Cheyenne language

The Cheyenne language (Tsėhesenėstsestotse, [tse̥hésene̥stsesto̥tse]) (informal spelling Tsisinstsistots), is the Native American language spoken by the Cheyenne people, predominantly in present-day Montana and Oklahoma, in the United States. It is part of the Algonquian language family. Like all other Algonquian languages, it has complex agglutinative polysynthetic morphology. This language is considered endangered, at different levels, in both states. Cheyenne is one of the Algonquian languages, which is a sub-category of the Algic languages. Specifically, it is a Plains Algonquian language. However, Plains Algonquian, which also includes Arapaho and Blackfoot, is an areal rather than genetic subgrouping. Cheyenne is spoken on the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation in Montana and in Oklahoma. On the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation in March 2013 there were approximately 10,050 enrolled tribal members, of which about 4,939 resided on the reservation; slightly more than a quarter of the population five years or older spoke a language other than English. The Cheyenne language is considered "definitely endangered" in Montana and "critically endangered" in Oklahoma by the UNESCO. In Montana the number of speakers were about 1700 in 2012 according to the UNESCO. In 2021 there were approximately 300 elderly speakers. In 2021 in Oklahoma there were fewer than 20 elderly speakers. There is no current information on any other state in the United States regarding the Cheyenne language. The 2017 film Hostiles features extensive dialogue in Northern Cheyenne. The film's producers hired experts in the language and culture to ensure authenticity. In 1997, the Cultural Affairs Department of Chief Dull Knife College applied to the Administration for Native Americans for an approximately $50,000 language preservation planning grant. The department wanted to use this money to assess the degree to which Cheyenne was being spoken on the Northern Cheyenne Reservation.