Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, I said for the first time in this Assembly that I would speak a little bit of my mother tongue. The language is called Michif. This Sunday, I attended a conference put on by the Metis Heritage Association on the language Michif, the language of the Metis people. It was attended by Metis elders from Fort Smith, Hay River, Fort Resolution, Fort Simpson, Fort Norman and Yellowknife, as well as facilitators from the province of Manitoba and from North Dakota in the United States.
This weekend I learned that a language of the Metis people evolved, flourished and still exists in small pockets across the west and here in the NWT, particularly along the Slave/Mackenzie river systems and where there was influence of French-speaking nuns, priests and traders. Michif was the working language of the Metis people and the voyageurs, and appears to be a combination of French-Cree, French-Chip, French-Ojibway and other languages with a french base. I seek unanimous consent to continue, Madam Speaker.