Native to Canada Dialects Babine
Witsuwit'en | Region British Columbia | |
Ethnicity 3,410 Nadot’en (Babine) and Wet'suwet'en in 7 of 9 communities (2014, FPCC) Native speakers 430 in 7 of 9 communities (2014, FPCC) Language family Dené–Yeniseian?
Na-Dené
Athabaskan–Eyak
Athabaskan
Northern Athabaskan
Babine–Witsuwit'en | ||
Babine–Witsuwit'en or Nadot’en-Wets’uwet’en is an Athabaskan language spoken in the Central Interior of British Columbia. Its closest relative is Carrier. Because of this linguistic relationship together with political and cultural ties, Babine–Witsuwit'en is often referred to as Northern Carrier or Western Carrier. Specialist opinion is, however, that it should be considered a separate, though related, language (Kari 1975, Story 1984, Kari and Hargus 1989).
Contents
A term used briefly in the 1990s is Bulkley Valley – Lakes District Language, abbreviated BVLD. The Ethnologue uses the bare name Babine for the language as a whole, not just for the Babine dialect.
As its name suggests, Babine–Witsuwit'en consists of two main dialects, Babine (Nedut’en) and Witsuwit'en. Babine is spoken around Babine Lake, Trembleur Lake, and Takla Lake. Witsuwit'en is spoken in the Bulkley Valley, around Broman Lake, and in the vicinity of Skins Lake. The two dialects are very similar and are distinguished primarily by the fact that in Babine but not in Witsuwit'en the Athabascan front velar series have become palatal affricates.
Several non-specialist sources (the First Peoples' Heritage Language and Culture Council, the British Columbia Ministry of Education, and the University of British Columbia Museum of Anthropology) classify Witsuwit'en as one language and Babine as a distinct language, either on its own or together with Carrier proper under the name Dakelh. Experts on the languages reject this classification. All agree that the differences between Babine and Witsuwit'en are small and that the major split is between Babine and Witsuwit'en on the one hand and Carrier proper on the other hand. The distinction is because speakers of Babine and of Carrier proper call themselves and their language Dakelh but that speakers of Witsuwit'en do not.
Like most other native languages of British Columbia, Babine–Witsuwit'en is an endangered language. It is spoken by a minority of the population, primarily elders. There are 161 fluent and 159 partial speakers of the Babine dialect and 131 fluent and 61 partial speakers of the Witsuwit'en dialect. At most a handful of children speak the language.
Phonology
The aspirated and ejective labials are rarer than other consonants.
Words and phrases
Source: First Voices
Basic word order in Babine-Witsuwit'en is Subject Object Verb (SOV). The Witsuwit'en verb consists of a lexical root and an aspectual, tense, or modal affix - most often a suffix. All Witsuwit'en verbs carry tense and subject inflection; there is no Witsuwit'en equivalent to the English infinitive. Verbs are inflected for direct objects, with the order of prefixing on verbs relatively rigid, with affixes furthest away from the lexical stem displaying more variability. However, Witsuwit'en does not mark for third-person singular subject or object, as demonstrated in the examples below:
1) Yilh niwilyekh.
with-3s 3s-plays ‘3s was playing with it’2) Yighinsiye.
‘3s invited 3s’3) Hiyïts’oldeh.
‘They need it’
While verbs are marked for tense and inflected via affix markers for subject and object, noun stems are inflected for possessor but do not take case marking as no case marking exists in Witsuwit'en. These two sets of affix markings for both nouns and verbs draw from the same set of prefixes, except in the case of subject marking on the verb stems. There are another set of markers for subject marking on verb stems, distinct from other pronominal affixes.