Gros Ventre Ethnogeography and Place Names: A Diachronic Perspective

Abstract:This article documents and linguistically analyzes all known place names in the Gros Ventre language. Analysis of names both from the perspective of a supra-tribal system of place names on the Northern Plains and with respect to a naming system specific to Gros Ventre (which we compare to that of Arapaho) allows a better understanding of the ethnogeographic process of identifying a particular region as a homeland. Postcontact names reveal shifts in the system; nonetheless, the overall homelanding process remains largely intact in its structure and ideology, despite major changes in the types of place names used resulting from the shift from nomadism, and attendant cosmological perspectives on the land, to a settled reservation existence.