Introduction

Welcome to the Tunica Dictionary! This dictionary is a reference resource for modern Tunica as spoken by members of the Tunica-Biloxi Tribe of Marksville, Louisiana. In 2010, the Tunica Language Project began revitalizing the language, and you can now find Tunica everywhere, from the classroom to Twitter and Facebook!

The pages of this dictionary contain voices from both the past and present. A large majority of the words come from Mary Haas’s work with Sesostrie Youchigant in the 1930s. Sesostrie Youchigant was a Tunica chief and the last known native speaker of the Tunica language, and Mary Haas was an anthropological linguist. While their collaboration is the basis of the Tunica Language Project’s efforts, new collaborations, including the one with the Tunica-Biloxi Tribe, have significantly expanded the number of Tunica words and the way in which they are used. Luhchi Yoroni hotu. All of this is Tunica. Hence all words are represented in the dictionary.