Blackfeet: Campus Voices, Future Echoes

As a Blackfeet senior student in the University of Montana/Missoula, I am research assistant to Mizuki Miyashita who is a linguistic professor who prioritizes the importance of the Blackfeet language revitalization at the university. Our work is surrounded on vowel changes and dialects because most of the language we use in our work is Blackfoot, which is the sister tribe in Canada, to show our work to people like myself that want to learn if not more about the Blackfeet language. My main interest in the abstract is to focus on what other native or non-native students would like to know more about or the reason to keep the Blackfeet language alive for future generations to come. With most native languages in Montana, every tribe prioritizes the importance of their language because it’s what gives us identity, culture and a sense of belonging for Native American heritage. On the university campus, there are a lot of native students and non-native students willing to learn the language like the Blackfeet or Amspaki Pikanii. The language itself is very hard to learn due to the authenticity and pronunciation of the words that are spoken by first language speakers, such as the older generations of the tribe. Yet what has helped with speaking the language are the recordings that had been approved by the Blackfeet elders. This is where my research helps with students that have taken interest in the language and they can help pass on the Blackfeet language to future generations.