English,
Míkmaw,
Frenchother Algonquian peoples
The Míkmaq (pronounced [mi?gmax]) are a First Nations (Native American) people, indigenous to northeastern New England, Canada's Atlantic Provinces, and the Gaspé Peninsula of Quebec. The nation has a population of about 20,000 of whom nearly 11,000 speak the Algonquian language Lnuísimk, more commonly known as "Micmac".[1][2][3] Lnuísimk was once written in Míkmaq hieroglyphic writing and is now written using most letters of the standard Latin alphabet.
Their name has traditionally been spelled Micmac in English, but the natives themselves have used different spellings Mi’kmaq (singular Mi’kmaw) by the Míkmaq of Nova Scotia, Miigmaq (Miigmao) by the Míkmaq of New Brunswick, Mi’gmaq by the Listuguj Council in Quebec, or Mìgmaq (Mìgmaw) in some native literature.[4] Until the 1980s, "Micmac" remained the most common spelling in English, and is still used, for example in Ethnologue, but it has fallen out of favor in recent years, and has been replaced by the native spelling Mi'kmaq in nearly all scholarly publications.[5] The Míkmaq themselves prefer to use one of the three current Míkmaq orthographies when writing in English or French,[6] saying that the English spelling is "perceived as being colonially tainted."[4]
