Sponsored by the Department of Culture and Communication and the Department of Education. North Slavery Working Committee: Sarah Doctor, Keren Rice, Paul Andrew, Dora Grandjambe, Jane Vandermeer, Judi Tutcho, Lucy Ann Yakeleya, Ron Cleary, and Agnes Naedzo.

In the 1970s, the Athapaskan Languages Steering Committee piloted the idea of standardization, and, in 1985, the GNWT created a Task Force on Aboriginal Languages which recommended the same. In 1987 the Dene Standardization Project was born, with the goal to make decisions regarding Dene orthographies, publish reference materials, support native language specialists and teachers to learn new orthographies, and other measures. Regional standardization was to be based on the speech of Elders.

Dene Kedǝ or North Slavey language had its own, unique considerations (from the "North Slavey Technical Report", p. 46)

• Dene Kedǝ at this time was thought to consist of “three major dialects, Rádeyı̨lı̨ ,Délı̨ne, and Tulı́t’a. The community of Tulı́t’a has two major dialects within it…. [one] very similar to that of Délı̨nę, which can be called the kw dialect, while others use the dialect that is labeled Tulı́t’a in this report, or the p dialect. Speakers from Rádeyı̨lı̨ and K’áhbamı̨túé use the f dialect.” (46)

• These dialects vary in emphasis, vocabulary, tone, etc.

• There are intergenerational and, possibly, gendered differences in speech.

The Standardization team also generated numerous recommendations for implementing standardized orthographies. These included using only standardized writing in GNWTpublications, holding public awareness and literacy campaigns, publishing more materials, and supporting language teachers to learn the new systems.

Access this Resource:

Contact the NWT Archives to obtain permission to access records from the Standardization project. See Accession no. G-2003-01. In addition, a paper on the Standardization project with similar content is available open access from ERIC. 

Government of the Northwest Territories. Report of the Dene Standardization Project. Yellowknife, 1990.