The Yinka Déné Language Institute
646 Stoney Creek Road
Vanderhoof BC V0J 3A1 Canada
250-561-5848, local 5460 (telephone)
250-561-5874 (FAX)
The Yinka Déné Language Institute is devoted to the preservation and promotion of Yinka Dene language and culture. Our activities include:
Encouraging the use of our languages.
Publishing material in our languages.
Producing documentation for our languages
Training researchers, language teachers, and other language specialists.
Developing curricula.
Producing teaching materials for our languages and culture.
Archiving material on our languages, culture, and history.
News and Announcements
Carrier language course
The College of New Caledonia is offering CLCT 110 "Carrier Language Level 1"
this fall in Vanderhoof. This is a university-level introduction to the Saik'uz
dialect. Those interested should contact CNC Nechako.
A language festival sponsored by
YDLI and the Carrier Sekani Tribal Council
will be held Saturday March 20 in the Atrium
at the College of New Caledonia in Prince George, 10-4. Everyone is
welcome: you do not need to be able to speak Carrier. You can
download the poster here.
For further information contact Janine Luggi at the Carrier Sekani Tribal
Council: jluggi@cstc.bc.ca.
Sophie Thomas
We regret to announce that Saik'uz
elder Sophie Thomas passed away the evening of March 17th.
We are pleased to announce that Saik'uz
elder Sophie Thomas will receive
an honourary doctorate from the University of Northern British Columbia
at this year's Commencement.
Margaret Gagnon
We regret to announce that Lheidli T'enneh elder Margaret Gagnon,
one of the last fluent speakers of the Lheidli dialect, passed away
on February 5th.
Athabascan Languages Conference
The next Athabascan Languages Conference will be held Friday 25 June through Sunday 27 June
2010 in Eugene, Oregon. The deadline for submitting abstracts is Thursday April 1st.
Further information is available on the conference
web site.
Carrier language course
An introductory course in Lheidli dialect is being offered in Prince George
by the College of New Caledonia starting in January.
It will be co-taught by Bill Poser and Jeanette Kozak.
The Carrier Language: a Brief Introduction
A new book about the Carrier language has been published by the
College of New Caledonia Press.
It is available from the Press and from bookstores including Books on Fourth in Prince
George.
Tanacross Learners' Dictionary
The Tanacross Learners' Dictionary, by Irene Solomon Arnold, Rick Thoman, and
Gary Holton, s a resource for students of Tanacross,
an Athabascan language spoken in eastern Alaska. The dictionary is a result
of a collaboration between Native speakers, linguists, and language
learners. The dictionary contains about 2000 English headwords with nearly
4500 Tanacross words and example sentences, as well as numerous examples of
verb paradigms. The dictionary includes a brief introduction to Tanacross
grammar, as well as a guide to the Tanacross writing system. As an
additional guide to pronunciation, dictionary users can access nearly 4000
accompanying audio recordings on the Alaska Native Language Center web site.
For further information, go to:
http://www.uaf.edu/anlc/tanacross/tld.
Ahtna Place Names Lists, 2nd edition revised, by James Kari
Ahtna is the Athabascan language of the Copper River drainage in
Southcentral Alaska. First published 1983, a revised 2nd edition of Ahtna
Place Names Lists is now available in a limited edition of 350 copies. With
over 2200 place names in drainage-based sections within and beyond the
35,000 sq. mi. language area, Ahtna has the most comprehensive geographic
name data set for any Alaska Native language.
The 33-page introduction entitled "Ahtna Athabascan Place Names as Shared
Knowledge" summarizes the documentary sources on Ahtna geographic names and
the core elements of Ahtna and Athabascan geographic naming. These
elements-name content, name structure, name distribution and name
networks-have promoted functional travel, strategic land use, shared
boundaries, and multilingualism with other Athabascan groups. For Ahtna we
can marvel at the strict purity, orderliness, symmetry, and functionality
of the geography. This is a shared, memorized, strongly confirmed
geographic system that is congruent across Athabascan language and dialect
boundaries. Over 89% of the Ahtna place names are fully analyzable and an
astounding 98% are fully-to-partially analyzable. Most of the place names
have naturalistic structure and content, with a mix of cultural activities
and metaphors, all of which facilitate memorization and efficient
foot-travel through and beyond Ahtna territory. Since the Ahtna geographic
system is representative of Northern Athabascan languages, the Ahtna place
names network can serve as primary data for discussions on the role of
geography in the prehistory of Athabascan, Na-Dene and Dene-Yeniseian.
For further information go to: Alaska Native Language Center.
The CD of the Louie Family Singers singing traditional Carrier songs
is available again.
Northwest Journal of Linguistics
A new journal devoted to the native languages of northwestern North America has
come into existence. It is published only in electronic form:
http://www.sfu.ca/nwjl/.
For information about other First Nations languages of British Columbia, about
the First Nations languages of British Columbia in general, and about endangered
languages, language maintenance, and related topics,
go to the First Nations Languages of British Columbia web site.
Nous sommes désolés de ne pas avoir tout traduit en franç;ais. Néanmoins,
certains renseignments sont disponibles en français. Cet index en
français.
Veuillez nous communiquer en français si vous voulez.
Updated 2010-05-21
Please send comments and questions about this site to: webmaster@ydli.org