Tsuutʼina language

People	Tsúùtʼínà
Language	Tsúùtʼínà Gūnáhà
Country	Tsúùtʼínà Nìsk’ā; Nitawahsin'nanni (ᖹᒣᖷᑊᓱᐡ ᖻᐡᖹ)

Tsuutʼina
Tsuutʼina
Sarcee
Tsúutʼínà Gunáhà
Native to	Canada
Region	Alberta
Ethnicity	Tsuutʼina
Native speakers	17 (2021)
Language family	Na-Dené Athabaskan–Eyak Athabaskan Northern Athabaskan Tsuutʼina; ; ; ;
Language codes
ISO 639-3	srs
Glottolog	sars1236
ELP	Tsuut'ina
	Tsuut'ina is classified as Critically Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger.
	This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

This article contains uncommon Unicode characters. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of the intended characters.

Tsuutʼina (endonym: Tsúùtʼínà Gūnáhà), also known as Sarcee or Sarsi,^: 2 is an Athabaskan language spoken by the people of the Tsuutʼina Nation, whose reserve and community is near Calgary, Alberta. It is related to other Athabaskan languages, such as Navajo and Chiricahua to the south, and Dene Suline and Tłı̨chǫ to the north.

Nomenclature

The name Tsuutʼina comes from the Tsuutʼina self designation Tsúùtʼínà, which has been translated as "many people" or "nation tribe". It likely derives from tsò-hú-t’ínà "people among the beavers". Sarcee, also spelled Sarsi, is a mostly former exonym (the Sarcee Nation changed its name in 1993 to Tsuu T’ina Nation and later to Tsuut’ina Nation) and is of unclear origin with variants Saahsi in Siksiká and sâsîw in Plains Cree.

Language revitalization

Tsuutʼina is a critically endangered language, with only 150 speakers, 80 of whom speak it as their mother tongue, according to the 2016 Canadian census. The Tsuutʼina Nation has created the Tsuutʼina Gunaha Institute with the intention of creating new fluent speakers. This includes full K–4 immersion education at schools on the Nation and placing stop signs in the Tsuutʼina language at intersections in the Tsuutʼina Nation.

Phonology

Consonants

The consonants of Tsuutʼina are listed below, with symbols from the standard orthography in brackets:

Consonants
		Bilabial	Alveolar			Post- alveolar	Velar		Glottal
		Bilabial	plain	sibilant	lateral	Post- alveolar	plain	rounded	Glottal
Stop	plain	p ⟨b⟩	t ⟨d⟩	ts ⟨dz⟩	tɬ ⟨dl⟩	tʃ ⟨j⟩	k ⟨g⟩	kʷ ⟨gw⟩	ʔ ⟨ʔ⟩
	aspirated		tʰ ⟨t⟩	tsʰ ⟨ts⟩	tɬʰ ⟨tł⟩	tʃʰ ⟨ch⟩	kʰ ⟨k⟩	kʷʰ ⟨kw⟩
	ejective		tʼ ⟨tʼ⟩	tsʼ ⟨tsʼ⟩	tɬʼ ⟨tłʼ⟩	tʃʼ ⟨chʼ⟩	kʼ ⟨kʼ⟩	kʷʼ ⟨kwʼ⟩
Fricative	voiceless			s ⟨s⟩	ɬ ⟨ł⟩	ʃ ⟨sh⟩	x ⟨x⟩		h ⟨h⟩
Fricative	voiced			z ⟨z⟩		ʒ ⟨zh⟩	ɣ ⟨gh⟩
Nasal		m ⟨m⟩	n ⟨n⟩
Approximant					l ⟨l⟩	j ⟨y⟩		w ⟨w⟩

↑ /p/ is only found in mimetic buꞏ 'to buzz' and borrowed buꞏs 'cat'.
1 2 The phonemic status of [kʷ] and [kʷʰ] is questionable; they might be /ku, kʰu/ before another vowel. /kʷʼ/ is quite rare but clearly phonemic.

Vowels

There are four phonemically distinct vowel qualities in Tsuutʼina: /i a ɒ u/, represented as ⟨i a o u⟩. While /a/ and /ɒ/ are fairly constant, /i u/ can vary considerably.

	Front	Back
Close	i ~ e ⟨i⟩	u ~ o ⟨u⟩
Open	a ⟨a⟩	ɒ ⟨o⟩

Vowels are also distinguished by length and tone, similar to other Athabaskan languages, so that Tsuutʼina, taking the total number of vowel phonemes to 24 (i.e. / ī í ì īː íː ìː ā á à āː áː àː ɒ̄ ɒ́ ɒ̀ ū ú ù ūː úː ùː ɒ̄ː ɒ́ː ɒ̀ː /).

long vowels are written doubled, e.g., aa [aː]
high tone is marked with an acute accent, e.g., á
low tone is marked with a grave accent, e.g., à
mid tone is marked with a macron, e.g., ā

Nouns

Nouns in Tsuutʼina are not declined, and most plural nouns are not distinguished from singular nouns. However, kinship terms are distinguished between singular and plural form by adding the suffix -ká (or -kúwá) to the end of the noun or by using the word yìná.

List of nouns

People

husband - kòlà
man, human - dìná
wife - tsʼòyá
woman - tsʼìkā
grandmother - is’su
grandfather - is’sa
mother - in’na
father - it’ta

Nature

Buffalo, cow - xāní
Cloud - nàkʼús
Dog - tłí(chʼà)
Fire - kù
Mud, dirt - gútłʼìs
Snow - zòs
Water - tú

Words and phrases

my name is (..) - sizi

Noun possession

Nouns can exist in free form or possessed form. When in possessed form, the prefixes listed below can be attached to nouns to show possession. For example, más, "knife", can be affixed with the 1st person prefix to become sìmázàʼ or "my knife". Note that -mázàʼ is the possessed form of the noun.

Some nouns, like más, as shown above, can alternate between free form and possessed form. A few nouns, like zòs, "snow", are never possessed and exist only in free form. Other nouns, such as -tsìʼ, "head", have no free form and must always be possessed.

Typical possession prefixes

1st person - si-
2nd person - ni-
3rd person - mi-
4th person (Athabaskan) - ɣi-

References

↑ "Dānít'ádā ~ 'How are you?' - A Warm Welcome from Tsuut'ina Nation". TC Energy. Tsuut'ina Nation. Retrieved 7 November 2023.
↑ "UVic news - University of Victoria". www.uvic.ca. Retrieved 2026-10-21.
1 2 "Census Profile, 2016 Census: Knowledge of languages". Statistics Canada. 8 February 2017. Retrieved 18 September 2019.
↑ "Tsuut'ina Gunaha Institute". Tsuut’ina Nation. Archived from the original on 2018-08-26. Retrieved 2018-07-29.
1 2 McDonough, Joyce; O'Loughlin, Jared & Cox, Christopher (2013-06-02). An investigation of the three tone system in Tsuutʼina (Dene). International Congress on Acoustics. Proceedings of Meetings on Acoustics. Montreal: Acoustical Society of America. p. 060219. doi:10.1121/1.4800661. Retrieved 2018-07-29. This study is part of the documentation and conservation of Tsuut'ina (formerly Sarcee, Sarsi; ISO 639-3: srs), a northern Dene (Athabascan) language, by a collaboration of academic and Tsuut'ina community members.
↑ Cox, Christopher (2013). Structuring stories: personal and traditional narrative styles in Tsuut'ina (PDF). Athabaskan Languages Conference 2011. p. 2. Retrieved 2023-07-27. This study investigates associations between particular lexical-grammatical features of Tsuut'ina (formerly Sarcee, Sarsi; ISO 639-3: srs) and the narrative contexts in which they are attested.
1 2 Cook 1984:1
↑ "'You can't just take a name'". The Sprawl. 2018-12-08. Retrieved 2026-10-22.
↑ Dempsey, Hugh; Parks, Douglas R. (2001). "Sarcee". Handbook of North American Indians. Vol. 13, Plains. p. 636.
↑ "New high school for Tsuutʼina Nation will have strong focus on culture and curriculum | CBC News".
↑ Tsuut’ina Nation displaying Indigenous language stop signs

Bibliography

Cook, Eung-Do (1971a). "Vowels and Tone in Sarcee". Language. 47: 164–179.
Cook, Eung-Do (1971b). "Morphophonemics of Two Sarcee Classifiers". International Journal of American Linguistics. 37: 152–155.
Cook, Eung-Do (1971d). "Sarcee Numerals". Anthropological Linguistics. 13: 435–441.
Cook, Eung-Do (1972). Sarcee Verb Paradigms. Mercury Series Paper No. 2. Ottawa: National Museum of Man.
Cook, Eung-Do. (1973b). "Complementation in Sarcee". [Unpublished?]
Cook, Eung-Do (1978b). "The Synchronic and Diachronic Status of Sarcee ɣy". International Journal of American Linguistics. 43: 259–268.
Cook, Eung-Do (1978c). "Palatalizations and Related Rules in Sarcee". In Cook, Eung-Do; Kaye, Jonathan (eds.). Linguistics Studies of Native Canada. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press. pp. 19–36.
Cook, Eung-Do (1978d). "The Verb 'BE' in Sarcee". Amerindia. 3: 105–113.
Cook, Eung-Do (1984). A Sarcee Grammar. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press. ISBN 0-7748-0200-6.
Goddard, P. E. (1915). "Sarcee Texts". University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology. 11: 189–277.
Honigmann, J. (1956). "Notes on Sarsi Kin Behavior". Anthropologica. 11: 17–38.
Hofer, E. (1973). "Phonological Change in Sarcee". [Unpublished?]
Hofer, E. (1974). Topics in Sarcee Syntax (M.A. thesis). The University of Calgary.
Hoijer, H. and Joël, J.. (1963). "Sarcee Nouns", in Studies in the Athabaskan Languages, eds. Hoijer, H. et al., 62–75.
Hoiger, H.; Joël, J. (1963). "Sarcee Nouns". In Hoijer, H.; et al. (eds.). Studies in the Athabaskan Languages. pp. 62–75.
Li, Fang-Kuei. "A Study of Sarcee Verb Stems". International Journal of American Linguistics. 6: 3–27.
Sapir, E. (1924). "Personal Names Among the Sarcee Indians", American Anthropologist n.s. 26, 108–199.
Sapir, Edward (1924). "Personal Names Among the Sarcee Indians". American Anthropologist. 26 (1): 108–199. JSTOR 660696.
Sapir, E. (1925). "Pitch Accent in Sarcee, An Athabaskan language". Journal de la Société des Américanistes de Paris. 17: 185–205. JSTOR 44386765.
Sarcee Culture Program. 1979. Tsu Tʼina and the Buffalo. Calgary.

External links

[12] /p/ is only found in mimetic buꞏ 'to buzz' and borrowed buꞏs 'cat'.

[labial-13] 1 2 The phonemic status of [kʷ] and [kʷʰ] is questionable; they might be /ku, kʰu/ before another vowel. /kʷʼ/ is quite rare but clearly phonemic.

[1] "Dānít'ádā ~ 'How are you?' - A Warm Welcome from Tsuut'ina Nation". TC Energy. Tsuut'ina Nation. Retrieved 7 November 2023.

[2] "UVic news - University of Victoria". www.uvic.ca. Retrieved 2026-10-21.

[16census-3] 1 2 "Census Profile, 2016 Census: Knowledge of languages". Statistics Canada. 8 February 2017. Retrieved 18 September 2019.

[Tsuutʼina_Gunaha_Institute-4] "Tsuut'ina Gunaha Institute". Tsuut’ina Nation. Archived from the original on 2018-08-26. Retrieved 2018-07-29.

[McDonough_et_al-5] 1 2 McDonough, Joyce; O'Loughlin, Jared & Cox, Christopher (2013-06-02). An investigation of the three tone system in Tsuutʼina (Dene). International Congress on Acoustics. Proceedings of Meetings on Acoustics. Montreal: Acoustical Society of America. p. 060219. doi:10.1121/1.4800661. Retrieved 2018-07-29. This study is part of the documentation and conservation of Tsuut'ina (formerly Sarcee, Sarsi; ISO 639-3: srs), a northern Dene (Athabascan) language, by a collaboration of academic and Tsuut'ina community members.

[6] Cox, Christopher (2013). Structuring stories: personal and traditional narrative styles in Tsuut'ina (PDF). Athabaskan Languages Conference 2011. p. 2. Retrieved 2023-07-27. This study investigates associations between particular lexical-grammatical features of Tsuut'ina (formerly Sarcee, Sarsi; ISO 639-3: srs) and the narrative contexts in which they are attested.

[:0-7] 1 2 Cook 1984:1

[8] "'You can't just take a name'". The Sprawl. 2018-12-08. Retrieved 2026-10-22.

[9] Dempsey, Hugh; Parks, Douglas R. (2001). "Sarcee". Handbook of North American Indians. Vol. 13, Plains. p. 636.

[10] "New high school for Tsuutʼina Nation will have strong focus on culture and curriculum | CBC News".

[11] Tsuut’ina Nation displaying Indigenous language stop signs

Tsuutʼina
Sarcee
Tsúutʼínà Gunáhà
Native to	Canada
Region	Alberta
Ethnicity	Tsuutʼina
Native speakers	17 (2021)
Language family	Na-Dené Athabaskan–Eyak Athabaskan Northern Athabaskan Tsuutʼina
Language codes
ISO 639-3	`srs`
Glottolog	`sars1236`
ELP	Tsuut'ina

Tsuut'ina is classified as Critically Endangered by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger.
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.