Assiniboine language

Assiniboine (; also known as Assiniboin, Hohe, or Nakota, Nakoda, Nakon or Nakona,For the usage of the term "nakona" by Fort Peck's Assiniboine, cf. Fort Peck Community College and NHE or Stoney) is a Nakotan language of the Northern Plains. The name Assiniboine comes from the term , from Ojibwe, meaning 'Stone Sioux'. They were called this because the Assiniboine people used heated stones to boil their food. In Canada, they are known as 'Stoney Indians', while they call themselves Nakoda, from the term Nakota 'allies'.

Classification The Dakotan group has five main divisions: Dakota (Santee-Sisseton), Dakota (Yankton-Yanktonai), Lakota (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: as opposed to Dakʰóta or Lakʰóta, and or as opposed to or ). The Assiniboine language is also closely related to the Sioux language and to the Stoney language (likewise called Nakoda or Nakota), although they are hardly mutually intelligible.

D-N-L classification system The Assiniboine language (Nakota), the Dakota language, and the Lakota language are usually classified in the D-N-L subgroup. 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:

Language group'greasy'Santee-SissetonYankton-YanktonaiTetonAssiniboineStoney

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 , , and 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. They argue there was 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 and phonemes made such classification doubtful. This example of lexical difference between the languages illustrates another possible distinction besides the D-N-L variations. Language group'horse'Santee-Sisseton Yankton-Yanktonai Teton Assiniboine Stoney

Related languages Sioux, Assiniboine, and Stoney are closely related languages of the Dakota family. Many linguists consider Assiniboine 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.

Dialect group Self-designation Political designationSantee-Sisseton Dakhóta SiouxYankton-Yanktonai Dakȟóta SiouxTeton Lakȟóta SiouxAssiniboine Nakhóta AssiniboineStoney Nakoda Stoney

Geographic distribution The languages of the Dakotan group are spoken in the following regions: Canada Alberta Manitoba Saskatchewan United States Minnesota Montana Nebraska North Dakota South Dakota

Reservation or reserve DialectAlbertaAlexis Stoney / Nakoda / IsgaBig Horn Stoney / Îyârhe Nakoda / NakodaEden Valley Stoney / Îyârhe Nakoda / NakodaPaul Stoney / Nakoda / IsgaStoney (Morley) Stoney / Îyârhe Nakoda / Nakoda SaskatchewanCarry the Kettle Assiniboine / NakhótaMoose Woods (White Cap) Sioux (Sisseton, Yanktonai) / Dakhóta / Dakȟóta Mosquito-Grizzly Bear's Head Assiniboine / NakhótaSioux Wahpeton (Round Plain) Sioux (Sisseton, Yanktonai) / Dakhóta / Dakȟóta Standing Buffalo Sioux (Sisseton, Yanktonai) / Dakhóta / Dakȟóta Whitebear Assiniboine / NakhótaWood Mountain Sioux (Teton) / Lakȟóta ManitobaBirdtail Sioux (Santee) / DakhótaOak Lake Sioux (Santee) / DakhótaSioux Valley Sioux (Santee) / DakhótaSioux Village-Long Plain Sioux (Santee) / Dakhóta North DakotaDevil's Lake Sioux (Sisseton, Yanktonai) / Dakhóta / DakȟótaStanding Rock Sioux (Yanktonai) / Dakȟóta South DakotaCheyenne River Sioux (Teton) / LakȟótaCrow Creek Sioux (Yanktonai) / DakȟótaFlandreau Sioux (Santee) / DakhótaLower Brule Sioux (Teton) / LakȟótaPine Ridge Sioux (Teton) / LakȟótaRosebud Sioux (Teton) / LakȟótaSisseton Sioux (Santee) / DakhótaStanding Rock Sioux (Teton) / LakȟótaYankton Sioux (Yankton) / Dakȟóta NebraskaSantee Sioux (Santee) / Dakhóta MinnesotaLower Sioux Sioux (Santee) / DakhótaPrairie Island Sioux (Santee) / DakhótaPrior Lake Sioux (Santee) / DakhótaUpper Sioux Sioux (Santee) / Dakhóta MontanaFort Belknap Assiniboine / NakhótaFort Peck Assiniboine, Sioux (Yanktonai, Sisseton) / Nakhóta / Dakȟóta / Dakhóta

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, most of them elderly.Ethnologue (cf. above). A 2021 study of Indigenous languages in Canada put Assiniboine at 350 speakers.

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. 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.

Labial Alveolar Palatal orpostalveolar Velar GlottalPlosive Plain Ejective Aspirated Fricative Voiceless Ejective Voiced Nasal Approximant includes /h/ as a glide rather than fricative due to its frequent place assimilation to the following vowel.

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 Character used IPA symbol Assiniboine pronunciationi i i as in policeu u oo as in booke e e as in a in mateo o o as in votea a a as in father

Nasal vowels

Character IPA symbol Also used asą ã aⁿ, an, aη, aN į ĩ iⁿ, in, iη, iNų ũ uⁿ, oⁿ, un, uη, uN

There are five oral vowels in Assiniboine, , and three nasal vowels, .

Words that follow the above rules: 'hill' 'hair' 'fog' 'otter' 'heavy' 'rice' 'to sneeze'

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 .

SecondptksšcmnFirstp - - - -t - - - - - - -k - s - - š - - x - - - m - - - - - - -

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, 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:

+ >

Phoneme loss: Syllabics

when is in medial position between and : >

when is in the medial position between and : >

when is in medial position between and : >

Phoneme loss: semi-syllabics > when follows

Phoneme loss: non-syllabics

is in medial position between and or and or and or and >

Phoneme shift: syllabics > before

Phoneme shift: non-syllabics

When -- is in medial position between and >

When is in medial position between and >

Nasalization loss exists as follows: >

Syllable loss occurs as follows: > Ex) 'to pay' so, + + > 'I pay'

Syntactic contraction: personal inflectional morphemes

'I' + 'you' > 'I...you';

Syntactic contraction with verbal themes occurs as follows:

+ – > c;

Syntactic alternation

> in verbal theme

> in nomial theme

> with the future suffix;

Syntax Assiniboine has SOV word order. The order of elements may differ from 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?'. Class 1 1st person+singular 2nd person

Class 2 1st person+singular 2nd person

For both class 1 and 2 1st person-singular 3rd person 3rd person 1st person + singular subject/ 2nd person object

Vocabulary – one – two – three – four – five – six – seven – eight – nine – ten – black – white – red – blue More words can be found in the Dakota-English Dictionary.Riggs, S. R. (1892). A Dakota-English Dictionary. Washington: US Government Printing

References Notes

Citations

Sources

Assiniboine language

Bron en licentie