Glottal Stops

Under certain conditions, vowels can be pronounced with a final glottal stop [ʔ].  A glottal stop is the sound you hear in the middle of the English word uh-oh; it feels like a catch in your throat.

In Southern East Cree, when a long vowel or a diphthong occurs before a [tʃ] sound, you can hear a glottal stop before the [tʃ].

Southern			Syllables	IPA
		waapaache	waa-paa-che	[waː -ˈpaːʔ- ʃe ]
		aweche	a-we-che	[a -ˈweːʔ – ʃe ]
		michisuuche	mi-chi-suu-che	[mi – chi -ˈsuːʔ –  ʃe ]

Similarly, in the Northern dialect, you can hear a glottal stop before the [tʃ]. In this dialect the glottal stop that occurs with dubitative inflection or dubitative pronouns is often written chi.

Northern			Syllables	IPA
		waapaachichaa	waa-paachi-chaa	[waː -ˈpaːʔ – ʃaː ]
		awaachichaa	a-waachi-chaa	[a -ˈwaːʔ – ʃaː ]
		michisuuchichaa	mi-chi-suuchi-chaa	[mi – chi -ˈsuːʔ –  ʃaː ]

Words that end in a vowel can also be optionally pronounced with a glottal stop when they are pronounced by themselves (that is, when they are not in a sentence). However, this doesn’t happen if the word already ends with an [h] sound.

Words with only one vowel sound are often pronounced with a glottal stop when they are pronounced in isolation. You can hear the glottal stop right after the vowel.