Consonants[]
Sekani has 55 consonants:
| Bilabial | Alveolar | Post- Alveolar |
Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| central | lateral | plain | labial | ||||||
| Stop | voiced | b | d | ɟ | ɡ | ɡʷ | |||
| unaspirated | p | t | c | k | kʷ | ||||
| aspirated | pʰ | tʰ | cʰ | kʰ | kʷʰ | ||||
| ejective | pʼ | tʼ | cʼ | kʼ | kʼʷ | ʔ | |||
| Affricate | unaspirated | ts | tɬ | tʃ | |||||
| aspirated | tsʰ | tɬʰ | tʃʰ | ||||||
| ejective | tsʼ | tɬʼ | tʃʼ | ||||||
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ŋ | |||||
| Fricative | voiceless | ɸ | s | ɬ | ʃ | ç | x | xʷ | h |
| voiced | β | z | ɮ | ʒ | ʝ | ɣ | ɣʷ | ɦ | |
| Approximant | ɹ | l | j | ɰ | w | ||||
- *Sekani, like other Athabaskan languages, does not contrast fricatives with approximants.
Vowels[]
| Front | Central | Back | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| unrounded | rounded | unrounded | rounded | ||
| High | i | y | ɨ | ɯ | u |
| High-Mid | e | ø | ə | ɤ | o |
| Low-Mid | ɛ | œ | ɞ | ʌ | ɔ |
| Low | æ | a | ɑ | ɒ | |
Tone[]
Sekani has two tones: low and high. High tone is the more common tone. Syllables phonologically marked for tone are low.
Nasalization[]
Nasalization of vowels is phonemic and so changes the meaning.