe, who studied spectograms, remarked (1970:108) that when two long vowels follow each other with a consonant between, the second vowel is longer than the first and the pitch level falls on the second, as in pōwā 'robber'. However, in a partial reduplication of a C/?/CV base, the length is retained in the reduplication but not in the base: thus wāhi 'to split' and its reduplicated derivative wāwahi. Utterance-final vowels marked with the macron and not preced-

14

Vowels 2.2

ed by long vowels are stressed but are usually not very long, as in the sentence Ua kū 'Standing'. This may not be related to the fact that short vowels at the ends of utterances are commonly voiceless, as, in fast speech, the final vowels in ki'i, aku, Makapu'u. They do not seem, however, ever to be completely dropped. Double vowels fuse into a single long vowel: aloha 'ia aku 'loved' becomes aloha 'iaku. Ia'u 'to me' is from iā a'u. Threefold repetition of the same vowel exists only as a means of imparting great emphasis, as in hele aaa uka 'went far far upland'.

Combinations of two unlike vowels are of two types. If the two vowels are pronounced in every environment with the stress on the first member, they constitute a diphthong. An example is ai: in 'aina 'meal' the stress is still on the first member of the combination. The other type of combination of two unlike vowels may be termed a cluster. If the combination is followed by a single syllable, the stress is on the second member of the cluster. An example is io in ‘Hole 'rat'. The diphthongs are ai, ae, au, ao, ei, eu, oi, ou. In each, the two vowels are not as closely knit as in English. Contrasts hard for the English ear to distinguish are such pairs as kai 'ocean' and kae 'to refuse'; hau, a tree, and hao 'iron'. The o in oi suggests the o in English sole (but not diphthongized oui). In fast speech a before i may suggest the vowels in English hat or set, and a before u may suggest the vowel in cut.

The following sets indicate the role of vowel length in distinguishing otherwise homophonous words:

And how is one to translate ii? The four pronunciations follow, with the number of entries in the revised Dictionary in parentheses: i'i (1), 'Vi (7), 'i'l (4), 'ī'ī (2). The poor translator has a choice of 14 glosses!

The devoicing of utterance-final vowels has been mentioned.

15

2.3 THE SOUND SYSTEM

In a few words, especially in place names, an entire second syllable is dropped, with lengthening of the vowel in the retained first syllable. Moku 'district' becomes mō- in the place name Mōkapu 'sacred district'; similarly mo'o 'lizard' becomes mō- in the place name Mō-'ili'ili 'pebble lizard'. One 'sand' becomes -ō- in Ke-ō-kea 'the white sand'. Limu 'seaweed' becomes lī- in such seaweeds as lī-pahapaha. Maka 'eye' becomes mā- in mākole 'red-eyed', mākahi 'one-eyed', and probably māka'i 'policeman'. Maha'oi 'rude' (literally, sharp head temple) is also mā'oi. The causative ho'o- is shortened to hō- and ho- in certain environments (section 6.4).

(For use of hyphens, see section 2.12.)

WORD STRESS

2.3 Albert J. Schütz has suggested (1977) for Fijian that stress (or accent) can best be described for that language on the basis of what he calls 'accent groups.' The term 'stress group' is used here. The stress in a stress group is always on the next to the last syllable or on a long vowel marked by a macron. In Fijian Schütz separates stress groups within a word by a period, as syllables are marked in some English dictionaries. Stress groups in Hawaiian consist most commonly of two syllables, often of one or three syllables, but never more than three except in proper names. Examples follow:

(1) Words containing a single stress group: akaaka 'clear'; hale 'house'; Hanauma, a place name; kanaka 'person'; malama 'light'

(2) Words containing two stress groups: 'ekale. sia 'church organization'; 'ele.makule 'old man'; Hana.lei, a place name; hei.au 'ancient temple'; kā.naka 'people'; mā. lama 'to care for'; nenele.au 'sumac'

(3) Words containing three stress groups: ho'o.lau.le'a 'celebration'; kō.'ele.'ele, species of seaweed; kū.nā.nā 'puzzled'

The stress in five-syllable reduplications is most commonly as in mā.lama.lama 'clear', but some are as in luma.luma'i 'to upset', or huele.elo 'having tails'.

If two or more stress groups occur in a single word, the last one as spoken is usually somewhat louder than the preceding one or ones.

Many proper names begin with the definite article ka/ke.

16

Word Stress 2.3

These are clitics; that is, they are pronounced as a part of what follows. Examples: Kameha.meha, Kapi'o-lani, Kalā-kaua, Kai.mukī.

In some long proper names, the breakup according to component words differs from the breakup according to stress groups:

The division by stress group is strange-looking and unfamiliar. We 'feel' that mehameha is a unit and should not be cut in two, regardless of pronunciation. For these reasons, proper names in the revised Dictionary are written with hyphens separating the identifiable parts. All entries, however, are written with periods separating the stress groups.

The syllable following a period within a word is usually rearticulated (that is, it is separated from die preceding syllable by a slight pause). Thus in ordinary conversation one says Kai.mukī, not Ka.imu.kī, hei.au, not he.iau; and ho'o.uli, not ho.ouli. Singers are sometimes criticized for incorrect placing of this pause, as in such common words as onaona 'fragrant' (not ona.ona) and i laila 'there' (not ila.ila). The period is also 'significant' if inserted between vowels otherwise pronounced as diphthongs:

a.i: kana.iwa 'nine', kula.iwi 'native'

a.e: kama.ehu 'strength'

a.u: pala.uli 'dark'

a.o: kana.ono 'sixty'

e.i: 'e.iwa 'nine times'

o.i: ho'o.ilo 'winter'

o.u: ho'o.uli 'to darken'

17

2.4 THE SOUND SYSTEM

In the present Grammar the stress groups are shown only if pronunciation is under discussion. The periods separating the stress groups are helpful in a glossary or pedagogical text and as a descriptive device, but are not needed in ordinary writing.

JUNCTURES

2.4 In spoken Hawaiian there are four types of pauses, sometimes called 'junctures':

(1) The end of a sentence, marked by a period. The final vowel in the sentence may be voiceless or even inaudible, and the pitch and volume may decrease.

(2) The end of a question sentence, marked by a question mark (section 2.6).

(3) Pauses within sentences, ordinarily between phrases (section 3.2), marked by a comma.

(4) A pause between words within a phrase, or the pause between stress groups (called a plus juncture) within words explained in section 2.3. Of the four types of juncture, this is the least prominent.

STRESS IN PHRASES AND SENTENCES

2.5 Stress in sequences longer than words depends to a large extent on the junctures just described. The stress patterns of words usually extend to the phrases in which they are used (a phrase is a base and its modifiers). Phrases are usually (but not always) separated by junctures of some kind. Each of the two examples below consists of two phrases—a verb phrase and a noun phrase in (1), and two noun phrases in (2). Each phrase is pronounced as a unit, but there is a plus juncture /+/ between the phrases. Vowel sequences with intervening /+/, as e + i in (1) and a + o in (2) usually do not diphthongize. The /+/ in each sentence separates two unstressed syllables.

(1) Ua hele + i laila. '[He] went there.'

(2) Nā maka + o Hina. 'The eyes of Hina.'

Both (1) and (2) are sentences, which are phonologically defined as sequences bordered by /./ or /?/. Sentences vary in length from a single word, such as Kimo! 'James!', to a long succession of phrases. In sentences, as in phrases, there is usually a single primary stress, with secondary stresses, if any, preceding the

18

Stress in Phrases 2.5

primary stress. The placing of the primary stress is unpredictable. In sentences (1) and (2) above primary stress could be on hele or laila, or on maka or Hina. The farther removed a secondary stress is from the primary stress, the louder it seems to be.

Proper names are sometimes very long and contain a succession of phrases. Unfortunately they are usually written as single words, for example, Kaliokalanilapakauilakuikahekiliikamakaokaopua. This becomes pronounceable if the glottal stops, macrons, and potential juncture points are marked (here, stress is indicated also):

(Possessive phrase)

Ka l/?/ ò ka láni, làpa kà uíla,

the chill of the sky flash the lightning

(Locative phrase) (Possessive phrase)

kù'i kà hekíli, í ka máka ò ka ‘/?/púa.

roar the thunder in the face of the horizon cloud.

'The chill of heaven, the flash of lightning, the roar of thunder in the face of the horizon cloud.' (This is a personal name and an indication of high rank; nature was believed to pay tribute to royalty.)

In other less obvious ways the usual orthography (even with glottal stops and macrons included) fails to reflect the pronunciation. For one thing, in ordinary fast speech, certain particles called clitics (see Glossary) are always short and are not followed by junctures. Common ones are the definite article ka/ke, the indefinite article he, and i 'at'. In fast speech and in personal names they are pronounced without any plus junctures as though they are a part of what follows.

ka ukana 'the baggage' /kau.kana/

ka inoa 'the name' /kai.noa/

ke aloha 'the love' /kea.loha/

i laila 'there' /ilaila/

In slow unnatural speech, or sometimes in acculturated speech, the clitics are followed by plus junctures. And conversely, in fast speech the given name 'Au-i-ke-kai-loa, for example, may become 'aui.kekai.loa.

Monosyllabic words and particles present an added difficulty, as some are always long, others are always short, and the length of vowels in still others varies according to the environ-

19

2.5 THE SOUND SYSTEM

ment. This seems to be the clearest explanation: Words (not particles) consisting of a single syllable are always long:

'ā 'to burn'

'ē 'different'

hā 'a stalk'

'ī 'to say'

kā 'to hit'

kō 'sugar cane'

kū 'upright'

lā 'sun'

mā 'faded'

nā 'to soothe'

'ō 'fork'

pā 'fence'

ū 'breast'

wā 'noise'

Such words have meanings in the real world and are intelligible if used alone. Some of the particles (most of which tell grammatical relationships and are not intelligible if used alone) are always short: ka/ke, singular articles; i 'at'. Other particles are always long: nā, plural article; nō, intensifier. Other equally common particles are usually short before short syllables and long before long syllables (short syllables have short vowel nuclei; long syllables have long vowels and diphthongs as nuclei). A macron is not used in these particles. The native speaker unconsciously lengthens them. Some examples:

It must be emphasized that the macron indicates both vowel length and stress. Its role is threefold: (1) Every vowel with a

20

Pitch Levels 2.6

macron is somewhat lengthened, but (2) at the end of a word or particle the length is not as noticeable as the stress, and (3) every word-final vowel with a macron is usually followed by some kind of juncture. A sentence that illustrates the three functions is Ùa k/?/ + 'o Kímo. 'Jim stood up.'

PITCH LEVELS

2.6 Of the four contrasting pitch levels, level 4 is the highest and least frequent, as for great emphasis. Utterances commonly begin with 2, and continue on this level with minor fluctuations until a marked change in level is made. The change in level is a definite step up or down, rather than a glide.

Pitch levels in (1) and (3) suggest those in similar English sentences. Pitch levels in (2) are rather different from those in English. The last four sentences illustrate two ways to ask questions. Aha in (6) and (7) is a question word, but takes the usual

21

2.7 THE SOUND SYSTEM

question intonations. Pitch levels in (5) and (7), with falling intonation, are commonly heard in Hawaiian Island English. It is not certain whether Hawaiian has influenced Island English, or vice versa. Or could we say that pitch levels in (4) and (6) have been influenced by English?

In contrast to English, intonation with question words is the same as that following other words. Abe (1970:110) diagramed the sentence Mahea kou wahi hānau? 'Where is your birthplace?' with medium pitch level on all syllables, except for a low level on Ma- and a rise on final -u.

NATURAL FAST SPEECH

2.7 In any language natural fast speech is quite different from slow artificial speech, and in Hawaiian there are many changes of vowel values, losses of vowels, and stress changes. These were studied at the Bishop Museum by Kinney (1956). She analyzed tape recordings of the speech of fourteen speakers who ranged in age from late middle age to eighty and ninety, and who, with one possible exception, grew up speaking Hawaiian before English. The results of her survey are given in table 2.

Kinney tabulated the varying pronunciations of nineteen words, most of which occur frequently in the spoken language. The second column in the table shows pronunciations that correspond to the traditional spelling, and the third column gives pronunciations that show assimilation or reduction. The fourth column gives the percentages of times that the fast pronunciations were noted, and the last column shows the number of times each word was recorded.

Other changes include partial instead of complete reduplications (makemake to mamake, kuikui to kukui), loss of short a (hele akula to hele kula, e ia nei to ei nei, ke akua to ke kua), whispering of vowels or syllables before silence (as the final vowel in Punalu'u or in reduplications (as the second and fourth o's in Nāpo'opo'o), raising an a before u to sound like the vowel in English cut (as in Maui) or to ou in the place name Ke-au-hou (usually called Ke-ou-hou), and especially the fusion of like vowels to a single vowel: loa'a ana to lo'ana, loa'a aku to lo'aku, pua aloalo to pualoalo, a hiki i kēia lā to a hiki kēia lā (FS 273).

This fusion induced Bible translators to insert an apostrophe, as in loaa'i instead of loa'a ai. This unfortunate use of the apostrophe is discussed in some detail in section 2.12.

22

Dialect Variations 2.8.1

TABLE 2

Sound Changes in Fast Speech

DIALECT VARIATIONS

2.8 Variations in Hawaiian dialects have not been systematically studied, but they appear to be not great if compared, for example, with those in the Marquesas. The dialect of Ni'ihau is the most aberrant and the one most in need of study.

NI'IHAU DIALECT

2.8.1 Ni'ihau is the only area in the world where Hawaiian is the first language and English is a foreign language. Because of many sufficiently marked variations, Ni'ihau people, when visiting or living in Honolulu, substitute the O'ahu dialect for their own—apparently easy to do—saying that otherwise people in Honolulu have trouble understanding them. Ni'ihau people speak very rapidly; many vowels and entire syllables are dropped or whispered. Newbrand (1951:106) reported that a Kala-pana, Hawai'i, male read at the rate of 120 words per minute, and a Ni'ihau female, at the rate of 170 words per minute.

23

2.8.1 THE SOUND SYSTEM

Reductions and changes noted by Newbrand include the following:

Newbrand reported that her Ni'ihau informant, reading from a text that she herself had prepared, sometimes read a written k as t and vice versa; t occurred 102 times, k 87 times. The informant used t consistently in the words makuahine 'mother' and hiki 'able'; k was used consistently in akā 'but', no ka mea 'because', and like 'like'; t was not used utterance initially. Some common examples of interchangeable use of k and t included ke, ka, ko'u, ka'u, keia (usually teia), kekahi, makemake. Vowel assimilation was frequent: mawaho 'outside' was mauwoho; 'a'ohe wahi 'no place' was 'a'ohi wahi.

In the early 1950s Elbert collected four short stories in the Ni'ihau dialect, all from the same informant, then the oldest man on the island but long since dead. In two of them the variant k was used 108 times, and the variant t, 107 times. In two others, k was recorded 178 times and t, 87 times. The first story had examples of 10 successive k's and 10 successive t's. The last story had one stretch of 21 successive k's and 10 successive t's. In the first story the common kēlā 'that' was recorded kēlā 11 times, tēlā 14 times, and tērā once.

William H. Wilson, who has worked extensively with the university Hawaiian-language radio programs, has noted that if a word has two k's, the Ni'ihau speakers pronounce the first as k and the second as t: kātou 'we', kahatai 'beach'. In the speech of informants from Kau-pō and Kī-pahulu in East Maui, and

24

Dialect Variations 2.8.2

Hālawa, Moloka'i, Wilson has noticed the t sound after the vowel i: laiti 'rice', 'ite 'to know', maita'i 'good', makahiti 'year'. This might be attributed to an assimilatory fronting of k after a high front vowel.

Experienced chanters, too, randomly substitute t for k without realizing they are doing so.

These are a few lexical differences noted between the speech of Ni'ihau (or Kaua'i) and O'ahu:

n FOR l AND GLOTTAL STOP FOR l AND k

2.8.2 The next most conspicuous dialect variation is substitution of n for l, especially, perhaps, on Moloka'i and Lā-na'i. Many of the changes are assimilatory; that is, l . . . n and n . . . l become n . . . n:

25

2.8.2 THE SOUND SYSTEM

Non-assimilatory changes include the following:

Of these, the l . . . n forms are in more general use except for kōnane, nihi, and kūnihi; kōnane (the game) may be a reflex of Proto Central Polynesian (PCP) nane; the other two, of Proto Polynesian (PPN) nifi.

A number of the l-forms are reflexes of PPN, indicating that most of the n-forms may be Hawaiian innovations. These include PPN lalanga (Hawaiian ulana), lili (Hawaiian lili), tuulanga (Hawaiian kūlana), and tulou (Hawaiian kūlou). In a few words, some speakers replace l by the glottal stop:

kūlou, kū'ou (?) 'to bow'

mālamalama, mā'ama'ama 'light'

malaulauā, ma'au'auā 'peddler'

malauea, ma'auea 'lazy'

palanehe, pa'anehe 'dainty'

pūliki, pū'iki 'to embrace'

Both Ulu-koa and Ulu'oa are listed in the Dictionary as names of an unknown star. In three words l is omitted without replacement:

'a'ole, 'a'oe 'not' (poetic)

huli, hui 'to turn' (poetic)

māilo, māio 'thin'

Some persons say lōkihi 'long' and kūlepe 'harelip' for com-

26

Loan Words 2.9.1

mon lō'ihi and 'ūlepe. Haki and ha'i 'to break' seem equally common, as are he'a and heka 'inflamed' and mu'umu'u and mukumuku 'to cut'. K instead of the current glottal stop also occurs in the O'ahu islet name Moko-li'i 'little lizard', commonly known as Chinaman's Hat. The prefixes kā- and kū- have 'ā- and 'a- and 'ū- and 'u- variants (sections 6.3.1 and 6.3.2).

Some names of plants of little use vary according to locality, but these have not yet been systematically studied.

LOAN WORDS

2.9

ENGLISH AS A SOURCE

2.9.1 Words taken from one language into another are called loan words. Hawaiian has hundreds of loan words, mostly from English. The Hawaiian Bible is filled with them. The Hawaiian uses loan words when he gets married, baptizes his baby, reads the Scriptures, eats his lunch, goes to San Francisco, or uses soap. The spelling of some Hawaiian loan words is not fixed. In the Hawaiian Bible are found the letters t, d, g, s, and z (all of which the Hawaiians usually pronounce k), b (usually pronounced p), r (usually pronounced l), and v (sometimes pronounced w). Many words are spelled with either English or Hawaiian letters, as dala and kālā 'dollar', ti and kī 'tea', mare and male 'to marry'. For the sake of consistency and ease of reference, words in the Dictionary are listed according to the usual pronunciation of old-time Hawaiians, with variant spellings following the entry word. Thus, the Biblical bapetema 'baptism' is entered in the p's, as follows: papekema, bapetema. Some substitutions for English consonant sounds in Hawaiianized loan words are shown in table 3.

We see that k, the most common Hawaiian consonant, is substituted for ten English consonant sounds. The Hawaiian word spelled kika has four variant spellings (tita 'sister', sida 'cider', tiga 'tiger', and kika 'cassia')—all from English. The only native kika means 'slippery'. The Hawaiian word spelled kini has two variant spellings, gini 'gin' and tini 'tin'; it also is the Hawaiian for king, kin, zinc, Guinea, Jean, Jane, and Jennie. The native Hawaiian meaning is 'multitude'.

Post-vocalic r is usually omitted in loans, as in the last syllable of kolopā 'crowbar'. This conforms with the pronunciation of New England missionaries to Hawai'i in the 1820s.

27

2.9.1 THE SOUND SYSTEM

TABLE 3

Hawaiian Substitutions for English Consonants

The vowel correspondences in loan words are based on the English vowels and diphthongs listed by Gleason (1967:34–35), and on Elbert's dialect of American English (see table 4). Hawaiian adaptations of English words beginning with a-, e-, i-, o-, and sometimes u- begin with glottal stops (cf. section 2.1).

As there are no consonant clusters in Hawaiian, English adjoining consonants are separated in Hawaiian by a vowel (pūlumi 'broom' and palaki 'brush'), or one of the English consonants is dropped:

English: steel San F ranc isco

Hawaiian: ki la Ka pa la ki ko

A vowel isadded at the ends of the words, very often a. Many of the missionary introductions were based on English spelling rather than on pronunciation, as koma 'comma', liona 'lion', hīmeni 'hymn', and poloka 'frog'. In a highly readable article, Schütz (1976) contrasts these introductions with those recorded by early visitors, who were less interested in English spelling than in the way the Hawaiians attempted to pronounce the foreign words. Thus Campbell listed, probably in 1809 (quoted by Schütz 1976:83) the following:

28

Loan Words 2.9.1

TABLE 4

Hawaiian Substitutions for English Vowels

The final vowel in these words (e), according to a key to pronunciation, was pronounced as the first e in eloquence or the y in plenty, and ee as in keep. Yet the missionaries preferred to end their introduced words with a. Just why is not clear, except that they may have wished to keep the foreign words separate from the native ones (which is certainly why they introduced so many consonants). The inserted vowels are now established, Schütz says, and he concludes his article: 'Thus are preserved the whims of those who were linguistically naive, but influential.'

Just as the Hawaiians pronounced the introduced consonants with their own sounds, so they usually kept their stress on the next to the last syllable, regardless of English stress, in the introduced words: 'enemi 'enemy', kokomi 'sodomy', pekana 'pagan'. Other three-syllable words derived from English words with primary stress on the first syllable tend to have stressed and lengthened vowels in that syllable, as lāpaki 'rabbit', nōkali 'notary', and pāloka 'ballot'.

The integration of much-used loan words is illustrated by their use with affixes: kula 'school', kukula 'to go to school'; male 'to marry', ho'omale 'to marry off.

29

2.9.2 THE SOUND SYSTEM

A number of loans are hybrids, either Hawaiian plus English or English plus Hawaiian:

haukalima 'ice cream', lit., cream ice

nī'au pulumi 'broom straw', lit., broom coconut-leaf midrib

nīoi 'pepper': nīoi pekela 'betel nut', nīoi pepa 'chili pepper'

nūpepa puka lā 'daily newspaper', lit., newspaper issuing day

'ohe puluka 'flute', lit., bamboo flute

pipikaula 'salted, dried beef', lit., rope beef

wilikī 'engineer', lit., key turning

The Dictionary lists 13 words beginning with mīkini 'machine', from English. In all except mīkini 'aiana 'clothes presser' (English, iron) the word or words following mikini are Hawaiian. The Dictionary lists nine sequences beginning loke 'rose', as well as 'ohi'a loke 'rose apple'. 'Ō'ō 'digging stick' is followed by halo, hou, palau, and pē—all from English.

For a fascinating comparison of adaptation of English loan words into Hawaiian and Japanese, see Carr ( 1964).

THE WORD FOR HORSE

2.9.2 The Hawaiian words for 'horse' and 'goat' have long been puzzling. 'Goat' is kao, which sounds like English cow. Why should a goat have been called a cow, and why the strange word lio for 'horse'? Could it have been because a horse's ears are sometimes pulled back 'tightly' (lio) as some suggest?

Schütz has suggested that early word lists might provide clues. These were examined, with results as shown in table 5 (today's spellings of the words used by the early writers are in parentheses).

Lisianski wrote today's l, u, eu, and w as r, oo, eo, and v. Campbell was less consistent. He wrote e and ee for today's i, and c and k for today's k. His d, a, and oo correspond to today's l, o, and u. His word for goat should probably have been peepe kao—koa is perhaps a misprint. Arago was the only one to write t for today's k.

Schütz has pointed out (oral communication) that rio and edea are different spellings of the word for 'dog', and that they served as generic terms for nonnative quadrupeds, just as the Tahitians and Marquesans used their words for 'pig'. In Tahitian 'horse' is pua'a horo henua (quadruped runs ground), and in Marquesan it is puaka piki 'enata (quadruped man rides). Lisianski's quadruped is lio and Campbell's is edea. Lisianski's

30

Loan Words 2.9.3

TABLE 5

Spellings of Hawaiian Words for Animals

goat is therefore a 'cow quadruped' and his sheep a 'hairy quadruped' (or a 'fuzzy quadruped'). Campbell called his dog a 'cow quadruped,' his goat 'cow beef,' his horse a 'big quadruped,' and his sheep 'beef.' By Arago's time 'goat' had lost its preceding generic classifier. 'Sheep' has become hipa from English, 'Īlio still serves as a generic classifier:

'īlio hae 'wolf' (fierce quadruped)

'īlio hohono 'skunk' (smelly quadruped)

'īlio holo a ka uaua 'seal' (quadruped running in the rough [sea])

'īlio hulu pāpale 'beaver' (quadruped [used for] hat fur)

Schütz suggested that the strange word for today's horse (lio) is a shortening of the word for dog ('īlio).

BIBLICAL TERMS

2.9.3 The missionaries introduced many words from Hebrew, Greek, and Latin in the course of their monumental task of translating the Bible into Hawaiian. They had access to the Masoretic (Hebrew) texts of the Old Testament, the Septuagint (Greek) Bible, and the Latin Vulgate, as well as Bible dictionaries. Most of the introductions were of plants, animals, and cultural items not found in Hawai'i. Aside from the Christian names so beloved by Hawaiians, the only words from these sources used with much frequency are 'ekalekia, hepekoma, and meli. In the lists that follow, the first spelling is with Hawaiian letters, the second with the letters introduced by the missionaries. If two glosses are given, the first is from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible and the second from the King James Version.

31

2.9.3 THE SOUND SYSTEM

From the Hebrew:

'aleka, areza 'cedar, fir': Hebrew erez

kikala, tidara 'plane tree, pine': Hebrew tidhar

kinola, kinora 'harp': Hebrew kinnur

From the Greek:

'ekalekia, ekalesia 'church organization': Greek ekklesia

hepekoma, hebedoma 'week': Greek hebdomas

meli 'honey': Greek meli

From the Latin:

lana 'frog': Latin rana

lepu 'hare': Latin lepus

mukuela, mutuela 'weasel': Latin mustela

Glottal stops rarely occur in Hawaiian loan words other than in initial position. Exceptions are Kana'ana 'Canaan', probably from Greek; 'Ikela'ela 'Israel', and le'ema 'reem', from Hebrew; and such personal names as 'A'alona 'Aaron', 'Ika'aka 'Isaac', and Lapa'ela 'Raphael'. Could these have been reflexes of Semitic glottal stops? It seems more likely that the Hawaiians were used to inserting glottal stops as they read, since few were then written; hence they read medial aa as a'a, ae as a'e, and ee as e'e.

Non-Biblical words from the Greek are the names for the letters m 'mū' and n 'nū'. Lists of Biblical words from the three ancient languages (other than proper names) may be obtained from Samuel H. Elbert.

A few Hawaiianized Christian names used by Catholics differ from those used by Protestants, and also from those used by both Catholics and Protestants. In the following list, which is far from exhaustive, the non-Hawaiian consonants sometimes used are listed below the Hawaiianized consonants:

32

Loan Words 2.9.4

OTHER SOURCES

2.9.4 Few words have been introduced from other immigrant groups, the largest number probably being from the Chinese, who were the first to arrive in Hawai'i after the Europeans. The following words from Cantonese have been identified by Robert L. Cheng of the Department of East Asian Languages at the University of Hawai'i:

konohī 'Chinese New Year' from kong-hee 'congratulations' pakalana 'Chinese violet' from pak-lan 'white orchid' Pākē 'Chinese' from pak ye 'father's older brother'

Kamakū, the name for a rice wine, is said to come from Cantonese samshu (or samshoo), identified by Knowlton (1955) as a Cantonese term written with two Chinese characters meaning 'thrice' + 'burned', referring to the fiery taste of the drink.

Others of uncertain origin are kīpā, a gambling game, said to be chee-fa, and mikilana 'Chinese rice flower' said to come from mei-sui-lan.

Mexican cowboys introduced the word paniolo from Spanish Español, with the meanings 'Spain, Spanish, cowboy'. From Portuguese bacalhau comes pakaliao 'codfish', and perhaps from Portuguese Pascoa came the Catholic name for Easter, Pakoa. From Portuguese or Spanish rosario'rosary' may have come Hawaiian lōkālio. Loans from French include 'elemita 'hermit', Kalema 'Lent', livere 'book', poma 'apple', and perhaps Luwele 'Louvre'. 'Anemoku 'peninsula' is a translation of French presqu'île. None of the French loans except Kalema seems to have been much used.

33

2.10 THE SOUND SYSTEM

Several loans come from Tahiti. Two of them may be recognized by the occurrence of a glottal stop in place of ng in other Polynesian languages such as Samoan:

Samoan (ng) manongi 'fragrance' Lalotonga 'Rarotonga'

Tahitian (') mono'i 'perfume' Laloto'a 'Rarotonga'

Hawaiian (n) mano'i 'perfume' Lalato'a 'Rarotonga'

(Vowel assimilation is common in Polynesian languages: note that Samoan manongi is mono'i in Tahitian; Lalo- in Samoan and Tahitian is Lala- in Hawaiian.) A famous wild banana in Tahitian is hē’ī; the same name is in Hawaiian as a variant of mai'a Polapola 'Tahitian banana'. A possible fourth Tahitian loan is ka'aka 'fellow, chap', an old slang term that may have come from Tahitian ta'ata 'man' that is cognate with Hawaiian kanaka.

The ancient name for Samoa is Ha'amoa, dating from Proto Polynesian times. Present-day Kāmoa must be a loan from English or from modern Sāmoa; the form inherited from Proto East Polynesian would have been Hāmoa.

RELATIVE FREQUENCIES OF SOUNDS

2.10 A computerized count of 3,347 sounds taken from legends in Elbert's Fornander Selections, prepared by Robert Hsu of the University of Hawai'i, revealed the following percentage frequencies:

The frequency of the glottal stop (7.2%) is comparable to the frequency of n in English (7.24%), as found by Dewey in 1923 (quoted by Trnka 1966, p. 125) in a count of sound frequencies in 100,000 English words in connected writing.

34

Drift 2.11

Certain combinations of sounds are absent or rare. No base exists in the shape CV, but of course CV particles are common (ka, ke, no, . . .). No base exists in the shape C?'V (cf. section 2.2). The sequence C?CV is not common, but does occur: hāna, kāna, kāne, kōhi, kōmi, māhu, māka, māki, māla, māna, māno, māpu, nāna, pāka, wāhi. Of these, māka, māki, and pāka are English loans.

According to Krupa (1971:670), the most common shape for morphs in any Polynesian language is (C)V(C)V (by 'morphs' he seems to mean bases or parts of bases). One or both of the vowels in CVCV words may be long. A study was made of the utilization of CVCV, C?C?, CVC?, and C?CV in native words, but only those utilizing three or four of the four possible shapes were counted. Only one series was found with all four: nana, nānā, nanā, nāna. For CVCV, C?C?, and CVC? shapes see in the Dictionary the following entries and the two entries just below each of them: 'a'a, hehe, huhu, 'i'i, keke, kika, kiki, koki, koko, kuku, mo'i, na'u, paku, papa, pa'u, pipi, 'uki. Two series consist of CVCV, C?C?, and C?CV shapes: hana, hānā, Hāna; and mana, mānā, māna. Two series consist of CVCV, CVC?, C?CV shapes: mano, manō, māno; and wahi, wahī, wāhi. Only one was noted with C?CV, C?C?, and CVC? shapes: māhu, māhū, mahū.

Krupa (1966:463–464) found 1,029 CVCV forms in the Hawaiian Dictionary, which is 50.81 percent of the 2,025 possible Hawaiian bi-vocalic forms. He found that most frequently the same vowels occurred, but different consonants. (He was not distinguishing long and short vowels.) Note that in the 15 C?CV words the same vowels exist in 7 forms, different consonants in all except nāna. Of the 17 forms taking CVCV, C?C?, and CVC? shapes, 10 have the same vowels, but only 6 have different consonants.

DRIFT

2.11 Drift is taken to mean the direction in which changes in the language are going. Certain changes from inherited forms are not complete, but are on-going. Some of these have been mentioned before; they are summarized in table 6. The 'most common forms' in the table, except for l, represent Hawaiian innovations.

A glottal stop is called a vestigial form of common l on the premise (by no means proven) that there existed a Proto

35

2.12 THE SOUND SYSTEM

TABLE 6

Hawaiian Drift

†In place of 'vestigial' Chen and Wang (1975:257) used the terms drift, retarded remnants, and belated cases.

Marquesan-Hawaiian stage before the separation of the two languages, that is, that at one time Marquesan and Hawaiian were one language, until finally the Hawaiians moved north. Marquesan today has only the glottal stop as a reflex of Proto East Polynesian (PEP) l and sometimes k (if we can believe the Dordillon dictionary), but in Proto Marquesan-Hawaiian time perhaps the two reflexes of PEP l existed side by side (cf. section 2.8.2).

Another feature apparently shared only with Marquesan consists of the rare possessives kā ia, kō ia, and nā ia 'by him', now almost entirely replaced by reflexes of Proto Central Polynesian taana, toona, and naana.

NOTES ON ORTHOGRAPHY

2.12 Differences between common pronunciations and orthography as used in this Grammar and in the Dictionary are mentioned frequently in this study. Important deviations will be summarized here, as well as some general spelling rules.

(1) The changes mentioned by Kinney (1956) and discussed in section 2.7 are not reflected in the spelling, even those that occurred in 100 percent of her informants' speech, as leila or lila for laila, keikua'ana for kaikua'ana, and keikunāne for kaikunāne. Such pronunciations are never sung, and have never appeared in print, according to our observations.

(2) The w-glides after o and u, described in section 2.1, are predictable, but have appeared in the Hawaiian Bible and other published matter.

36

Orthography 2.12

(3) The Hawaiian Bible (Ka Baibala) uses an apostrophe to indicate a glottal stop in a few words, for example, ko'u, ka'u, o'u, a'u 'mine', ia'u 'me', and no'u, na'u 'for me', and the same symbol as indication of a dropped vowel, in the manner of English can't. This is common (a) with the directionals aku and a'e (section 7.2): e lawe pio ia'ku [that is, 'ia aku] (Ieremia 28.6) 'capturing', i ka ninau ana'e ['ana a'e] (Na Lii I 1.6), 'the questions'; (b) with the anaphoric ai (section 7.3): ka olelo maikai ia e hooluoluia'i [hō'olu'olu 'ia ai] (Na Solomona 12.25), 'a good word maketh it glad'; (c) with the common nouns akua 'god' and ali'i 'chief: na'kua [nā, akua] 'the gods', na'lii [nā ali'i] (Isaia 32.11) 'the chiefs'. (The apostrophe was not used in the title of the Book of Kings.)

Andrews (1854:21) recommends such use of the apostrophe as a marker of elision, but it is frowned upon in the present study because of confusion with the glottal stop. One rule in Hawaiian will take care of the dropped a: a+a becomes a (as in the sequences illustrated above: 'ia aku, 'ana a'e, 'ia ai, nā akua, nā ali'i).

For another, somewhat different but equally unsatisfactory use of the apostrophe, see section 6.6.2.

(4) Hyphens are used in proper names in the Dictionary and in this Grammar to separate the component parts in order to facilitate pronunciation and comprehension, but the pauses they mark do not necessarily occur in fast, natural speech (see section 2.3) and need not always be used. The Dictionary uses hyphens also to separate the component parts in names of winds, rains, stars, lua fighting holds, and tapa and mat designs:

Kuehu-lepo, a wind associated with Ka'ū, Hawai'i (lit., dust-stirring)

Kani-lehua, a rain associated with Hilo (lit., lehua rustling)

Hōkū-pa'a 'North Star' (lit., unmovable star)

'Alapa'i-a-ka-'ōpae, a lua fighting hold (lit., ladder of the shrimp)

iwi-puhi, a tapa design (lit., eel bone)

hōkū-helele'i, a mat design (lit., falling star)

Most of these names are descriptive, poetic, or fanciful. Wind and rain names are frequently, but not always, preceded by makani and ua.

The names of plants and animals are written as single, unhyphenated words if the meaning of the whole is not decipherable from the meaning of the parts:

37

2.12 THE SOUND SYSTEM

manulele, a variety of sugarcane (lit., flying bird)

nūkea, a mudhen (lit., white bill)

pānini 'cactus' (lit., fence wall)

po'ouli, a honeycreeper (lit., black head)

Similarly with many other words:

kūkaepele 'match' (lit., volcanic excreta)

laholio 'rubber' (lit., horse scrotum)

ulepua'a and wilipua'a 'corkscrew' (lit., pig penis and pig twist)

Hyphens are inserted, however, in names of plants that consist of more than a single phrase:

'ai-a-ka-nēnē, a plant (lit., food of the goose)

mo'opuna-a-ka-līpoa, a seaweed (lit., grandchild of the līpoa [another seaweed])

(5) The parts in names of plants and animals that consist of a single base followed by one or more than one qualifier are written as separate words:

maile lau li'i 'large-leafed maile'

maile lau nui 'large-leafed maile'

‘iole li'ili'i 'mouse' (lit., small quadruped)

‘iole pua'a 'guinea pig' (lit., pig quadruped)

koa'e kea 'white-tailed tropic bird'

koa'e 'ula 'red-tailed tropic bird'

The same rule applies to place names, such as Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa and Ko'olau Loa and Ko'olau Poko.

Other orthographic conventions. The subject-marking preposition 'o is separated from a following head word, except that it is joined to the third person singular pronoun ('oia), and usually but not always to the second person singular pronoun. The object-marking preposition iā is joined to the first person singular pronoun (ia'u), usually to the third person pronoun (iāia), and sometimes to the second person pronoun (iā'oe). The passive/imperative 'ia is often written joined to a preceding base, but this is not done in the Dictionary for reasons given in section 6.6.3.

As mentioned in section 2.3, ho'o- and Hana- form a separate stress group, but conventionally they are written joined to a following head word. Similarly we write kanaono (kana.ono) 'sixty' and kanaiwa (kana.iwa) 'ninety'.

38