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  • Table of Contents

    • Part 1: First Nations of the Peace River Region
    • Part 2: The Fur Trade Era
    • Part 3: Transportation and Communication
    • Part 4: Old Timers and the Price of Land
    • Part 5: Dawson Creek: The Story of the Community
    • Part 6: Mysteries, Adventures and Indian Legends
    • Part 7: Arts, Crafts and Recreation
    • Part 8: Agriculture
    • Part 9: Church Histories
    • Part 10: Schools
    • Part 11: Health Care
    • Part 12: Industries and Enterprises
    • Part 13: Policing the Peace
    • Part 14: Pouce Coupe, Rolla, and Other South Peace Communities
    • Part 15: Chetwynd and the Fort St. John Area
    • Part 16: The Alberta Peace
    • Part 17: Natural History of the Peace River Region
    • Part 18: Interviews with Old Timers
    • Part 19: Remembering Our Veterans

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01-021: Linguistic Classification of Indians

By Dorthea Calverley
Linguistic Subdivisions

Almost all major ethnic divisions may be further subdivided into groups which share single languages or major dialects, and form convenient regional cultural units for study. Among the aboriginal peoples of British Columbia the ten major ethnic groups have been subdivided into thirty-four linguistic subdivisions.

The Athapaskan division, of interest to the Peace River area, has nine subdivisions:

 Beaver Chilcotin Sekanni
 Carrier Tahltan Kaska
Nicola Slave Tsetsaut (extinct)

 

One immediately questions whether all these groups might have come over Bering Strait and down the Mackenzie or Rocky Mountain Trench corridors.

In order to divide Indian groupings into a workable number of descriptive units, most scholars have decided on certain names for certain groups. These names are not usually ones the Indians use for themselves and perhaps those names should be used.

In British Columbia alone there are ten well recognized major ethnic groups commonly referred to by these names:

 Haida Tsimshian Kwakiutl
Nootka Bella Coola Coast Salish
Tlingit Kootenay Interior Salish

Then there is the tenth group, of special interest here: The Athapaskans

« 01-020: Social and Political Organization

01-022: Cultural Divisions »

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