A Great Collection

Deborah Jacobs, head of the Squamish Nation Education Department, shows off a copy of the recently released Xwelíten — a Squamish-English dictionary that’s designed to boost the future prospects of the language. It is listed as “critically endangered” by the United Nations.

To the untrained eye, the official writing system for the Squamish language is a confusing derivative of English populated with sevens, but to scholars, linguists and the Squamish Nation, it bridges the present and the past, acting as an interface for an oral language that is classified — in the United Nations’ Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger — as “critically endangered.”

Recently, the writing system — officially adopted in 1980 — has given rise to the first-ever Squamish-English Dictionary, the first compilation by the Squamish Nation of the nation’s language, more than 100 years in the making.

“Paradoxically, oral cultures must interact with the printed word, for renewal and survival,” wrote Deborah Jacobs, Squamish Nation Education Department (SNED) Head, in a letter addressed to Squamish Nation members after the dictionary’s official launch and celebration on April 8.

“Squamish culture has been perpetuated by orality, now we must anchor it with literacy.”

With fewer than 15 fluent speakers remaining today, the Squamish language — or the Skwxw?7mesh sníchim — may not survive as a first language into the next generation. The dictionary — or skexwts, meaning “a great collection of words” — is designed as a beginner’s resource to explain how to interpret the writing system: the order of the alphabet and how to pronounce it, the basic grammar rules and how they work, and the translations for words and phrases from Squamish to English, as well as English — or Xwelíten — back to Squamish.

“Part of my work has been to keep the vision and the hope alive because we have such a small pool of people that we are able to work with,” Jacobs said in an interview.

“There might have been just over 24 or 25 fluent speakers when the idea for a dictionary was proposed about 18 years ago — today, there are 15 or so,” she said. “Our last highly proficient speaker who just passed away over a year ago was my grandmother and she would have been 98 this year.”

The field work and documentation for the dictionary is the life work of Jacobs’ cousin, Dr. Peter Jacobs, the dictionary’s editor-in-chief, who is a linguist by profession. Deborah has also been involved with the dictionary project since its inception as an administrator, carrying on the vision of her great-grandfather Chief Isaac Jacobs. Isaac’s work with Dutch linguist Aert Kuipers contributed to the first scholarly work of the Skwxw?7mesh language published in 1956, although the first recorded collections date as far back as the late 1880s.

But it was the extensive documentation of the Squamish language and culture initiated in 1968 by the B.C. Native Language Project that led to the development of the writing system used today. The early 1970s saw the first adult night classes offered in North Vancouver, and eventually the program became offered in the North Vancouver elementary and high schools predominantly attended by Squamish Nation students.

“When I came on to work for the nation in 1986, our public school mandate was largely around looking at cultural enrichment, which gave breadth to large projects like the North Vancouver Outdoor School longhouse program,” said Jacobs.

In the 1990s, the Squamish Nation Language Team led by the dictionary’s associate editor, Vanessa Campbell, implemented the teaching of the Skwxw?7mesh language as a second language curriculum.

“We negotiated what I call a back-to-back principle — for every year [the North Vancouver School District] introduced French, we introduced Squamish language,” Jacobs said.

The Skwxw?7mesh sníchim is an independent language, one of 10 that comprise the Coast Salish branch of the Salish language family, which consists of five branches spoken throughout southern B.C., Washington State and the Oregon Coast, into Idaho and Montana. Historically, there were 23 Salish languages in total.

It wasn’t until 1990 that Skwxw?7mesh was declared the Squamish Nation’s official language and the cornerstone of its identity, as well as in a state of emergency.

The category ascribed to the Skwxw?7mesh language by the United Nations is that of “critically endangered,” whereby the youngest speakers are grandparents and older, and they speak the language partially and infrequently. It is considered the final degree of endangerment before a language reaches “extinct” status, defined as such because there are no speakers left.

As part of its language regeneration program, the Squamish Nation offers bilingual and bicultural education at the early childhood centre for Grade 1 in North Vancouver, Skwxw?7mesh as a second language curriculum to more than 400 Squamish learners in the North Vancouver public school system, and cultural enrichment programming in Sea to Sky School District.

“We are optimistic we’re going to be building a middle school and the vision is to see it to a high school in which we offer full immersion,” Jacobs said.

The Skwxw?7mesh sníchim is also currently offered as a First Nation language course at Capilano University’s North Vancouver campus.

In the dictionary’s foreword, Jacobs gratefully thanks the “elders and leaders who protected the language and saw it through until today and had the foresight many years ago to begin this skexwts — this great collection of words.

“We present this dictionary as a picture of where the language was in the past up to where it is today.

“Our hope is for many more versions of the dictionary in the future to represent our living language.”

The Skwxw?7mesh Sníchim - Xwelíten Sníchim Skexwts/Squamish-English Dictionary may be purchased from www.washington.edu/uwpress for $40. Limited numbers are available directly from the Squamish Nation Department of Education. To obtain a copy, please contact Deborah_Jacobs@squamish.net or call (604) 980-4553. Audio clips of the Skwxw?7mesh language can be listened to at www.sta7uwlh.com, a primary-level website with games and activities designed by the Squamish Nation Department of Education.