My name is Emma Stevens, and I am from Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. I’m Mi’kmaq from Eskasoni First Nation.

On a word from your language that is meaningful

The first word that probably pops into my head is kesalul, and it means “I love you.” There’s not a lot of love in the world today, and I feel like everyone should at least, like, say it out loud, even if it’s in a different language and no one understands what you’re saying. Just saying “I love you” can make you feel warmer in the inside. And even if you are loved, many people want more people to love and you can’t have enough people to love you. You can always have more.

On hopes for the International Decade of Indigenous Languages

Since I’m a musician, I want to add language and music together. And, like I’ve done in the past with Blackbird that I’ve done in Mi’kmaq, it was to show people that you can bring language into music, and people will understand it from other countries and other different religions, and they’ll still understand what you’re saying and what you’re trying to get your point across. So I want to make sure that in the next decade or so that there is more information about language with music, and there’s more options to learn with music.

On language and music

Music is a universal language. Everyone knows some type of music… And everyone understands it and they learn to like it, and all of these things. So why can’t we do the same with language? You can use music and language; they’re the exact same thing. Just one has melody and the other has purpose.