Nokota Horses.jpg

Nakota (or Nakoda or Nakona) is the endonym used by those '' Assiniboine'' Indigenous people in the US, and by the Stoney People, in Canada.

The Assiniboine branched off from the Great Sioux Nation (aka the ''Oceti Sakowin'') long ago and moved further west from the original territory in the woodlands of what is now Minnesota into the northern and northwestern regions of Montana and North Dakota in the United States, and Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta in Canada. In each of the Western Siouan language dialects, ''nakota'', ''dakota'' and ''lakota'' all mean "friend".

Linguistic history

Historically, the tribes belonging to the Sioux nation have generally been classified into three large language groups:
* Lakota (; anglicized as ''Teton''), who form the westernmost group.
* Dakota, ('' Dakhótiyapi'' - ''Isáŋyathi'' anglicized as ''Santee'') originally the easternmost group
* ''Nakota'', originally the two central tribes of the Yankton and the Yanktonai,

The Assiniboine separated from the Yankton-Yanktonai grouping at an early time. For a long time, very few scholars criticized this classification.

In 1978, Douglas R. Parks, A. Wesley Jones, David S. Rood, and Raymond J. DeMallie engaged in systematic linguistic research at the Sioux and Assiniboine reservations to establish the precise dialectology of the Sioux language. They ascertained that both the Santee and the Yankton/Yanktonai referred (and refer) to themselves by the autonym "Dakota." The name of ''Nakota'' (or ''Nakoda'') was (and is) exclusive usage of the Assiniboine and of their Canadian relatives, the Stoney. The subsequent academic literature, however, especially if it is not produced by linguistic specialists, has seldom reflected Parks and DeMallie's work. The change cannot be regarded as a subsequent terminological regression caused by the fact that Yankton-Yanktonai people lived together with the Santee in the same reserves.

Currently, the groups refer to themselves as follows in their mother tongues:
*Dakota people – Dakota, Santee, Yankton and Yanktonai
* Lakota people - Lakota or Teton Sioux
*Nakota - the Nakoda people, the AssiniboineThe endonym includes both the Assiniboine/Stoney and the Lakota/Dakota. and the Stoney

Present trends

Recently the Assiniboine and, especially, the Stoney have begun to minimize the historic separation from the Dakota, claiming a shared identity with the broader Sioux Nation. This can be seen on Alberta's Stoney official Internet sites, for example, in the self-designation of the '' Alexis Nakota ''Sioux'' First Nation'', or in the claim of the '' Nakoda people'' to their Sioux ancestry and the value of their native language:
"As descendants of the great Sioux nations, the Stoney tribal members of today prefer to conduct their conversation and tribal business in the Siouan mother tongue". Saskatchewan's Assiniboine and Stoney tribes also claim identification with the Sioux tradition.

The Assiniboine-Stoney tribes have supported recent "pan-Sioux" attempts to revive the native languages. Their representatives attend the annual "Lakota, Dakota, Nakota Language Summits." Since 2008, these have been sponsored by ''Tusweca Tiospaye'' (Dragonfly Community), the Lakota non-profit organization for the promotion and strengthening of the language. They promote a mission of "Uniting the Seven Council Fires to Save the Language".Cf. . The Lakota promoters acknowledge a common origin with the Nakota peoples: 2008's Language Summit was an effort to unite the Lakota, Dakota, and Nakota ("Sioux") ''oyate'' (peoples) in both the United States and Canada to revive the Lakota, Dakota, and Nakota languages. In the program of the 2009 summit, the list of the tribes forming the "Seven Council Fires" included the Assiniboine and Stoney in the "Fire" of the Yanktonai. (This was the group from which they are said to have separated historically.) Later, the two Nakota tribes were shifted to the end of the list. The wording, "Also includes the Stoney and Assiniboine People," was retaine
2009 Summit

Notes

Sources

* Curtis, Edward Sheriff, ''The North American Indian : being a series of volumes picturing and describing the Indians of the United States, and Alaska'' (written, illustrated, and published by Edward S. Curtis; edited by Frederick Webb Hodge), Seattle, E. S. Curtis ambridge, Mass. : The University Press 1907–1930, 20 v.
Northwestern University

* DeMallie, Raymond J., "Sioux until 1850"; in Raymond J. DeMallie (ed.), ''Handbook of North American Indians: Plains'' (Vol. 13, Part 2, p. 718–760), William C. Sturtevant (Gen. Ed.), Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., 2001 ()
* Guy E. Gibbon, ''The Sioux: the Dakota and Lakota nations'', Malden, Blackwell Publishers, 2003 ()
* Howard, James H., ''The Canadian Sioux'', Lincoln, University of Nebraska Press, 1984 ()
* Lewis, M. Paul (a cura di), 2009. ''Ethnologue: Languages of the World'', Sixteenth edition, Tex.: SIL International. Online version: http://www.ethnologue.com/
* Palmer, Jessica D., ''The Dakota peoples: a history of the Dakota, Lakota, and Nakota through 1863''. Jefferson: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2008 ()
* Parks, Douglas R., DeMallie, Raymond J., "Sioux, Assiniboine and Stoney Dialects: A Classification", ''Anthropological Linguistics'', Special Issue, Florence M. Voegelin Memorial Volume, Vol. 34:1-4 (Spring - Winter, 1992), pp. 233-255 (accessible online a
JSTORE

* Parks, Douglas R. & Rankin, Robert L., "The Siouan languages", in Raymond J. DeMallie (ed.), ''Handbook of North American Indians: Plains'' (Vol. 13, Part 1, p. 94–114), William C. Sturtevant (gen. ed.), Smithsonian Institution, Washington, 2001.
* Christopher Westhorp, ''Pocket guide to native Americans'', Salamander Books, Londra, 1993 () – Italian edition consulted: ''Indiani. I Pellerossa Tribù per Tribù'', Idealibri, Milan, 1993 ().

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Nakoda (Stoney)
First Nations in Alberta
First Nations in Saskatchewan
Native American tribes in Montana
Plains tribes
Algonquian ethnonyms
Siouan peoples