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'Bungee' (also 'Bungi,' 'Bungie,' 'Bungay', or 'The Red River Dialect') was spoken in western
Canada by
Métis descended from
Scottish and
Cree voyageurs. The language was a mixture of
Cree and
Scottish Gaelic, and was spoken until the
mid-twentieth century. Their name is derived from either the
Anishinaabe word "bangii" or the
Cree word "pahkī", meaning "little bit" in both languages.
Barkwell et al. write of Blain's 1989 study:
:This is the only major academic study of the Bungee language. Blain interviewed about six Bungee speakers, not all of whom agreed to be taped. The small sample really limits the value of this thesis.
Brian Orvis, a Bungee-speaker who grew up in
Selkirk, Manitoba, takes issue with Blain’s description of the language as a dialect. He asserts that there are still Bungee speakers and that it is a language like
Michif, and not a dialect (Swan, 1991: 133).
See also
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Anishinaabe language
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Cree language
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Red River Colony
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Michif
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Métis
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Anglo-Métis
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Métis National Council
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Scottish Gaelic
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Scottish Gaelic in Canada
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Chinook Jargon
Notes and References
Notes
# Barkwell, Lawrence; Dorion, Leah; & Préfontaine, Darren R. (n.d.).
Annotated bibliography and references in ''Metis legacy''.
# Blain, Eleanor M. (1987). Speech of the lower Red River settlement. In W. Cowan (Ed.), ''Papers of the eighteenth
Algonquian Conference'' (pp. 7–16). Ottawa: Carleton University.
# ——. (1989). The Bungee dialect of the Red River settlement. (MA thesis,
University of Manitoba).
# ——. (1994). ''The Red River dialect''. Winnipeg: Wuerz Publishing.
# Cansino, Barbara. (1980, March 26). Bungi in
Petersfield: An 81 year old writes about the Red River dialect. ''
Winnipeg Free Press''.
# Scott, S. Osborne; & Mulligan, D. A. (1951, December). The Red River dialect. ''The Beaver'', 42–45.
# ——. (1951). The Red River dialect. In J. K. Chambers (Ed.), ''
Canadian English: Origins and structures'' (pp. 61–63). Toronto: Methuen.
# Pentland, David H. (1985, March 9). Métchif and Bungee: Languages of the fur trade. (Paper presented in the series ''Voices of Rupert's Land: Public Lectures on Language and Culture in Early Manitoba''. Winnipeg.
# Swan, Ruth Ellen. (1991). Ethnicity and the Canadianization of Red River politics (p. 133). (MA thesis, Winnipeg, University of Manitoba).
# Stobie, Margaret. (1967–1968). Backgrounds of the dialect called Bungi. ''Historical and Scientific Society of Manitoba'', 3 (24), 65–67.
# ——. (1971). The dialect called Bungi. ''Canadian Antiques Collector'', ''6'' (8), 20.
# Walters, Frank J. (1969–1970). Bungee as she is spoke. ''Red River Valley Historian and History News''. ''The Quarterly Journal of the Red River Valley Historical Society'', ''3'' (4), 68–70.
References
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Bungee (Canadian Encyclopedia)
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Backgrounds of the Dialect Called Bungi (Manitoba Historical Society)