Practising Nakoda

“Nakón-wico’i’e né uspénic’iciyac/Practising Nakoda: A Thematic Dictionary”
by Vincent Collette, Tom Shawl and Wilma Kennedy
Published by University of Regina Press
Review by Shelley A. Leedahl
$27.95 ISBN 9781779400185

Language and cultural identity are intrinsically connected, and for the Nakoda people, who believe that “language is a gift of the Creator,” the Nakoda language is, “through prayers and songs, the means by which important cultural values and spiritual knowledge are transmitted from generations to generations.” This is the first tenet I learned in the tri-authored book, Nakón-wico’i’e né uspénic’iciyac/Practising Nakoda: A Thematic Dictionary, published by University of Regina Press.

In Canada, Nakoda (aka Stoney or Assiniboine) is spoken by an estimated 50-150 people … and they’re aging. Understanding the import of language to one’s culture, Vincent Collette—professor of linguistics at the Université du Québec à Chicoutimi—teamed with Montana’s Tom Shawl (former Nakoda culture and language instructor at the Aannii Nakoda College) and activist Wilma Kennedy (d. 2020), who lived on the Carry the Kettle Nakoda First Nation in Saskatchewan and had previously worked with Collette on two other Nakoda books (including a concise dictionary), to create a “thematic” dictionary for Nakoda-learners.

The thematic dictionary makes learning Nakoda easier as Nakoda’s a “polysynthetic language where words are often built up with many elements that attach to the root,” and thus seeing the words in thematic groupings builds the student’s “morphological awareness.” Once the root of each word is learned, and the “morphemes” (a morpheme is the smallest unit of language that contains meaning, and there are five types. “Dog” is an example of a free morpheme … the word “incoming” has three morphemes “-in,” “come,” and “-ing” – study.com) understood, learning Nakoda’s made easier.

In short, this is no A to Z dictionary: it’s “divided into sections meant to enhance daily and ceremonial communication (including dances, ceremonies, and ceremonial clothing),” and yes, one could perhaps find an app and locate the Nakoda word for “dress,” for example, but this dictionary is a teaching tool that will help learners form sentences “in order to communicate in a meaningful way with other Nakoda speakers.”

Nakoda consists of eight vowels and seven word classes, including nouns, verbs, and interjections, like Ahé (an “expression of humility used at the beginning of prayers or songs”). Unlike English, verbs are “almost always at the end of the sentence,” making Lakoda a SOV (Subject-Object-Verb) language. The writers give this example: English: That dog is running. Nakoda: Dog that runs.

The book’s many chapters, or themes, include the “Human Body,” “Feelings, Instincts, Emotions, and Motives,” and “Agriculture, Gardening, and Ranching.” With this dictionary you can learn how to say both practical, everyday things like, “It is a very nice day today, thus we will go fishing” and “My grandmother is in the garden,” and you can also learn how to say specific things, like “My lips are chapped because of the wind,” and “She had two miscarriages.”

As “full immersion with native speakers is not possible” currently, Practising Nakoda is the next best thing for anyone wishing to learn/preserve the language. It’s a ground-breaking reference book “for the documentation, revitalization, and strengthening of Nakoda language and culture.”

THIS BOOK IS AVAILABLE AT YOUR LOCAL BOOKSTORE OR FROM WWW.SKBOOKS.COM