Chipewyan language

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Chipewyan
Dene Suline
ᑌᓀᓱᒼᕄᓀ Dëne Sųłiné
Native to Canada
Region Northern Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba; southern Northwest Territories and Nunavut
Ethnicity Chipewyan people
Native speakers
 12,000  (2006)[1]
Official status
Official language in
  Northwest Territories (Canada)[2]
Language codes
ISO 639-2 chp
ISO 639-3 chp

Chipewyan /tʃɪpəˈwaɪən/,[3] ethnonym Dëne Sųłiné IPA: [denɛsũɬinɛ́], is the language spoken by the Chipewyan people of northwestern Canada. It is categorized as part of the Northern Athabaskan language family. Dëne Sųłiné has over 11,000 speakers in Canada, mostly in Saskatchewan, Alberta, Manitoba and the Northwest Territories,[1] but only has official status in the Northwest Territories alongside 8 other aboriginal languages: Cree, Dogrib, Gwich’in, Inuktitut, Inuinnaqtun, Inuvialuktun, North Slavey and South Slavey.[4][5]

Most Chipewyan people now use Dene and Dëne Sųłiné (Dënesųłiné) to describe themselves and their language. The Saskatchewan communities of Fond-du-Lac,[6] Black Lake,[7] Wollaston Lake [8] and La Loche are a few.

Sounds

Consonants

The 39 consonants of Dëne Sųłiné:

  Bilabial Inter-
dental		 Dental Post-
alveolar		 Velar/Uvular Glottal
central lateral plain labial
Nasal m m   n n          
Plosive plain b p   d t     g k gw kʷ  
aspirated     t tʰ     k kʰ kw kʷʰ  
ejective     tʼ tʼ     kʼ kʼ kwʼ kʼʷ ɂ ʔ
Affricate plain   ddh tθ dz ts dl tɬ j tʃ      
aspirated   tth tθʰ ts tsʰ tł tɬʰ ch tʃʰ      
ejective   tthʼ tθʼ tsʼ tsʼ tłʼ tɬʼ chʼ tʃʼ      
Fricative voiceless   th θ s s ł ɬ sh ʃ hh χ hhw χʷ h h
voiced   dh ð z z l ɮ zh ʒ gh ʁ ghw ʁʷ  
Trill     r r          

The "velar" fricatives are actually uvular.

Vowels

Dëne Sųłiné has vowels of 6 differing qualities.

  Front Central Back
Close i i   u u
Close-mid ë/e e   o o
Open-mid e ɛ    
Open   a a  

Most vowels can be either

  • oral or nasal
  • short or long

As a result, Dëne Sųłiné has 18 phonemic vowels:

  Front Central Back
short long short long short long
Close oral i iː     u uː
nasal ĩ ĩː     ũ ũː
Close-mid e       o  
Open-mid oral ɛ ɛː        
nasal ɛ̃ ɛ̃ː        
Open oral     a aː    
nasal     ã ãː    

Dëne Sųłiné also has 9 oral and nasal diphthongs of the form vowel + /j/.

  Front Central Back
oral nasal oral nasal oral nasal
Close         uj ũj
Mid ej ẽj əj   oj õj
Open     aj ãj    

Tone

Dëne Sųłiné has two tones:

  • high
  • low

Demographics

Villages in Canada with a Dëne Sųłiné speaking population
15 communities in Canada with Dëne Sųłiné populations. Flashing dots are villages with over 1,000 speakers.
Welcome signs by the La Loche Airport
Close-up of Dëne Sųłiné and English sign

In the 2011 Canada Census 11,860 people chose Dene as their mother tongue. 70.6% were located in Saskatchewan and 15.2% were located in Alberta.[9]

Not all were from the historical Chipewyan regions south and east of Great Slave Lake. Approximately 11,000 of those who chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011 are Dene/Chipewyan with 7,955 (72%) in Saskatchewan, 1,005 (9%) in Manitoba, 510 plus urban dwellers in Alberta and 260 plus urban dwellers in the Northwest Territories. The communities within the Dene/Chipewyan traditional areas are shown below:

Saskatchewan

The Dene (Dëne Sųłiné) speaking communities of Saskatchewan are located in the northern half of the province. The area from the upper Churchill River west of Pinehouse Lake all the way north to Lake Athabasca and from Lake Athabasca east to the north end of Reindeer Lake is home to 7410 people who chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.[10]

Prince Albert had 265 residents who chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011, Saskatoon had 165, the La Ronge Population Centre had 55 and Meadow Lake had 30.[10]

3,050 were in the Lake Athabasca-Fond du Lac River area including Black Lake and Wollaston Lake in the communities of:

3,920 were in the upper Churchill River area including Peter Pond Lake, Churchill Lake, Lac La Loche, Descharme Lake, Garson Lake and Turnor Lake in the communities of:

Manitoba

Two isolated communities are in northern Manitoba.

Alberta

The Wood Buffalo-Cold Lake Economic Region in the north eastern portion of Alberta from Fort Chipewyan to the Cold Lake area has the following communities. 510 residents of this region chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.[10]

  • Fort Chipewyan 45 out of 847 residents chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.[10]
  • Fort McKay 30 out of 562 residents chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.
  • Janvier (Janvier 194) 145 out of 295 residents chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.
  • Janvier South 35 out of 104 residents chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.
  • Cold Lake 149 105 out of 594 residents chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.
  • Cold Lake 149 B, Alberta 25 out of 149 residents chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.

Northwest Territories

Three communities are located south of Great Slave Lake in Region 5. 260 residents of Region 5 chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.[10]

  • Fort Smith 30 out of 2093 residents chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.[10]
  • Fort Resolution 95 out of 474 residents chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.[10]
  • Lutselk'e 120 out of 295 residents chose Dene as their mother tongue in 2011.[10]

See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Statistics Canada: 2006 Census Sum of 'Chipewyan' and 'Dene'.
  2. ↑ Official Languages of the Northwest Territories (map)
  3. ↑ Laurie Bauer, 2007, The Linguistics Student’s Handbook, Edinburgh
  4. ↑ Northwest Territories Official Languages Act, 1988 (as amended 1988, 1991-1992, 2003)
  5. ↑ Official Languages of the Northwest Territories (map)
  6. ↑ "Prince Albert Grand Council (Fond-du-Lac)". Retrieved 2013-05-26. 
  7. ↑ "Prince Albert Grand Council (Black Lake)". Retrieved 2013-05-26. 
  8. ↑ "Prince Albert Grand Council (Wollaston Lake)". Retrieved 2013-05-26. 
  9. ↑ "Statistics Canada Table 1 (Aboriginal language families)". Canada Census 1011. Retrieved 2013-04-14. 
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 10.3 10.4 10.5 10.6 10.7 10.8 10.9 10.10 10.11 10.12 "Community Profiles". Canada Census 2011. Retrieved 2013-04-14. 

Bibliography

  • Cook, Eung-Do. (2004). A Grammar of Dëne Sųłiné (Chipewyan). Algonquian and Iroquoian Linguistics - Special Athabaskan Number, Memoir 17. Winnipeg: Algonquian and Iroquoian Linguistics. ISBN 0-921064-17-9.
  • Cook, Eung-Do. 2006. "The Patterns of Consonantal Acquisition and Change in Chipewyan (Dëne Sųłiné)". International Journal of American Linguistics. 72, no. 2: 236.
  • De Reuse, Willem. 2006. "A Grammar of Dëne Sųłiné (Chipewyan) (Cook)". International Journal of American Linguistics. 72, no. 4: 535.
  • Elford, Leon W. Dene sųłiné yati ditł'ísé = Dene sųłiné reader. Prince Albert, SK: Northern Canada Mission Distributors, 2001. ISBN 1-896968-28-7
  • Gessner, S. 2005. "Properties of Tone in Dëne Sųłiné". Amsterdam Studies in the Theory and History of Linguistic Science. Series IV, Current Issues in Linguistic Theory. 269: 229-248.
  • Li, Fang-Kuei. (1946). Chipewyan. In C. Osgood & H. Hoijer (Eds.), Linguistic Structures of Native America (pp. 398–423). New York: The Viking Fund Publications in Anthropology (No. 6). (Reprinted 1963, 1965, 1967, & 1971, New York: Johnson Reprint Corp.).

External links

Chipewyan language test of Wikipedia at Wikimedia Incubator
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