Meanings
- alternativeAlternative form of Anishinaabemowin: The macrolanguage spoken by the Nishnaabe (Ojibwe, Nipissing, Algonquins, Odawa, and Potawatomi).
- specificallyThe variants of Nishnaabemwin that use this form of the word (which are spoken with vowel syncope), spoken in southern Ontario, around Lake Huron, primarily Odawa, Eastern Ojibwe and Nipissing.
On a Tuesday in April 2017, Janet Macbeth composed an all-office email. “My story,” read the subject line in Nishnaabemwin, the Ojibwe language. “Hello everyone,” the email continued in Nishnaabemwin. “My name is Janet.”
2019 November 15, Kate Allen, “‘I am Janet.’ One transgender woman’s journey and her pioneering surgery”, in Toronto Star, archived from the original on 17 Jul 20242 more examples
When Nipissing author Jenny Kay Dupuis co-wrote I Am Not a Number, she knew that she wanted to have it translated into the Nbising dialect of Nishnaabemwin, the language that her grandmother was forbidden to speak at residential school.
2019 February 1, Zoe Tennant, “Jenny Kay Dupuis wanted her book to be available in the language her grandmother was punished for speaking”, in CBC Radio, archived from the original on 25 Feb 2025Mary Ann Naokwegijig-Corbiere, originally from Wikwemikong First Nation, is an assistant professor in Indigenous Studies at the University of Sudbury and has been teaching Nishnaabemwin for the last three decades. She is one of two editors of the Nishnaabemwin: Odawa and Eastern Ojibwe Dictionary. She's been adding new words to the dictionary since 1997, after consulting with five communities in southern Ontario.
2020 March 8, Ka’nhehsí:io Deer, “Celebrating Indigenous women who are reclaiming and revitalizating their languages”, in CBC News, archived from the original on 16 Mar 2020
Origin
- OttawaNishnaabemwin
- EnglishNishnaabemwin
Borrowed from Eastern Ojibwa and Ottawa Nishnaabemwin.
More words from Ottawa
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
Nishnaabemwin. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Nishnaabemwin
“Nishnaabemwin.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Nishnaabemwin. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “Nishnaabemwin,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Nishnaabemwin.
Source: Nishnaabemwin on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.