Kurur Sumi (Kurisæmur) is the language of the Kurur Sumi people. It is the easternmost of the Sumi languages and is spoken around the King Kanaq Ice Range in Sumiqtunatupiakuq by a little over 3000 people. Kurur, along with six other Sumi languages, form the Central branch of the Sumi language family. Its nearest related language is Sampa Sumi, with which it is mutually intelligible.
The phonetic inventory is /t, k, s, m, n, l, r, j, h, v/ with short vowels /a, i, o, u/, long vowels /a:, i:, o:, u:/, and one vowel dipthong /ai, ai:/.
The known nominal suffixes of Kurur Sumi are included below:
For example:
Kolan "house" (Sampa Sumi; kȧlan)
Kolalu kolalu "to the two houses"
Kolar "at the houses"
Kolaru "at home"
The personal pronouns are, in the ergative case:
_________SG DU PL
1st person ju juju inæ
2nd person kæ kuna kunū
3rd person sæ suna sunū
The demonstrative adjectives and pronouns are:
Ætla "this", Ola "that": Ætla kolan "this house".
Basic interrogative pronouns are:
Nal "who?", Jal, "what?"
Kurur Sumi numerals are:
All of the Sumi languages are basically ergative-absolutive languages, what is odd in the Kurur Sumi language, however is the use of a Dative case, as this is the only known Sumi language to employ this type of case. The Dative case is used in Kurur Sumi to indicate movement to, away , or at an object, making nouns using this case fairly vague as to what its manner of movement is. It is possible that Sampa Sumi once used this case because the allative, elative, inessive, and ablative cases are strikingly similar.
