Cree language in the context of Nemaska

James Bay (French: Baie James, pronounced [bɛ dʒɛmz]; Cree: ᐐᓂᐯᒄ, romanized: Wînipekw, lit. 'dirty water') is a body of water located on the southern end of Hudson Bay in Canada. It borders the provinces of Quebec and Ontario, and is politically part of Nunavut. Its largest island is Akimiski Island.

Numerous waterways of the James Bay watershed have been modified with dams or diversion for several major hydroelectric projects. These waterways are also destinations for river-based recreation. Several communities are located near or alongside James Bay, including a number of Aboriginal Canadian communities, such as the Kashechewan First Nation and nine communities affiliated with the Cree of northern Quebec.

East Cree, also known as James Bay (Eastern) Cree, and East Main Cree, is a group of Cree dialects spoken in Quebec, Canada on the east coast of lower Hudson Bay and James Bay, and inland southeastward from James Bay. Cree is one of the most spoken non-official aboriginal languages of Canada. Four dialects have been tentatively identified including the Southern Inland dialect (Iyiniw-Ayamiwin) spoken in Mistissini, Oujé-Bougoumou, Waswanipi, and Nemaska; the Southern Coastal dialect (Iyiyiw-Ayamiwin) spoken in Nemaska, Waskaganish, and Eastmain; the Northern Coastal Dialects (Iyiyiw-Ayimiwin), one spoken in Wemindji and Chisasibi and the other spoken in Whapmagoostui. The dialects are mutually intelligible, though difficulty arises as the distance between communities increases.

East Cree is not considered an endangered language thanks to the large population of younger people who speak it (Mela S.; Mali A. 2009). There are estimated to be more than 18,000 first-language speakers.

Winnipeg (/ˈwɪnɪpɛɡ/ ) is the capital and largest city of the Canadian province of Manitoba. It is centred on the confluence of the Red and Assiniboine rivers. As of 2021, Winnipeg had a city population of 749,607 and a metropolitan population of 834,678, making it Canada's sixth-largest city and eighth-largest metropolitan area.

The city is named after the nearby Lake Winnipeg; the name "Winnipeg" comes from the Western Cree words for "muddy water" – winipīhk. The region was a trading centre for Indigenous peoples long before the arrival of Europeans; it is the traditional territory of the Anishinaabe (Ojibway), Ininew (Cree), Oji-Cree, Dene, and Dakota, and is the birthplace of the Métis Nation. French traders built the first fort, Fort Rouge, on the site in 1738. A settlement was later founded by the Selkirk settlers of the Red River Colony in 1812, the nucleus of which was incorporated as the City of Winnipeg in 1873. Being far inland, the city's climate is extremely seasonal (continental) even by Canadian standards, with average January highs of around −11 °C (12 °F) and average July highs of 26 °C (79 °F).

Canadian syllabic writing, or simply syllabics, is a family of writing systems used with a number of indigenous Canadian languages of the Algonquian, Eskaleut, and (formerly) Athabaskan language families. These languages had no formal writing system previously. They are valued for their distinctiveness from the Latin script and for the ease with which literacy can be achieved. For instance, by the late 19th century the Cree had achieved what may have been one of the highest rates of literacy in the world. Syllabics are an abugida, where glyphs represent consonant–vowel pairs, determined by the rotation of the glyphs. They were created by linguist and missionary James Evans working with the Cree and Ojibwe.

Canadian syllabics are currently used to write all of the Cree languages, including Eastern Cree, Plains Cree, Swampy Cree, Woods Cree, and Naskapi. They are used regionally for the other large Canadian Algonquian language, Ojibwe, as well as for Blackfoot. Among the Athabaskan languages further to the west, syllabics have been used at one point or another to write Dakelh (Carrier), Chipewyan, Slavey, Tłı̨chǫ (Dogrib), and Dane-zaa (Beaver). Syllabics have occasionally been used in the United States by communities that straddle the border. Among Inuit languages and dialects of the Canadian Arctic, they are used to write Inuktitut and are co-official with the Latin script in the territory of Nunavut.

A multitude of languages have always been spoken in Canada. Prior to Confederation, the territories that would become Canada were home to over 70 distinct languages across 12 or so language families. Today, a majority of those indigenous languages are still spoken; however, most are endangered and only about 0.6% of the Canadian population report an indigenous language as their mother tongue. Since the establishment of the Canadian state, English and French have been the co-official languages and are, by far, the most-spoken languages in the country.

According to the 2021 census, English and French are the mother tongues of 56.6% and 20.2% of Canadians respectively. According to the 2016 census, a total of 86.2% of Canadians could conduct a conversation in English, while 29.8% could conduct a conversation in French. Under the Official Languages Act of 1969, both English and French have official status throughout Canada in respect of federal government services and most courts. All federal legislation is enacted bilingually. Provincially, only in New Brunswick are both English and French official to the same extent. French is Quebec's official language, although legislation is enacted in both French and English and court proceedings may be conducted in either language. English is the official language of Ontario, Manitoba and Alberta, but government services are available in French in many regions of each, particularly in regions and cities where Francophones form the majority. Legislation is enacted in both languages and courts conduct cases in both. In 2022, Nova Scotia recognized Mi'kmawi'simk as the first language of the province, and maintains two provincial language secretariats: the Office of Acadian Affairs and Francophonie (French language) and the Office of Gaelic Affairs (Canadian Gaelic). The remaining provinces (British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland and Labrador) do not have an official provincial language per se but government is primarily English-speaking. Territorially, both the Northwest Territories and Nunavut have official indigenous languages alongside French and English: Inuktut (Inuktitut and Inuinnaqtun) in Nunavut and, in the NWT, nine others (Cree, Dënësųłıné, Dene Yatıé/Zhatıé, Gwich’in, Inuinnaqtun, Inuktitut, Inuvialuktun, Sahtúgot’įné Yatı̨́ / Shíhgot’įne Yatı̨́ / K’ashógot’įne Goxedǝ́, and Tłįchǫ Yatıì).

The Iron Confederacy or Iron Confederation (also known as Cree-Assiniboine in English or Nehiyaw-Pwat in Cree) was a political and military alliance of Plains Indians of what is now Western Canada and the northern United States. This confederacy included various individual bands that formed political, hunting and military alliances in defense against common enemies. The ethnic groups that made up the Confederacy were the branches of the Cree that moved onto the Great Plains around 1740 (the southern half of this movement eventually became the "Plains Cree" and the northern half the "Woods Cree"), the Saulteaux (Plains Ojibwa), the Nakoda or Stoney people also called Pwat or Assiniboine, and the Métis and Haudenosaunee (who had come west with the fur trade). The Confederacy rose to predominance on the northern Plains during the height of the North American fur trade when they operated as middlemen controlling the flow of European goods, particularly guns and ammunition, to other Indigenous nations (the "Indian Trade"), and the flow of furs to the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) and North West Company (NWC) trading posts. Its peoples would take part in the bison (buffalo) hunt, and the pemmican trade. The decline of the fur trade and the collapse of the bison herds sapped the power of the Confederacy after the 1860’s.

Muskeg (Ojibwe: mashkiig; Cree: maskīk; French: fondrière de mousse, lit. moss bog) is a peat-forming ecosystem found in several northern climates, most commonly in Arctic and boreal areas. Muskeg is approximately synonymous with bog or peatland, and is a standard term in Canada and Alaska. The term became common in these areas because it is of Cree origin, maskek (ᒪᐢᑫᐠ) meaning "low-lying marsh".

Muskeg consists of non-living organic material in various states of decomposition (as peat), ranging from fairly intact sphagnum moss, to sedge peat, to highly decomposed humus. Pieces of wood can make up five to fifteen percent of the peat soil. The water table tends to be near the surface. The sphagnum moss forming it can hold fifteen to thirty times its own weight in water, which allows the spongy wet muskeg to also form on sloping ground.

Winnipeg River is a Canadian river that flows roughly northwest from Lake of the Woods in the province of Ontario to Lake Winnipeg in Manitoba. This river is 235 kilometres (146 mi) long from the Norman Dam in Kenora to its mouth at Lake Winnipeg. Its watershed is 106,500 square kilometres (41,100 sq mi) in area, mainly in Canada. About 29,000 square kilometres (11,000 sq mi) of the watershed is in northern Minnesota, United States.

The Winnipeg River watershed was the southeasternmost portion of the land granted in 1670 to the Hudson's Bay Company. The portion in Canada corresponds roughly to the land deeded to Canada in Treaty 3, signed in 1873 by Her Majesty's treaty commissioners and the First Nation chiefs at Northwest Angle on the Lake of the Woods. The river's name means "murky water" in Cree.

CBC North (Inuktitut: ᓰᐲᓰ ᐅᑭᐅᖅᑕᖅᑐᒥ, romanized: SiiPiiSii Ukiuqtaqtumi, lit. 'CBC Northwest'; Cree: ᓰᐲᓰ ᒌᐌᑎᓅᑖᐦᒡ, romanized: SiiPiiSii Chiiwetinuutaahch; French: ICI Grand Nord) is the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's radio and television service for the Northwest Territories, Nunavut, and Yukon of Northern Canada as well as Eeyou Istchee and Nunavik in the Nord-du-Québec region of Quebec.

Michif (also Mitchif, Mechif, Michif-Cree, Métif, Métchif, French Cree) is one of the languages of the Métis people of Canada and the United States, who are the descendants of First Nations (mainly Cree, Nakota, and Ojibwe) and fur trade workers of white ancestry (mainly French). The fathers of the Metis Nation were also known as voyageurs, the expert canoeists whose main occupation involved traveling long distances and trading with First Nations. This occupation also required forging relationships and common language with Indigenous contacts. The voyageurs and Indigenous women began intermarrying as early as the 1780s and 1790s, combining predominantly Catholic French culture with First Nations culture. Michif emerged in the early 19th century as a mixed language and adopted a consistent character between about 1820 and 1840.

The geographical distribution of Metis communities has resulted in the formation of multiple dialects of Metis languages, as well as multiple names for said dialects (Rosen 2008, 613). Michif is the most common title of this language. One form of Michif combines Cree and Métis French (Rhodes 1977, Bakker 1997:85), a variety of Canadian French, with some additional borrowing from English and indigenous languages of the Americas such as Ojibwe and Assiniboine. It is widely accepted that the Algonquian language family contributed both Cree and Ojibwe, while the settlers introduced French, and to a lesser degree English (Barkwell, Dorion, and Préfontaine 1999; Bakker 1997; Rosen 2008; Gillon & Rosen 2016; Teillet 2019.) Peter Bakker contributed a foundational work to the study of Michif, but Metis scholars have argued that his research poorly understood their language and culture, and should therefore be examined critically, especially as it relates to phonology and syntax (Barkwell, Dorian, and Préfontaine 1999, 1-5). In general, Michif noun phrase phonology, lexicon, morphology, and syntax are derived from Métis French, while verb phrase phonology, lexicon, morphology, and syntax are from a southern variety of Plains Cree (a western dialect of Cree). Articles and adjectives are also of Métis French origin but demonstratives are from Plains Cree.

The Algic languages (/ˈæl.ɡɪk/); also Algonquian–Wiyot–Yurok or Algonquian–Ritwan) are an indigenous language family of North America. Most Algic languages belong to the Algonquian subfamily, dispersed over a broad area from the Rocky Mountains to Atlantic Canada. The other Algic languages are the Yurok and Wiyot of northwestern California, which, despite their geographic proximity, are not closely related to each other. All these languages descend from Proto-Algic, a second-order proto-language estimated to have been spoken about 5,000 years ago and reconstructed using the reconstructed Proto-Algonquian language and the Wiyot and Yurok languages.

Innu-aimun or Montagnais is an Algonquian language spoken by over 10,000 Innu in Labrador and Quebec in Eastern Canada. It is a member of the Cree–Montagnais–Naskapi dialect continuum and is spoken in various dialects, depending on the community.

Swampy Cree (variously known as Maskekon, Maskegon and Omaškêkowak, and often anglicized as Omushkego) is a variety of the Algonquian language, Cree. It is spoken in a series of Swampy Cree communities in northern Manitoba, central northeast of Saskatchewan along the Saskatchewan River and along the Hudson Bay coast and adjacent inland areas to the south and west, and Ontario along the coast of Hudson Bay and James Bay. Within the group of dialects called "West Cree", it is referred to as an "n-dialect", as the variable phoneme common to all Cree dialects appears as "n" in this dialect (as opposed to y, r, l, or ð; all of the phonemes are considered a linguistic reflex of Proto-Algonquian *r).

It had approximately 4,500 speakers in a population of 5,000 as of 1982 according to the 14th edition of the Ethnologue. Canadian census data does not identify specific dialects of Cree (all estimates now current rely on extrapolations from specific studies), and currently, no accurate census of any Algonquian language exists.

The Albany River (Cree: ᑭᐢᑕᒍ·ᐊᐣ ᓯᐱ kistachowan sipi) is a river in Northern Ontario, Canada, which flows northeast from Lake St. Joseph in Northwestern Ontario and empties into James Bay. It is 982 kilometres (610 mi) long to the head of the Cat River (a tributary of Lake St. Joseph), tying it with the Severn River for the title of longest river entirely in Ontario. Major tributaries include the Kenogami River and Ogoki River.

Treaty No. 9 (also known as The James Bay Treaty) is a numbered treaty first signed in 1905–1906 between Anishinaabe (Algonquin and Ojibwe) and Omushkegowuk Cree communities and the Canadian Crown, which includes both the government of Canada and the government of the province of Ontario. It is commonly known as the "James Bay Treaty," since the eastern edge of the treaty territory is the shore of James Bay in Northern Ontario.

By the early 1900s, both federal and provincial governments were interested in taking control of lands around the Hudson and James Bay watersheds in northern Ontario, traditionally home to Cree, Oji-Cree, and Ojibwe peoples.

Fort Albany First Nation (Cree: ᐲᐦᑖᐯᒄ ᐃᓕᓕᐗᒃ pîhtâpek ililiwak, "lagoon Cree") is a Cree First Nation in Cochrane District in Northeastern Ontario, Canada, within the territory covered by Treaty 9. Situated on the southern shore of the Albany River on the west coast of James Bay, Fort Albany First Nation is accessible only by air, water, or by winter road. It is roughly 129km (80mi) away from Moose Factory, and 415km (257mi) away from Timmins

The First Nation is a signatory of Treaty 9, and is part of the Mushkegowuk Council, within the Nishnawbe Aski Nation. The community is policed by the Nishnawbe-Aski Police Service, an Indigenous police service. It shares band members and the Fort Albany 67 Indian Reserve with the Kashechewan First Nation, which separated from Fort Albany starting in the late 1950s. Fort Albany First Nation is situated on Sinclair and Anderson Islands, as well as on the south shore on the mainland of the river. The Nation controls the Fort Albany Indian Settlement on the south shore of the Albany River, and the Kashechewan First Nation controls the Kashechewan Indian Settlement directly across the river.

Regina (/rɪˈdʒaɪnə/ rih-JY-nə) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. The city is the second-largest in the province, after Saskatoon, and is a commercial centre for southern Saskatchewan. As of the 2021 census, Regina had a city population of 226,404, and a metropolitan area population of 249,217. It is governed by Regina City Council. The city is surrounded by the Rural Municipality of Sherwood No. 159.

Regina was previously the seat of government of the North-West Territories, of which the current provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta originally formed part, and of the District of Assiniboia. The site was previously called Wascana (from Cree: ᐅᐢᑲᓇ, romanized: Oskana "Buffalo Bones"), but was renamed to Regina (Latin for "Queen") in 1882 in honour of Queen Victoria. The name was proposed by Queen Victoria's daughter Princess Louise, who was the wife of the Governor General of Canada, the Marquess of Lorne.

Mistissini (Cree: ᒥᔅᑎᓯᓃ, romanized: Mistisinî meaning Big Rock) is a Cree town located in the south-east corner of the largest natural lake in Quebec, Lake Mistassini. The town is inside the boundaries of the Baie-James Municipality and is the second largest Cree community with a population of 3,731 people in 2021. The surface area of the town is 807.75 square kilometres (311.87 sq mi) (Category I land, as defined in the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement).

Mistissini is part of the Grand Council of the Crees (Eeyou Istchee) and the Cree Regional Authority. The Cree School Board and the Cree Construction Company have their head offices here.