Fox language

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

Dialects

The three distinct dialects are:

• Fox or Meskwakiatoweni (Meskwaki language)[failed verification] (also called Mesquakie, Meskwaki)
• Sauk or Thâkiwâtowêweni (Thâkîwaki language) (also rendered Sac), and
• Kickapoo or Kiikaapoa (also rendered Kikapú; considered by some to be a closely related but distinct language).

If Kickapoo is counted as a separate language rather than a dialect of Fox, then only between 200 and 300 speakers of Fox remain. Extinct Mascouten was most likely another dialect, though it is scarcely attested.[citation needed]

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. In 2011, 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."

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

Phonology

Until the early 1900s, Fox was a phonologically very conservative language and preserved many features of Proto-Algonquian; records from the decades immediately following 1900 are particularly useful to Algonquianists for this reason. By the 1960s, however, an extensive progression of phonological changes had taken place, resulting in the loss of intervocalic semivowels and certain[which?] other features.

Consonants

The consonant phonemes of Fox are given in the table below.

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

Vowels

The Fox language has eight vowel phonemes:

Grammar

According to A Concise Dictionary of the Sauk Language by Gordon Whittaker, the language's nouns can be divided into animate and inanimate groups. Animate nouns end in -a (ex: tîtîwa /ˈti:.ti:.wa/, "blue jay (bird)"). To pluralise most animate nouns, the ending is transformed from -a to -aki (ex: tîtîwa -> tîtîwaki). The few exceptions that exist have specific forms, according to the Dictionary.

Inanimate nouns typically end in -i (ex: mâtethi /ˈma:.tet.hi/, "knife"). To pluralise most inanimate nouns, the ending is transformed from -i to -ani (ex: mâtethi -> mâtethani). Like the animate nouns, the few exceptions that exist also have specific forms, according to the Dictionary.

Verbs can be divided into transitive and intransitive; transitive involves two parties (i.e "I give it to you!" / "Kemînêwene!"), while intransitive is one party (i.e "You're alive." / "Kepemâtethi.")

This conjugation is only for verbs that end in -amwa; all other animate transitive verbs take the same conjugation as the animate intransitive verbs.

Vocabulary

Sauk numerals are as follows:

Writing systems

Besides the Latin script, Fox has been written in two indigenous scripts.

Fox I

"Fox I" is an abugida based on the cursive French alphabet (see Great Lakes Algonquian syllabics). Consonants written by themselves are understood to be syllables containing the vowel /a/. They are:

Vowels are written by adding dots to the consonant:

Fox II

"Fox II" is a consonant–vowel alphabet. According to Coulmas, /p/ is not written (as /a/ is not written in Fox I). Vowels (or /p/ plus a vowel) are written as cross-hatched tally marks.

See also

• Sac and Fox Nation
• Sauk language
• Kickapoo language
• Kickapoo whistled speech

Notes

• Bloomfield, Leonard (1925). . International Journal of American Linguistics. 3 (2/4): 219–232. doi:.
• Coulmas, Florian (1999). The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Writing Systems. Blackwell Publishing.
• Dahlstrom, Amy. . Lucian. University of Chicago.
• Goddard, Ives (1991). . Papers of the Twenty-Second Algonquian Conference. 22: 157–181.
• Jones, William (1906). . In Lanfer, Berthold (ed.). Boas anniversary volume: Anthropological papers written in honor of Franz Boas. New York: G.E. Stechert. pp.88–93.{{cite book}}:|work= ignored (help)
• Voorhis, Paul H. (1974). . Bloomington: Indiana University Press. ISBN978-0-87750-177-0.
• Whittaker, Gordon (2005). (PDF). Stroud, OK: The Sac & Fox National Public Library. Archived from (PDF) on October 29, 2020.

Further reading

• Jones, William (1907). Boaz, Franz (ed.). . Publications of the American Ethnological Society. Vol.1. Leyden: Brill.
• Michelson, Truman, ed. (1895). (in Sac and English).{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: unrecognized language (link)
• Michelson, Truman, ed. (1921). . Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin. Vol.72. Smithsonian Institution.
• . USA Today. Tama, IA. Associated Press. July 4, 2002.

External links