The Micmac Grammar of Father Pacifique

Winnipeg, Manitoba, Algonquian and Iroquoian Linguistics, Memoir 7, 1990. — 291 p.Micmac (Mi’kmaq, Migmaw, Mikmaw) is an Eastern Algonkian (Algonquian) language now spoken by 11.000 out of 20.000 ethnic Micmac in Canada and United States. It is a language close to Maliseet-Passamaquoddy, Munsee, Abenaki and Unami. This book is an English translation of Leçons grammaticales théoriques et pratiques de la langue micmaque (1938, 1939) by Father Pacifique (1863-1943), probably the last priest being fluent in Micmac. The translators have also retranscribed the Micmac words because Father Pacifique’s abbreviated alphabet was not easily readable. Though the modern dialects have remarkably changed, old and obsolete words (some of them drawn from the 18th century grammar by Father Maillard) have been maintained in the text due to their historical importance.