The Diné Bizaad: The Navajo Language
There is an estimated 6,800 languages spoken in the world today. Linguists say that about half of the languages are endangered, and that 90% will disappear by the end of this century (Rozovsky). With the possibility of extinction for a language, not only does the language die but the culture will also come to its demise, a perfect example of this situation is the Navajo language. Also known as Diné Bizaad, the Navajo language is a language in the Athabaskan branch with approximately 175,000 people in the United States (“Diné Bizaad …”). The Navajo Indians are located in Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and Colorado, their language isn’t necessarily the most endangered, the language is only at risk of being severely endangered. The Navajo Indians have approximately 7,600 monolingual people, the Navajo language is still going pretty
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strong, the ethnic population is about 266,000 people so with the 175,000 still being able to speak Navajo, the language would be considered the “most-spoken Native American language in the United States” (“Navajo Indian…”). That being said, it is a wonder why the Navajo language and the culture is so susceptible to becoming severely endangered and why people don’t do anything to help preserve this language.
The Navajo Indians believe that they descended from the first man and woman couple who climbed out of the netherworld through a hole on a mountain to the surface of the earth, thus making them the first people of the planet earth.
Anthropologists, however, speculate that the Navajo people originated from Mongolian tribes from extreme western Asia that may have migrated across the Bering Strait, either by frozen ocean or an ancient land bridge. By using various studies of language development, Linguists have proven the anthropological theory; recent studies have concluded the Navajo language is a part of the larger Athabaskan family (“History”). The Navajo people are now located in Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and Colorado. In 1968 the tribe opened the first Native-operated College also known as Navajo Community College, in hopes the Navajo language and culture will live amongst the generations to come (“Navajo History”). Coincidently, the Navajo language is the largest living language of the whole Na-Dené language family, not just the Athabaskan branch which the language is categorized under and the language itself is still growing in
numbers.
With the language growing it’s a wonder how or why the Navajo language is endangered. In 1998, only about 30% of the school children spoke the language when they entered school whereas in 1968, 90% of the school children spoke the language (Thompson). In order for a language to become endangered the amount of people who speak the language as their first language has to decline compared to the original numbers of speakers (Woodbury). Now, the numbers don’t look so well percentage wise but, there are more Navajo children who still speak English as their first language but still speak the tribe’s native language whether it be at home or in any other situation that calls for them to use the language. Though now-a-days everything is becoming more modernized and the fall of the first couple of generations of the tribe is causing the endangerment of the Navajo language to increase. It seems as though, the ratio between second language speakers and speakers that don’t speak the language at all is growing due to the lack of interest or urgency to teach children, with this tribes background, to speak the Navajo Indian language at a young age to hopefully interest the offspring to pursue in speaking the language more often and teaching their young ones a little piece of their background.
In North America a recent survey revealed that out of hundreds of languages spoken only 194 languages remain, roughly 67 languages are spoken by adults and children, 73 by just adults, 49 just by a few people, all mostly over 70; and 5 languages out of the 194 may already have become extinct (Woodbury). In 1991 and 2001 a survey showed the fewer than 28% of children under the age of five years-old speak the Navajo language (“Endangered Languages”). That survey in and of itself goes to show that the numbers of the younger Navajo children who speak the language is slowly declining and it also shows that the urgency to teach the children to speak Navajo isn’t there. Which is one reason as to why the Navajo language is on a vulnerable level on the path to extinction.
Every day, languages are being born to take the place of the ones that die or become endangered, for example, American Sign Language has been born within the last few centuries (Woodbury). Think of how many languages have possibly died within the time that American Sign Language was born. This just goes to show that no one thing, in this case, language, is safe from becoming obsolete. It seems like it almost may be time to say “good-bye” to the Navajo language and “hello” to a brand spanking new language that will take the Navajo’s place. Though Navajo isn’t extremely endangered there obviously is no immediate need to have a new language spring up and take its place. The linguistic sketch of the Navajo language is fairly simple, the following is a broken down outline of the language; the number of phonemes in the Navajo language is disputed, but many scholars agree that there are thirty-three consonants and twelve vowel sounds, including a large number of fricatives and affricatives. Length is phonemic in the Navajo language, and vowels may appear either short, long, or overlong. The syllables in Navajo can carry either a high, low, rising, or falling tone. The falling and rising tone may very well occur on the long syllables. A falling tone is marked in the orthography by the acute accent on the first syllable, whilst the rising tone is marked by the acute accent on the second vowel (“Diné Bizaad …”). Vowels can also be nasalized in the Navajo language, lowering the soft palate so that air escapes partially through the nose during the production of the sound is how nasalization is produced. Nasalization also may change the meaning of words in the Navajo language (Thompson). Navajo is an agglutinating, polysynthetic language, however, many of its affixes combine in much of the same way as synthetic languages. Navajo tends to have more verbs than any other parts of speech. For instance, the Navajo use verbs for adjectival functions (Thompson). As far as preservation of the language, there are linguists trying to learn as much about every language as possible so if a language were to die out, all knowledge of the language won’t disappear at once. Linguists also work with communities around the world who want to preserve their language by offering both practical and technical help with the languages teaching, maintenance, and revival. All of the help provided is based on the dictionaries and grammars that the languages community write. Linguists can also help in many other ways, by using their experience in teaching and studying a wide variety of languages, linguists can use everything they have learned about the other endangered languages to help future communities preserve their own sacred language. The latest technology for recording and studying languages is what makes everything possible for the charitable linguists to help any endangered language community that seeks it (Woodbury). Aside from the linguists lending a hand to endangered communities there is an organization in Shiprock, New Mexico ran by Freddy and Nancy Hall, called Freddy Hall Navajo Outreach. Though Freddy Hall Navajo Outreach is a husband and wife who live and minister on the Navajo Indian Reservation in Shiprock their efforts in founding a local church called the Dineh Christian Center is helping the Navajo language stay afloat, Dineh Christan Center is one of the largest Native American congregations on the Navajo reservation (“About Us”). Freddy and Nancy Hall are just two examples as to why all hope in preserving a language shouldn’t be thrown upon only linguists. If everyone were to take a stand and fight for the preservation of endangered languages the world may actually have more languages spoken and the rate of extinction may significantly decrease.
strong, the ethnic population is about 266,000 people so with the 175,000 still being able to speak Navajo, the language would be considered the “most-spoken Native American language in the United States” (“Navajo Indian…”). That being said, it is a wonder why the Navajo language and the culture is so susceptible to becoming severely endangered and why people don’t do anything to help preserve this language.
The Navajo Indians believe that they descended from the first man and woman couple who climbed out of the netherworld through a hole on a mountain to the surface of the earth, thus making them the first people of the planet earth.
Anthropologists, however, speculate that the Navajo people originated from Mongolian tribes from extreme western Asia that may have migrated across the Bering Strait, either by frozen ocean or an ancient land bridge. By using various studies of language development, Linguists have proven the anthropological theory; recent studies have concluded the Navajo language is a part of the larger Athabaskan family (“History”). The Navajo people are now located in Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and Colorado. In 1968 the tribe opened the first Native-operated College also known as Navajo Community College, in hopes the Navajo language and culture will live amongst the generations to come (“Navajo History”). Coincidently, the Navajo language is the largest living language of the whole Na-Dené language family, not just the Athabaskan branch which the language is categorized under and the language itself is still growing in
numbers.
With the language growing it’s a wonder how or why the Navajo language is endangered. In 1998, only about 30% of the school children spoke the language when they entered school whereas in 1968, 90% of the school children spoke the language (Thompson). In order for a language to become endangered the amount of people who speak the language as their first language has to decline compared to the original numbers of speakers (Woodbury). Now, the numbers don’t look so well percentage wise but, there are more Navajo children who still speak English as their first language but still speak the tribe’s native language whether it be at home or in any other situation that calls for them to use the language. Though now-a-days everything is becoming more modernized and the fall of the first couple of generations of the tribe is causing the endangerment of the Navajo language to increase. It seems as though, the ratio between second language speakers and speakers that don’t speak the language at all is growing due to the lack of interest or urgency to teach children, with this tribes background, to speak the Navajo Indian language at a young age to hopefully interest the offspring to pursue in speaking the language more often and teaching their young ones a little piece of their background.
In North America a recent survey revealed that out of hundreds of languages spoken only 194 languages remain, roughly 67 languages are spoken by adults and children, 73 by just adults, 49 just by a few people, all mostly over 70; and 5 languages out of the 194 may already have become extinct (Woodbury). In 1991 and 2001 a survey showed the fewer than 28% of children under the age of five years-old speak the Navajo language (“Endangered Languages”). That survey in and of itself goes to show that the numbers of the younger Navajo children who speak the language is slowly declining and it also shows that the urgency to teach the children to speak Navajo isn’t there. Which is one reason as to why the Navajo language is on a vulnerable level on the path to extinction.
Every day, languages are being born to take the place of the ones that die or become endangered, for example, American Sign Language has been born within the last few centuries (Woodbury). Think of how many languages have possibly died within the time that American Sign Language was born. This just goes to show that no one thing, in this case, language, is safe from becoming obsolete. It seems like it almost may be time to say “good-bye” to the Navajo language and “hello” to a brand spanking new language that will take the Navajo’s place. Though Navajo isn’t extremely endangered there obviously is no immediate need to have a new language spring up and take its place. The linguistic sketch of the Navajo language is fairly simple, the following is a broken down outline of the language; the number of phonemes in the Navajo language is disputed, but many scholars agree that there are thirty-three consonants and twelve vowel sounds, including a large number of fricatives and affricatives. Length is phonemic in the Navajo language, and vowels may appear either short, long, or overlong. The syllables in Navajo can carry either a high, low, rising, or falling tone. The falling and rising tone may very well occur on the long syllables. A falling tone is marked in the orthography by the acute accent on the first syllable, whilst the rising tone is marked by the acute accent on the second vowel (“Diné Bizaad …”). Vowels can also be nasalized in the Navajo language, lowering the soft palate so that air escapes partially through the nose during the production of the sound is how nasalization is produced. Nasalization also may change the meaning of words in the Navajo language (Thompson). Navajo is an agglutinating, polysynthetic language, however, many of its affixes combine in much of the same way as synthetic languages. Navajo tends to have more verbs than any other parts of speech. For instance, the Navajo use verbs for adjectival functions (Thompson). As far as preservation of the language, there are linguists trying to learn as much about every language as possible so if a language were to die out, all knowledge of the language won’t disappear at once. Linguists also work with communities around the world who want to preserve their language by offering both practical and technical help with the languages teaching, maintenance, and revival. All of the help provided is based on the dictionaries and grammars that the languages community write. Linguists can also help in many other ways, by using their experience in teaching and studying a wide variety of languages, linguists can use everything they have learned about the other endangered languages to help future communities preserve their own sacred language. The latest technology for recording and studying languages is what makes everything possible for the charitable linguists to help any endangered language community that seeks it (Woodbury). Aside from the linguists lending a hand to endangered communities there is an organization in Shiprock, New Mexico ran by Freddy and Nancy Hall, called Freddy Hall Navajo Outreach. Though Freddy Hall Navajo Outreach is a husband and wife who live and minister on the Navajo Indian Reservation in Shiprock their efforts in founding a local church called the Dineh Christian Center is helping the Navajo language stay afloat, Dineh Christan Center is one of the largest Native American congregations on the Navajo reservation (“About Us”). Freddy and Nancy Hall are just two examples as to why all hope in preserving a language shouldn’t be thrown upon only linguists. If everyone were to take a stand and fight for the preservation of endangered languages the world may actually have more languages spoken and the rate of extinction may significantly decrease.