White Dove's Cherokee-English-Cherokee Dictionary

  1. Pronunciation guide:

    2. Vowels A, E, I, O, and U are pronounced as in Spanish or Italian while V is pronounced to rhyme with the French nasalized vowel in the indefinite male article "un". If you don't know French, the vowel sound in English "huh" or "the" will do.

    The consonants are pretty much as in English except that TS is pronounced more like the 'CH' in "Cherokee" or the 'J' in "Joseph", depending on the dialect of Cherokee used. Also, the 'QU' can be pronounced as 'KW' or 'GW' while 'TL' is often pronounced as 'HL'.

    It is sometimes the case that a word isn't pronounced exactly as spelled. The word for 'apple', for example, is spelled (SV-GA-TA) while it is actually pronounced SV-K-TA. I haven't dealt with that issue in this dictionary, but I may add a column for pronunciation in the future for those words that need it. In the meantime, see my article on a proposed set of diacritics for learners of Cherokee for more information on this issue.

  2. Links to dictionary:

    3. Click on the desired section below. There are links back and forth between the sections once you get inside.

    1. Cherokee-English

      2. Indexed in alphabetical order on the Cherokee words.

    2. English-Cherokee

      3. Indexed in alphabetical order on the English words.

    3. Topically Indexed (Just Numbers, Colors, and Days of the Week so far)

      4. Indexed by topic.
David Harris on behalf of White Dove - May 12th, 1999