The Assiniboine language (also known as Assiniboin, Hohe, or Nakota, Nakoda, Nakon or Nakona, or Stoney) is a Nakotan
Siouan language
Siouan or Siouan–Catawban is a language family of North America that is located primarily in the Great Plains, Ohio and Mississippi valleys and southeastern North America with a few other languages in the east.
Name
Authors who call the entire ...
of the
Northern Plains
The Great Plains (french: Grandes Plaines), sometimes simply "the Plains", is a broad expanse of flatland in North America. It is located west of the Mississippi River and east of the Rocky Mountains, much of it covered in prairie, steppe, and ...
. The name Assiniboine comes from the term ''Asiniibwaan'', from
Ojibwe
The Ojibwe, Ojibwa, Chippewa, or Saulteaux are an Anishinaabe people in what is currently southern Canada, the northern Midwestern United States, and Northern Plains.
According to the U.S. census, in the United States Ojibwe people are one of ...
, meaning "Stone Siouans". The reason they were called this was that Assiniboine people used heated stone to boil their food. In
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
, Assiniboine people are known as
Stoney Indians, while they called themselves
Nakota or Nakoda, meaning "allies"''.''
Classification
The Dakotan group of the Siouan family has five main divisions:
Dakota
Dakota may refer to:
* Dakota people, a sub-tribe of the Sioux
** Dakota language, their language
Dakota may also refer to:
Places United States
* Dakota, Georgia, an unincorporated community
* Dakota, Illinois, a town
* Dakota, Minnesota, ...
(Santee-Sisseton), Dakota (Yankton-Yanktonai),
Lakota
Lakota may refer to:
* Lakota people, a confederation of seven related Native American tribes
*Lakota language, the language of the Lakota peoples
Place names
In the United States:
* Lakota, Iowa
* Lakota, North Dakota, seat of Nelson County
* La ...
(Teton), Nakoda (Assiniboine) and
Nakoda (Stoney).
[Miller, D., Smith, D., McGeshick, J. R., Shanley, J., & Shields, C. (2008). ''The History of the Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes of the Fort Peck Indian Reservation, Montana'', 1800-2000. Montana: Montana Historical Society Press.] Along with the closely related
Stoney, Assiniboine is an n variety of the Dakotan languages, meaning its autonym is pronounced with an initial n (thus: ''Nakʰóta'' as opposed to
''Dakʰóta'' or
''Lakʰóta'', and ''Nakʰóda'' or ''Nakʰóna'' as opposed to ''Dakʰód'' or ''Lakʰól''). The Assiniboine language is also closely related to the
Sioux language and to the
Stoney language
Stoney—also called Nakota, Nakoda, Isga, and formerly Alberta Assiniboine—is a member of the Dakota subgroup of the Mississippi Valley grouping of the Siouan languages. The Dakotan languages constitute a dialect continuum consisting of Santee ...
(likewise called Nakoda or Nakota), although they are hardly mutually intelligible.
Official status
The Assiniboine language is not a government-recognized official language of any state or region where Assiniboine people live. There are two Reservations located in Montana, but the official language of the state is English. An estimate of native speakers ranges from less than 50, to about 100, to about 150
Assiniboine people
The Assiniboine or Assiniboin people ( when singular, Assiniboines / Assiniboins when plural; Ojibwe: ''Asiniibwaan'', "stone Sioux"; also in plural Assiniboine or Assiniboin), also known as the Hohe and known by the endonym Nakota (or Nakoda ...
, most of them elderly.
[Ethnologue](_blank)
(cf. above).
Related languages
Sioux
The Sioux or Oceti Sakowin (; Dakota language, Dakota: Help:IPA, /otʃʰeːtʰi ʃakoːwĩ/) are groups of Native Americans in the United States, Native American tribes and First Nations in Canada, First Nations peoples in North America. The ...
,
Assiniboine
The Assiniboine or Assiniboin people ( when singular, Assiniboines / Assiniboins when plural; Ojibwe: ''Asiniibwaan'', "stone Sioux"; also in plural Assiniboine or Assiniboin), also known as the Hohe and known by the endonym Nakota (or Nakoda ...
, and
Stoney are closely related languages of the Dakota family. Many linguists consider
Assiniboine
The Assiniboine or Assiniboin people ( when singular, Assiniboines / Assiniboins when plural; Ojibwe: ''Asiniibwaan'', "stone Sioux"; also in plural Assiniboine or Assiniboin), also known as the Hohe and known by the endonym Nakota (or Nakoda ...
and
Stoney to be dialects. However, they are mutually unintelligible. Parks and DeMallie report that they are not variant forms of a single dialect, but that Assiniboine is closer to the Sioux dialects than it is to Stoney. The exact number of interrelationships among the subdialects and dialects comprising this continuum is unknown.
Geographic distribution
The languages of the Dakotan group are spoken in the following regions:
*
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
**
Alberta
Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...
**
Manitoba
Manitoba ( ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population o ...
**
Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...
*
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
**
Minnesota
Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minnesota is home to western prairies, now given over to ...
**
Montana
Montana () is a state in the Mountain West division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota and South Dakota to the east, Wyoming to the south, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbi ...
**
Nebraska
Nebraska () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Kansas to the south; Colorado to the southwe ...
**
North Dakota
North Dakota () is a U.S. state in the Upper Midwest, named after the Native Americans in the United States, indigenous Dakota people, Dakota Sioux. North Dakota is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba to the north a ...
**
South Dakota
South Dakota (; Sioux language, Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state in the West North Central states, North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Lakota people, Lakota and Dakota peo ...
D-N-L classification system
The Assiniboine language(Nakota), the Dakota language and the Lakota language are usually classified into a group with D-N-L subgroup classification. As suggested by the name of the system, the variation in pronunciations of certain words follows the D-N-L rule. A typical example is given below:
Santee-Sisseton and Yankton-Yanktonai are languages that belong to the Dakotan group and Teton is a language in the Lakotan group. The table above illustrates a typical variation amongst these three languages. Just as the name of these three tribes suggest, the Dakota language, the Lakota language and the Nakota (Assiniboine) language have respective inclinations towards /d/, /l/, and /n/ in some substitutable consonants.
Arguments against the classification system
Some scholars argue that the D-N-L classification system may not be totally accurate due to the non-rigidness of the substitution form. Siouan Indians live on an expansive continuum such that the distinction between different languages does not manifest in a rigid, clear-cutting criterion. Historically, linguists have debated on Yankton-Yanktonai languages and their proper positions into the D-N-L classification system, but the coexistence of /d/ and /n/ phonemes made such classification doubtful. This example of lexical difference between the languages of the Siouan group illustrates another possible distinction besides the D-N-L variations.
Phonology
The phonemic inventory has 27 consonants, which includes aspirated, plain, and ejective stops. In addition to this, it has five
oral vowels and three
nasal vowels
A nasal vowel is a vowel that is produced with a lowering of the soft palate (or velum) so that the air flow escapes through the nose and the mouth simultaneously, as in the French vowel or Amoy []. By contrast, oral vowels are produced witho ...
. It is a structure-preserving language. Assiniboine has no definite or indefinite articles, no nominal case system, and no verbal tense marking. Clauses unmarked are "realized," while clauses marked as "potential" by means of verbal enclitic, which is successful in producing a future/non-future distinction. The verbal system is split into active and stative (split-intransitive). The active object pronominal affixes coincide with the stative verbs of the subject pronominal affixes.
The affricates and stops of Assiniboine are often described as voiced rather than voiceless, due to intervocalic voicing rules which result in surface voiced forms.
Oral vowels
Nasal vowel
A nasal vowel is a vowel that is produced with a lowering of the soft palate (or velum) so that the air flow escapes through the nose and the mouth simultaneously, as in the French vowel or Amoy []. By contrast, oral vowels are produced wit ...
s
There are five oral vowels in Assiniboine, , and three nasal vowels, .
Words that follow above rules
*/bahá/ hill
*/pahá/ hair
*/čupó/ fog
*/ptą/ otter
*/pka/ heavy
*/psi/ rice
*/pša/to sneeze
[Hollow, R. C.. (1970). A Note on Assiniboine Phonology. International Journal of American Linguistics, 36(4), 296–298. Retrieved from https://www.jstor.org/stable/1264256
]
Syllable structure
Syllables are primarily of CV structure. While codas are possible, they are restricted and uncommon, often becoming restructured as the onset of the following syllable. Onsets may include up to two consonants but codas must be simplex. Possible onset clusters are given in the following table:
[Reproduced from .]
Grammar
Morphology
Morphological processes for Assiniboine language are primarily agglutinating. In addition, the character of morpheme alternation in Assiniboine may be classified in terms of
phoneme loss,
phoneme shift,
contraction
Contraction may refer to:
Linguistics
* Contraction (grammar), a shortened word
* Poetic contraction, omission of letters for poetic reasons
* Elision, omission of sounds
** Syncope (phonology), omission of sounds in a word
* Synalepha, merged ...
,
nasalization loss,
syllable loss,
syntactic contraction, and
syntactic alternation.
[Levin, N. B. (1964).''The Assiniboine language''. Bloomington: Indiana University.]
Morphophonemics
Examples from Levin (1964).
Contraction->When two syllabics come into contact they contract as in:
;/a/+/i/ > /i/
;/i/+/i/ > /i/
;/a/+/u/ > /u/
Phoneme loss: Syllabics
when /a/ is in medial position between /k/ and /h/:
;/a/> /∅/
when /o/ is in the medial position between /i/ and/k/:
;/o/>/∅/
when /e/ is in medial position between /p/ and /k/:
;/e/>/Φ/
Phoneme loss: semi syllabics
;/y/ > /∅/ when:
;/y/ follows /n/
Phoneme loss: non syllanics
/k/ is in medial position between/u/ and/k/ or /u/ and /h/ or /u/ and /n/ or /u/ and /y/
;/k/ > /∅/
Phoneme shift: syllanics
;/i/ > /a/ before /n/
Phoneme shift: non syllabics
When /a/--/e/ is in medial position between/g/ and /š/
;/g/ > /x/
When /a/--/e/ is in medial position between/g/ and /c/
;/g/ > /x/
When /g/ is in medial position between /a/ and /y/
;/g/ > /x/
Nasalization loss exists as follows:
;/ą/ > /a/
Syllable loss occurs as follows:
:/ye/ > /Φ/ Ex) iyópe... ye "to pay" so, iyópe + wa + ye > iyópewa "I pay"
Syntactic contraction: personal inflectional morphemes
;wa "I" + ni "you" > ci "I...you";
Syntactic contraction with verbal themes occurs as follows
;/i/ + /k/ - /kk/ > c;
Syntactic alternation
;/a/ > /e/ in verbal theme
;/a/>/e/ in nomial theme
;/a/>/e/ with the future suffix;
Syntax
Assiniboine is SOV word order. Elements order might be different from the canonical SOV, this is not free nor scrambling word order, but instead, the result of topicalization or other movements. Out of context sentences are always interpreted as SOV order even if it sounds odd. For example, 'the man bit the dog', unless an element is moved into a focus
position. Focused element sentences are highly marked, and practically, a strange semantic reading is preferred over an interpretation of OSV. For example, the following sentence was interpreted as 'A banana ate the boy' by a native speaker, and to get the OSV reading out of it the object must be stressed, for example if the sentence was given as a reply to the question 'What did the boy eat?'.
Vocabulary
#wąži - one
#nųba - two
#yamni - three
#tópa - four
#záptą - five
#šákpe - six
#iyušna - seven
#šaknoğą - eight
#napcuwąga - nine
#wikcémna - ten
#saba - black
#ska - white
#ša - red
#to - blue
More words can be found in the Dakota-English Dictionary
[Riggs, S. R. (1892). A Dakota-English Dictionary. Washington: US Government Printing]
*Pronunciation may be learned at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7o1X1tBgaw by Fred Spyglass
Writing system
Class 1
: wa- 1st person+singular
: ya- 2nd person
Class 2
: ma- 1st person+singular
: ni- 2nd person
For both class 1 and 2
: ũ- 1st person-singular
: o- 3rd person
: wica- 3rd person
: ci- 1st person + singular subject/ 2nd person object
Notes
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
External links
A video of Fred Spyglass (Mosquito First Nation) countingVideo on Assiniboine historyOnline dictionary of Assniboine American Indian Studies Research Institute
{{Languages of Montana
Indigenous languages of the North American Plains
First Nations languages in Canada
Endangered languages of the United States
Endangered indigenous languages of the Americas
Western Siouan languages
Indigenous languages of Montana