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Fox
Meskwaki-Sauk-Kickapoo
Meshkwahkihaki
Native to	United States,Mexico
Region	CentralOklahoma, NortheasternKansas,Iowa, andCoahuila
Ethnicity	760Meskwaki andSauk and 820Kickapoo in the US (2000 census)[1] and 423Mexican Kickapoo (2010 census)[2]
Native speakers	700: 250 Sauk and Fox and 400 Kickapoo in the US (2007–2015)[1] 60 Kickapoo in Mexico (2020 census)[3]
Language family	Algic Algonquian Fox
Dialects	Fox Sauk Kickapoo
Writing system	Latin, Great Lakes Algonquian syllabics
Language codes
ISO 639-3	Either: sac – Fox and Sauk kic – Kickapoo
Linguist List	qes Mascouten
Glottolog	foxx1245
Map showing the distribution ofOklahomaIndian Languages
Kickapoo is classified as Severely Endangered by theUNESCOAtlas of the World's Languages in Danger.
This article containsIPA phonetic symbols. Without properrendering support, you may seequestion marks, boxes, or other symbols instead ofUnicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, seeHelp:IPA.

Fox (known by a variety of different names, includingMesquakie (Meskwaki),Mesquakie-Sauk,Mesquakie-Sauk-Kickapoo,Sauk-Fox, andSac and Fox) is anAlgonquian language, spoken by a thousandMeskwaki,Sauk, andKickapoo in various locations in theMidwestern United States and innorthern Mexico.

The three distinct dialects are:

• Fox orMeskwakiatoweni (Meskwaki language)^{[4][failed verification]} (also called Mesquakie, Meskwaki)
• Sauk orThâkiwâtowêweni (Thâkîwaki language) (also rendered Sac), and
• Kickapoo orKiikaapoa (also renderedKikapú; considered by some to be a closely related but distinct language).^[5]

If Kickapoo is counted as a separate language rather than a dialect of Fox, then only between 200 and 300 speakers of Fox remain. Extinct Mascouten was most likely another dialect, though it is scarcely attested.^{[citation needed]}

Most speakers are elderly or middle-aged, making it highlyendangered. The tribal school at theMeskwaki Settlement in Iowa incorporates bilingual education for children.^[4][6] In 2011, the Meskwaki Sewing Project was created, to bring mothers and girls together "with elder women in the Meskwaki Senior Center sewing traditional clothing and learning the Meskwaki language."^[7]

Prominent scholars doing research on the language includeIves Goddard,^[8]Lucy Thomason of the Smithsonian Institution, andAmy Dahlstrom of the University of Chicago.

The consonant phonemes of Fox are given in the table below. The eight vowel phonemes are: short/a,e,i,o/ and long/aː,eː,iː,oː/.

Other than those involving a consonant plus/j/ or/w/, the only possible consonant cluster is/ʃk/.

Until the early 1900s, Fox was a phonologically very conservative language and preserved many features ofProto-Algonquian; records from the decades immediately following 1900 are particularly useful to Algonquianists for this reason. By the 1960s, however, an extensive progression of phonological changes had taken place, resulting in the loss of intervocalic semivowels and certain^[which?] other features.^[9]

According toA Concise Dictionary of the Sauk Language by Gordon Whittaker,^[10] the language's nouns can be divided into animate and inanimate groups. Animate nouns end in -a (ex: tîtîwa /ˈti:.ti:.wa/, "blue jay (bird)"). To pluralise most animate nouns, the ending is transformed from -a to -aki (ex: tîtîwa -> tîtîwaki). The few exceptions that exist have specific forms, according to the Dictionary.

Inanimate nouns typically end in -i (ex: mâtethi /ˈma:.tet.hi/, "knife"). To pluralise most inanimate nouns, the ending is transformed from -i to -ani (ex: mâtethi -> mâtethani). Like the animate nouns, the few exceptions that exist also have specific forms, according to the Dictionary.^[11]

Verbs can be divided into transitive and intransitive; transitive involves two parties (i.e "I give it to you!" / "Kemînêwene!"), while intransitive is one party (i.e "You're alive." / "Kepemâtethi.")

This conjugation is only for verbs that end in -amwa; all other animate transitive verbs take the same conjugation as the animate intransitive verbs.^[12]

Sauknumerals are as follows:^[13]

Besides theLatin script, Fox has been written in two indigenous scripts.^[14]

"Fox I" is anabugida based on the cursive French alphabet (seeGreat Lakes Algonquian syllabics). Consonants written by themselves are understood to be syllables containing the vowel/a/. They are:

Vowels are written by adding dots to the consonant:

"Fox II" is a consonant–vowel alphabet. According to Coulmas,/p/ is not written (as/a/ is not written in Fox I). Vowels (or/p/ plus a vowel) are written as cross-hatched tally marks.

• Sac and Fox Nation
• Sauk language
• Kickapoo language
• Kickapoo whistled speech

• Bloomfield, Leonard (1925)."Notes on the Fox Language".International Journal of American Linguistics.3 (2/4):219–232.doi:10.1086/463756.
• Coulmas, Florian (1999).The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Writing Systems. Blackwell Publishing.
• Dahlstrom, Amy."Meskwaki Syntax (Manuscript)".Lucian. University of Chicago.
• Goddard, Ives (1991)."Observations Regarding Fox (Mesquakie) Phonology".Papers of the Twenty-Second Algonquian Conference.22:157–181.
• Jones, William (1906)."An Algonquian syllabary". In Lanfer, Berthold (ed.).Boas anniversary volume: Anthropological papers written in honor of Franz Boas. New York: G.E. Stechert. pp. 88–93.{{cite book}}:|work= ignored (help)
• Voorhis, Paul H. (1974).Introduction to the Kickapoo Language. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.ISBN 978-0-87750-177-0.
• Whittaker, Gordon (2005).A Concise Dictionary of the Sauk Language(PDF). Stroud, OK: The Sac & Fox National Public Library. Archived fromthe original(PDF) on October 29, 2020.

• Jones, William (1907). Boaz, Franz (ed.).Fox texts. Publications of the American Ethnological Society. Vol. 1. Leyden: Brill.
• Michelson, Truman, ed. (1895).The Autobiography of a Fox Indian Woman (in Sac and English).{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: unrecognized language (link)
• Michelson, Truman, ed. (1921).The Owl Sacred Pack of the Fox Indians. Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin. Vol. 72. Smithsonian Institution.
• "Last Meskwaki code talker remembers".USA Today. Tama, IA.Associated Press. July 4, 2002. RetrievedJuly 19, 2012.

• Native Languages of the Americas: Mesquakie-Sauk
• Meskwaki Language - Alphabet
• OLAC resources in and about the Meskwaki language
• OLAC resources in and about the Kickapoo language

• Algonquian languages
• Sac and Fox
• Native American language revitalization
• Indigenous languages of the North American eastern woodlands
• Indigenous languages of the North American Plains
• Indigenous languages of Oklahoma
• Endangered Algic languages
• Endangered Indigenous languages of the Americas
• Kickapoo
• Meskwaki

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