Gitxsan

Gitxsan Nation is located in the Skeena Watershed of British Columbia, Canada on 30,000 square kilometers of land. The Nation is a matrilineal society that consists of Frog, Eagle, Wolf, and Fireweed Clans. There are approximately 10,000 members worldwide with 70% of the membership living on the traditional lands where there are five villages: Gitwangak, Gitsegukla, Gitanmaax, Glen Vowell, and Kispiox with two municipal provinces: Hazelton and New Hazelton. Eighty percent of the people living on the lands are Gitxsan (People of the River Mist) and archeological evidence supports a habitation of at least 10,000 years.

Gitksan is a First Nations language of northwestern British Columbia. It is a Tsimshianic language, closely related to the neighboring Nisga’a language. Indeed, linguists have often treated Gitksan and Nisga’a as dialects of a single Nass-Gitksan language. The two groups are, however, politically separate and prefer to refer to Gitksan and Nisga’a as distinct languages.

The text in this article excerpt is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia articles “Gitksan language” and “Gitxsan Nation”.