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Concept information

Preferred term

okaOkanagan  

Type

  • Language

Definition

  • Colville-Okanagan is a Salish language which arose among the inhabitants of the Okanagan River Basin and spread into the Columbia River Basin. Following British, American, and Canadian colonization during the 1800s and the subsequent repression of all Salishan languages, the use of Colville-Okanagan declined drastically. Colville-Okanagan is highly endangered and is rarely learned as either a first or second language. There are about 150 deeply fluent speakers of Colville-Okanagan Salish, the majority of whom live in British Columbia. The language is currently moribund and has no fluent speakers younger than 50 years of age. Colville-Okanagan is the second most spoken Salish language after Shuswap.

Entry terms

  • Colville-Okanagan language

ISO 639-3 code

  • oka

Notation

  • oka

In other languages

  • Colville-okanagan

    French

URI

http://lexvo.org/id/iso639-3/oka

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