‘Our language is alive’: U of W launches Anishinaabemowin degree program

Banaise-Kwe Henry is battling homesickness so she can return to the southern shores of Lake Huron to help raise her nephew and his peers in Anishinaabemowin.

“Nigaan-inaabidan,” is the phrase that comes to mind for the 19-year-old when asked to describe her mission in Manitoba.

“It means, ‘to think ahead — forward thinking,’” said Henry, a member of Kettle and Stony Point First Nation, located in Ontario, about 2,000 kilometres east of Winnipeg.

“Anishinaabe people, in general, we talk a lot about seven generations forward and seven generations back and so, when I think about my language learning, I take time to reflect.”

Henry’s reflections and aspirations — she wants to open a kindergarten-to-Grade 12 immersion school in her community — have landed her in a history-making cohort at the University of Winnipeg.

U of W welcomed 17 students this week to start building a new degree program that will immerse participants in their second language.

Upon meeting for a ceremony and feast on campus Monday, students described their motivations for enrolling in the first-of-its-kind program in Manitoba.

Many of them spoke about wanting to connect with their Ojibwa ancestry and be an active part of the language revitalization movement.

There are roughly 7,000 people who speak an Ojibwa language in Manitoba, according to the latest census data. The percentage of speakers dropped nearly 12 per cent between 2016 and 2021.

“We need to create a pathway for people — make it easier, make it natural. That’s what our community has been asking for,” program co-ordinator Aandeg Muldrew said.

Muldrew’s team is finalizing its submission to U of W’s senate to seek approval for a bachelor of arts in Indigenous language immersion in Anishinaabemowin.

The three-year degree is slated to be made up of new credits, as well as existing introductory and intermediate language courses on the downtown campus.

Muldrew said what makes the task particularly challenging is that “our language is alive” and it’s learned by engaging with fluent speakers rather than reading texts.

Anishinaabemowin has typically been passed down through oral storytelling and academics plan to honour that in carrying out the program, the assistant professor of anthropology said.

Muldrew credits much of his personal understanding of the language to spending time with his grandmother, Pat Ningewance Nadeau, a renowned language teacher at the University of Manitoba.

He grew up in Winnipeg, although his paternal family is from Lac Seul First Nation in Ontario.

As his grandmother’s self-described “apprentice,” he said he’s spent countless hours listening to her speak and participate in language classes and immersion camps.

U of W will assign each student to a mentor to practise their oral language skills, in addition to engaging in group discussions.

An intensive “field school,” is in the works for this summer so students can spend time speaking Anishinaabemowin in a more relaxed setting outside the city.

U of W is taking inspiration from both the University of Minnesota and Algoma University.

The latter, in Sault Ste. Marie, is the only Canadian university that already offers a three-year undergraduate degree in Anishinaabemowin. It touts the program as one that allows graduates to “gain a functional level of fluency” and better understanding of Ojibwa history and worldviews.

U of W’s immersion students met for their first formal lesson on Tuesday. Participants have been assigned six hours of in-person instruction, split up into two three-hour blocks, every week.

The Kinew government has earmarked $2.3 million to establish the program in order to build the province’s pool of fluent speakers and create a pathway to teacher certification.

The province updated the Public Schools Act last year to recognize Indigenous languages as official languages of instruction, along with English and French.

Premier Wab Kinew, who speaks English, French and Anishinaabemowin, is outspoken about his concerns that urgent action is required to preserve Indigenous languages.

Kinew is currently using artificial intelligence tools to build an automatic translator for Anishinaabemowin.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca