The languages woven through Alicia's documented ancestry — the Red River Métis line and its Cree, Saulteaux, and French roots. A place to honour them, learn them, and (one day) teach them at the retreat. Curated for the way Alicia learns: by falling in love with the language itself.
Alicia's proven line runs: French-Canadian voyageurs (Beaugrand dit Champagne, Larocque) who came west and married First Nations women at Red River — the union that created the Métis. So her heritage languages are exactly that braid: Michif (the Métis language itself), the Cree and Saulteaux of her First Nations grandmothers, and the French of the voyageurs. (If the Akwesasne lead on her mother's side is ever confirmed, Kanien'kéha / Mohawk joins the list — kept below, pending.)
The Métis Nation's own language — a true mixed language that braids Cree verbs with French nouns, born at Red River from exactly the kind of union in Alicia's tree. It is the most direct linguistic inheritance of her documented line — and one of the most endangered languages in the world (a few hundred fluent speakers remain), which makes learning it an act of revival.
The language family at the heart of Michif's verbs, and almost certainly the tongue of Alicia's First Nations grandmother Josette ("Indian," b. ~1777) and the Red River community she came from. Plains Cree (Nēhiyawēwin) is widely taught, with rich free online tools.
Saulteaux is the western dialect of Ojibwe (Anishinaabemowin), one of the two main Indigenous nations of the Red River Métis. The records put it squarely in Alicia's family's world — Baptiste Larocque's second country-wife was recorded Saulteaux-Cree, the cultural context Josette belonged to.
The other half of the braid. Alicia's line is full of French-Canadian voyageurs — Beaugrand dit Champagne, Larocque, Coutu, Gignard — back to the immigrant founder Jean Beaugrand (~1641). French supplies Michif's nouns, and it's the most accessible of the four to reach fluency in.
Held here in case the family's belief in Akwesasne on Alicia's mother's side is confirmed (not yet found in records — see the Action Plan). If it is, Kanien'kéha — a Haudenosaunee language, unrelated to the Algonquian Cree/Ojibwe family — becomes part of her inheritance, with strong revitalization programs at Akwesasne.
This makes Alicia's gift for language more than a passion — it's a fundable, community-serving revitalization role she's naturally suited to, and a beautiful through-line from the family tree to the land.