The first bilingual street signs will be unveiled in Ucluelet today to honour the language of the Yuułuʔiłʔatḥ (Ucluelet) First Nation.
Street signs will feature the West Barkley dialect of the Nuu-chah-nulth on the top, with English below. The project is intended to celebrate and preserve the language.
Ucluelet Mayor Mayco Noel said, “Our bilingual street sign project is a small way we can honour the Yuułuʔiłʔatḥ people and their traditional language.”
The bilingual street sign project began in late 2019, and by the end of 2022 all street names that are translatable to the Nuučaan̓n̓uɫ language will be installed in the district.
About half the street names in Ucluelet are nouns. Plans call for those signs to be updated with the First Nation language.
“Not all Nuučaan̓n̓uɫ (Nuu-chah-nulth) words translate to English words. Only nouns that are familiar to who we are and where we live can be translated,”said Jeneva Touchie, culture and heritage keeper for the Yuułuʔiłʔatḥ nation.
“It is really great to see our language live within Ucluelet, our traditional territory. It feels like home. It has been an honour to work with one of our Yuułuʔiłʔatḥ elders and language keepers, Bob Mundy, who is a fluent Nuučaan̓n̓uɫ speaker,” she said.
Updating public signs is a “small step on the path to reconciliation,” the town said in a statement about the event, which will take place at 10 a.m. at the corner of Peninsula Road and Otter Street.
“We are grateful to have had the opportunity to work closely with Yuułuʔiłʔatḥ language keepers on this project and want to thank them for their contributions to making this possible.”
Brian Greig, who heads up community planning, said existing street names include Alder, Bay, Cedar and Peninsula, which could be translated.
First Nation language experts worked on spelling and translation, he said.
Public works crews will install the remaining signs in coming weeks and as time allows.
Ucluelet First Nation president Charles McCarthy said the signs represent a big shift to being inclusive, and recognize a lot of places from the nation’s perspective.
To have been included by the district in the process is a positive step, McCarthy said.
“To me, it is more of a recognition of …whose territory or land you are on.”
• For more information on the language, to hear it spoken and learn words and more, go to
firstvoices.com/explore/FV/sections/Data.
Scroll down to find Nuu-chah-nulth (Barkley). The site includes games to help children learn the language.
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