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Fox language

  • ️Thu Jul 19 2012
Fox
Meshkwahkihaki
Spoken natively in United States, Mexico
Region Central Oklahoma, Northeastern Kansas, Iowa, and Coahuila
Ethnicity Fox, Sauk, and Kickapoo
Native speakers 200-1000  (date missing)
Language family
Language codes
ISO 639-3 Either:
sac – Fox and Sauk
kic – Kickapoo

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Fox (known by a variety of different names, including Mesquakie, Meskwaki, Mesquakie-Sauk, Mesquakie-Sauk-Kickapoo, Sac and Fox, and others) is an Algonquian language, spoken by around 1000 Fox, Sauk, and Kickapoo in various locations in the Midwestern United States and in northern Mexico.

Dialects

There are three distinct dialects: Fox (also called Mesquakie, Meskwaki, and Meshkwahkihaki), Sauk (also called Sac, and Sac and Fox), and Kickapoo (also called Kikapú; considered by some to be a separate but closely related language). If Kickapoo is counted as a separate language rather than a dialect of Fox, then there are only between 200 and 300 speakers of Fox.

Revitalization

Most speakers are elderly or middle-aged, making it highly endangered. The tribal school at the Meskwaki Settlement in Iowa incorporates bilingual education for children.[1] [2] In 2011, the The Meskwaki Sewing Project was created, to bring mothers and girls together "with elder women in the Meskwaki Senior Center sewing traditional clothing and learning the Meskwaki language."[3]

Prominent scholars doing research on the language include Ives Goddard [4] and Lucy Thomason of the Smithsonian Institution and Amy Dahlstrom of the University of Chicago.

Phonology

The consonant phonemes of Fox are given in the table below. There are eight vowel phonemes: short /a, e, i, o/ and long /aː, eː, iː, oː/.

Labial Alveolar Postalveolar
or palatal		 Velar Glottal
Nasal m n
Stop plain p t tʃ k
preaspirated ʰp ʰt ʰtʃ ʰk
Fricative s ʃ h
Approximant j w

Other than those involving a consonant plus /j/ or /w/, the only possible consonant cluster is ʃk.

See also

References

  1. ^ Meskwaki Settlement School Website, http://www.meskwaki.bia.edu/
  2. ^ "Meskwaki Education Network Initiative (MENWI)". American Indian Studies Research Institute at Indiana University. http://www.indiana.edu/~aisri/projects/menwi/. Retrieved 2012-07-19.
  3. ^ Scandale, Maria (2011-02-21). "Meskwaki Tribe Receives Grant for Sewing and Language Project - ICTMN.com". Indian Country Today Media Network, ICTMN.com. http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2011/02/25/meskwaki-tribe-receives-grant-for-sewing-and-language-project-19645. Retrieved 2012-07-19.
  4. ^ Nelson, John (2008-07-27). "Talking the talk". WCFCourier.com. http://wcfcourier.com/news/local/article_90c8d30e-0501-596a-a914-e5501687f1a8.html. Retrieved 2012-07-19.
  • Voorhis, Paul H. 1974. Introduction to the Kickapoo Language, Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
  • Bloomfield, Leonard. 1925. "Notes on the Fox Language." International Journal of American Linguistics 3:219-32.

External links

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