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Welcome to the Mi'gmaq language wiki!
This wiki aims to provide a snapshot of some of the current topics in describing the grammar of Mi'gmaq that McGill linguists are working on with members of the Listuguj community. It is still a work in progress, so nothing here should be taken as the final word on the language, although we are doing our best to make it as accurate as possible. If you see an error, we are very happy to fix it, so please contact us through the blog or if you have an account feel free to fix it yourself! If you know something about Mi'gmaq and would like to contribute to the wiki, you can create an account using the link at the top right corner of the screen, although we would also love to hear from you in person. Please be aware that anything that is submitted to the wiki may be edited by other contributors.
A list of glosses used on this wiki can be found on the Glosses page. There are various resources online which provide definitions of basic linguistic terminology, for example this glossary of linguistic terms; see the "Linguistics Online" sidebar of the blog for more info.
Many of the articles in this wiki build on class projects that were developed as part of a class wiki for a field methods course on Mi'gmaq in Fall 2011 at McGill. Currently available and projected topics are listed below.
Background information
Mi'gmaq is an Eastern Algonquian language spoken in eastern Canada. For more information about the history and the people, see the article Background. There are several general characteristics of the language that are useful to understand for the remaining sections. These include:
Sounds and spelling
There are several different ways of writing down Mi'gmaq. This wiki uses the Spelling from Listuguj, but some of the resources we discuss may also use other systems. One sound that is not always written is schwa, because it is sometimes possible to predict where to pronounce it anyway. For details on this, see Writing Schwa.
Mi'gmaq has six vowels and thirteen consonants according to the Listuguj orthography. For a longer description of them, see Sound Inventory and Pronunciation, and for a description of how Mi'gmaq sounds compare to English sounds, see Pronunciation Differences. Mi'gmaq words also generally have one portion that is pronounced more emphatically, or stressed.
Verbs
Verbs are used to describe actions, activities, or events. They are the central component of a sentence in Mi'gmaq and are made up of many different pieces of information. They contain enough information that they can represent a complete sentence, and are often the only element in a sentence.
There are several smaller pieces that occur in almost all verbs: the Verb Stems, the Finals, and Person and number marking. The person and number markings are often different depending on the final, as described in the following articles.
- VAI Intransitive Animate Verbs
- VII Intransitive Inanimate Verbs
- VTA Transitive Animate Verbs
- VTI Transitive Inanimate Verbs
There are other parts of the verb that are more optional, including Preverbs, Negation, Tense, Obviation, and Mood.
Nouns
Nouns are words that refer to persons, places, or things. They are the elements that do the action described by the verb or have the action done to them. Many Mi'gmaq sentences have nouns in them, but they aren't necessary.
Nouns can have several characteristics in Mi'gmaq, including Animacy, being Singular or Plural, Obviation, and being Absentative. Nouns can be modified by a variety of things, including Possession, Adjectives, Determiners, Numerals, Diminuitives and Relative Clauses. Pronouns can also be used to substitute for nouns.
Sentences
Understanding and Editing this Wiki
- Consult User's Guide for information on using the wiki software
- MediaWiki FAQ
Mi'gmaq Language Resources
- The blog associated with this wiki, for project updates and more language-related links
- Mikmaq Online, which includes an online dictionary