Many resources are available that can assist second language speakers to learn and improve their ability to speak Anishinaabemowin.
And many of these resources are available for free via the Internet. But it can be a challenge finding these resources. It is not uncommon
for Anishinaabemowin projects to get started, but these projects do not always continue to get updated. And it can be difficult differentiating
between the best resources and resources that may have a more limited value.
In this guide, page, you will find resources that have been identified as having ongoing value and that can be accessed either through the Internet
or onsite at Shingwauk Kinoomaage Gamig. You will also find profiles of some of the leaders in the efforts to revitalize and reclaim Anishinaabemowin.
To get an understanding of some of the issues around the revitalizing of Anishinaabemowin, you can watch
First Speakers: Restoring the Ojibwe Language (2010) on YouTube.
Online Resources
Aakoziiwigamig: An Ojibwe Radio Drama
The University of Winnipeg (Wii Chiiwaakanak Learning Centre, Indigenous Engagement, and the Oral History Centre), the University of Manitoba, Indigenous Languages of Manitoba, Native Communications Inc. Radio (NCI) and Mazinaate Publishing have collaborated on an Indigenous Language radio show that premiered on January 13, 2021. The objective of the radio program is to create an Ojibway speaking community outside of the classroom.
Anishinaabemowin Learning Materials
From the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, this site includes a collection of colouring books, as well as a booklet titled Anishinaabe-Gaagiigidowinan: Five Things Needed for Ceremony.
Anishinaabemowin Revival Program
The goal of this program is to develop proficiency in conversational Anishinaabemowin in learners at Lakeview School in M’Chigeeng First Nation. To find all of their resources, click on the ANISHINAABEMOWIN tab at the top of their page.
Great Lakes Indian Wildlife and Fish Commission
This website hosts various language resources for all age groups. Content includes early childhood colouring books, stories, and games as well as interactive story-telling audio and videos.
The GLIFWC represents eleven Ojibwe tribes in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan who reserved hunting, fishing and gathering rights in the 1837, 1842, and 1854 Treaties with the United States government.
Mazinaate has been publishing Indigenous Language books and resources since 1998. Their goal is to provide superior language learning books and resources to encourage language learners to pursue the beauty and culture of Indigenous communities. Mazinaate is a native-owned and operated publishing company, dedicated to preservation of indigenous languages through development of practical language tools and resources for students and teachers.
A language community for Anishinaabemowin language revitalization, land based practices, and the arts.
Ojibwe.net is an independently run non-profit website. This cyber space was created so that the ancient sounds are not lost and can be connected to anyone willing to listen, learn, and labor with us in the effort to maintain Anishinaabemowin. We are humbled by our teachers and those who have preceded us in this work. The Ojibwe.net team is based out of Wisconsin and Michigan.
From Bemidji State University in northern Minnesota (where Dr. Anton Treuer is currently Professor of Ojibwe), this website includes a fairly lengthy list of links to resources dedicated to Anishinaabemowin. Many links are for resources at BSU, but the list also includes many other links.
Ojibwe Stories is a program of Ojibwe culture, language, and ideas that aired in 2017 and 2018 on 103.3fm KUMD in Duluth, Minnesota. It was produced by Chris Harwood at KUMD and the University of Minnesota, Duluth Department of American Indian Studies.
Ojibwemotaadidaa Omaa Gidakiiminaang
OOG is an organization that operates out of Fond du Lac reservation. As well as online resources, they hold a yearly two week summer immersion program in addition to a once-a-month weekend immersion throughout the winter. Applications to both cohorts can be found on their website. Additionally, their website is filled with language content for babies and parenting and traditional cultural activities. They also have a YouTube channelwhere you can listen to and watch first-language speakers.
Online Ojibwe Language Community Program
From the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, this is an online Ojibwe language program, where anyone can watch live or archived classes for free.
Reclaiming and Revitalizing Anishinaabemowin @ SKG
A series of videos (available on YouTube) created at SKG through a grant made available by the First Nations Confederacy of Cultural Education Centres (FNCCEC). These videos, all conducted in Ojibwe, reflect the dialect found in the region of Sault Ste. Marie and Manitoulin Island.
Waadookodaading Ojibwe Immersion School
This website is still a work in progress but it’s the website for the Ojibwe immersion school in Hayward, Wisconsin, the only k-8 Ojibwe immersion school today.
Online Dictionaries and Grammar Resources
Nishnaabemwin Online Dictionary
An online dictionary for Eastern Odawa and Ojibwe language. This dictionary is most relevant to the language spoken in and east of Sault Ste. Marie. This dictionary was developed by and maintained by Rand Valentine and master language speaker, Mary Ann Corbiere.
(See also the following video on YouTube: Nishnaabemwin/Ojibwe Online Dictionaries: An Overview with Mary Ann Corbiere)
The Wiki for Ojibwe Grammar has had great contributions to it and remains a solid resource for anyone wanting to learn linguistic insights into the Ojibwe Language
The Ojibwe People’s Dictionary
The Ojibwe People’s Dictionary was established by faculty and students in the Department of American Indian Studies at the University of Minnesota. It can be searched by entering terms in English or in Ojibwe.
Rand Valentine’s Ojibwe Language Lessons
Another grammar & lesson based website that was created by master Nishnaabemwin linguist, Rand Valentine.
This page offers excellent insights into Ojibwe grammar as well as self-taught lessons and story translation assignments.
Anishinaabemowin Leaders
The importance of the Ojibwe language to Anishinaabe language is uncontested.
But the individuals leading efforts to revitalize Anishinaabemowin are of equal, if not greater, importance.
Barbara Nolan
Barbara is a proud Nishnaabe-kwe, formerly from Wikwemikong Unceded Indian Reserve, who now resides in Garden River First Nation.
She has been the Anishinabek Nation Language Commissioner since December, 2020.
Barbara Nolan is grateful to have survived the attempts by Canada’s Indian residential schools system to take her Nishnaabe language from her. As a vibrant first-speaker of Nishnaabemwin, she has spent several decades working with a variety of organizations to revitalize our language.
Barbara particularly enjoys consulting with Anishnaabe communities on the effective development of language nests and immersion programs, as well as training Nishnaabemwin speakers in methods of immersion instruction. She continues to do immersion classes, most recently in a year-long, 270-hour, part-time Nishnaabe-language immersion program.
Aside from immersion classes, Barbara has had the opportunity to produce the Nishnaabemdaa language app which can be downloaded from Apple’s App Store and from Google Play.
You can watch Anishinaabemowin Language Lessons with Barb Nolan on YouTube
Patricia Ningewance
Patricia is Bear clan. She is Ojibwe from Lac Seul First Nation in northwestern Ontario and has traveled throughout Anishinaabe country where Ojibwe is spoken and tries to include all dialects in her books. She has previously written two language books: Survival Ojibwe (new edition with answers included, 2017) and Anishinaabemodaa: Becoming a Successful Ojibwe Eavesdropper (out of print). She is also the author of Pocket Ojibwe and Gookom’s Language. And Patricia is a longtime translator.
She has been able to teach her grandson, Aandeg Muldrew, to speak Ojibwe by taking him to her university classes and language camps since he was 12. Now he speaks and writes it, and teaches Introductory Ojibwe for the University of Manitoba via Zoom, with Patricia teaching Intermediate and Advanced Ojibwe. He is working on his Master of Linguistics at the University of MInnesota. It’s not often a grandmother and grandchild are teaching Ojibwe at the same time at a university!
She is Vice-President for the Indigenous Language Institute, based out of Santa Fe, New Mexico. And is the writer and director of the 12 episodes of Aakoziiwigamig, the Ojibwe Language Radio Drama that airs from NCI in Winnipeg (NCI is a public broadcaster, offering radio programming throughout Manitoba, designed for and by Indigenous people).
Patricia is also the founder and president of the publishing company Mazinaate Incorporated, and the books she has authored may be purchased from their website. Mazinaate Inc. now has 14 books published. They are primarily in Ojibwe, but Pocket Oibwe has been translated into Inuktitut, Dene, Swampy Cree, Ojicree, and Plains Cree.
Helen is from Wikwemikong Unceded Reserve on Manitoulin Island and has been teaching Anishinaabemowin for 30 years. She currently resides in Michigan and recently retired from teaching Ojibwe language at Michigan State University. Over the years, she has developed a working method for new learners. It is called the Sound Based Method of Understanding Anishinaabemowin. It is not just a method; it is the way the language was originally understood before any English was known by Anishinaabeg.
On her website, material is available for purchasing, while some videos and content can be accessed for free.
Stewart Roy
Stewart is an assistant professor of Anishinaabemowin at Algoma University.
He led a project at Shingwauk Kinoomaage Gamig to record Elders in Anishinaabemowin and these videos can be viewed on YouTube
Anton Treuer
Anton Treuer (pronounced troy-er) is Professor of Ojibwe at Bemidji State University and author of many books, including The Language Warrior’s Manifesto: How to Keep Our Languages Alive No Matter the Odds. He is also editor of the Oshkaabewis (pronounced o-shkaah-bay-wis) Native Journal, the only academic journal of the Ojibwe language.
His equity, education, and cultural work has put him on a path of service around the region, the nation, and the world.
The video First Speakers: Restoring the Ojibwe Language (2010) is available on YouTube and profiles Anton.
Isadore Toulouse
Isadore Toulouse is a member of the Turtle clan from the Wikwemikong Unceded First Nation located on Manitoulin Island, Ontario.
Isadore recognized the absence of the language and culture within the existing educational system that reaffirmed his belief to pursue a career in Aboriginal education. He enrolled in Trent University’s Native studies program in Peterborough, Ontario in 1979. Eventually, his studies lead him to participate and graduate from Lakehead University’s Native Language Instructors Program in Thunder Bay, Ontario.
For the past twenty-seven years of teaching, he became only too familiar for the need of Ojibwe language material prepared for and by Ojibwe people.
Isadore holds an Online Anishinaabemowin language class. It is a live instructional hour class with Isadore speaking on video, going through the basics of Anishinaabemowin. The class is open to all language speaking levels, and all people. A link with more details can be found here on Facebook.
Mary Ann Naokwegijig-Corbiere
Mary Ann acquire her mother tongue, Nishnaabemwin (aka Ojibwe), through her upbringing in Wikwemikong, a Nishnaabe First Nation on Manitoulin Island in Ontario. After graduating from York University, her desire to be among eNshinaabemjik – other speakers of her language – again full time, took her back home for several years. She has taught her language in university since 1989 and obtained a doctorate in 2007. She has developed instructional resources for adult learners and has partly completed a Nishnaabemwin dictionary with co-author, J.R. Valentine.
Shirley Ida Williams
Ms Shirley Ida Williams is a member of the Bird Clan of the Ojibway and Odawa First Nations of Canada. Her Aboriginal name is “Migizi ow-kwe” meaning “that Eagle Woman”. She was born and raised at Wikwemikong, First Nations Unceded Reserve on Manitoulin Island, now residing in Peterborough. She attended the St. Joseph’s Residential School, Spanish, Ontario. Shirley has lectured across Ontario promoting Nishnaabe language and Culture.
She received her B.A. degree in Native Studies from Trent University. She received her diploma in Native Language Instructor’s Program, Lakehead University and her M.A. at York University on Language and Culture Manitoulin Dialect in 1996. Shirley started her work in the Native Studies Department in 1986 to develop and promote Native language courses within the department.
Shirley is a Professor Emeritus at Trent University, Indigenous Studies where she has taught Anishnaabe language, identity, and culture for many years. Over the course of her career at Trent and still today, Shirley has developed many different resources to help with the teaching and learning of Anishnaabemowin. She is the author of Shoolee: The Early Years, an autobiographical and bilingual (English and Anishnnaabemowin) account of what traditional life was like growing up in the language and living close to the land on Manitoulan Island.
According to Elder Shirley Williams, supporting Indigenous language education is at the heart of reconciliation in Canada today. The residential school system almost destroyed the Anishnaabe language and the Anishnaabe educational system. If we are going to move past the many harms of the residential school system and towards reconciliation in Canada, Indigenous languages need to be supported and we need to write and speak in the language as much as we can. We need to respect and accept each other’s dialect and encourage each other to learn and speak the language. We need to love our Anishnaabe language no matter how it is said. We all belong because the Creator gave us all this language together.
Books Available at Shingwauk Kinoomaage Gamig
A full listing of titles related to Anishinaabemowin available at Shingwauk Kinoomaage Gamig can be found bysearching the SKG Library Catalog.
Entering “anishinaabemowin” in the search field will bring up the complete list.
Here is a selected listing of books available at SKG:
- Anishinaubae Thesaurus
By Basil Johnston, 2007 - A Dictionary of the Ojibway Language
By Frederic Baraga and John Nichols, 1992 - Eastern Ojibwa-Chippewa-Ottawa Dictionary
By Richard A. Rhodes, 1993 - Gookom’s Language: Learning Ojibway
By Patricia M. Ningewance, 2004 - Ezhichigeyang: Ojibwe word list
By Nancy Jones, Gordon Jourdain, Keller Paap, Rose Tainter and Anton Treuer, 2011
Anishinaabemowin Books Online
Many online titles are historic and will contain Anishinaabemowin that is specific to a point in time in history.
Often, this history contains a strong European and colonial bias. Below is a sample of this material.
- A Concise Dictionary of the Ojibway Indian Language (1903):
Part 1 English-Ojibway
Part 2 Ojibway-English - Dibaajimowinan: Anishinaabe stories of culture and respect
2013 - A Dictionary of the Otchipwe Language, Explained in English: this language is spoken by the Chippewa Indians, as also by the Otawas, Potawatamis and Algonquins, with little difference; for the use of missionaries, and other persons living among the above mentioned Indians
1853 - The Ojebway language a manual for missionaries and others employed among the Ojebway Indians
1874 - Voyages and travels of an Indian interpreter and trader: describing the manners and customs of the North American Indians; with an account of the posts situated on the river Saint Laurence, Lake Ontario, &c.; to which is added a vocabulary of the Chippeway language; names of furs and skins, in English and French ; a list of words in the Iroquois, Mohegan, Shawanee, and Esquimeaux tongues, and a table, shewing the analogy between the Algonkin and Chippeway languages
By J. Long, 1791 - Widjindiwini-masinaigan (Catholic prayer book)
1913
