Editing Slavey language (section)

== Status ==
North and South Slavey are recognized as official languages of the Northwest Territories; they may be used in court and in debates and proceedings of the Northwest Territories legislature. However, unlike English and French, the government only publishes laws and documents in North and South Slavey if the legislature requests it, and these documents are not authoritative.<ref>Nitah, S. (2002). One land - many voices: report of the NWT Special Committee on the Review of the Official Languages Act. ''Canadian Parliamentary Review'' 25(3), 4-8.</ref>

In 2015, a Slavey woman named Andrea Heron challenged the territorial government over its refusal to permit the [[Glottal stop (letter)|ʔ]] character, representing the Slavey glottal stop, in her daughter's name, Sakaeʔah, despite Slavey languages being official in the NWT. The territory argued that territorial and federal identity documents were unable to accommodate the character. Heron had registered the name with a hyphen instead of the ʔ when her daughter was born, but when Sakaeʔah was 6, Ms. Heron joined a challenge by a [[Chipewyan]] woman named Shene Catholique-Valpy regarding the same character in her own daughter's name, Sahaiʔa.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Browne |first1=Rachel |date=12 March 2015 |title=What's in a name? A Chipewyan's battle over her native tongue |url=http://www.macleans.ca/society/life/all-in-the-family-name/ |access-date=5 April 2015 |work=Maclean's}}</ref>

Also in 2015, the [[University of Victoria]] launched a language revitalization program in the NWT, pairing learners of indigenous languages including Slavey with fluent speakers. The program requires 100 hours of conversation with the mentor with no English allowed, as well as sessions with instructors in [[Fort Providence, Northwest Territories|Fort Providence]].<ref>{{cite news |author1=Erin Brohman |author2=Garrett Hinchey |date=16 March 2015 |title=UVic program aims to revitalize South Slavey language in N.W.T. |url=http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/uvic-program-aims-to-revitalize-south-slavey-language-in-n-w-t-1.2996608 |access-date=5 April 2015 |work=CBC News}}</ref>