ABSTRACT

Lakota – also sometimes referred to as Teton Sioux – is one of the major languages of the Siouan family of North American languages. With about 6,000 speakers, it is the numerically strongest of the Dakota group of languages spoken in North and South Dakota as well as bordering US states and areas of Canada; this close-knit group also includes Eastern Dakota (often termed simply Dakota) and Western Dakota (often termed Nakoda or Nakota), and all three variants are mutually intelligible. Lakota is the westernmost dialect. The word ‘Dakota’ is a Sioux ethnonym meaning ‘friends/allies’.