Comments on: The Quick 10: 10 Extinct Languages of the U.S.

By: Joanna

Joanna — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 19:25:00 +0000

When my (recently late) grandfather would talk about his time in Hawaii in WWII, he would always stress that the city is pronounced HO-nolulu, not HA-nolulu; he would then recite the letters of the Hawaiian alphabet and explain that it’s really Ha-VA-ee-ee. Even the visiting nurse got the lecture. He said listening to native Hawaiians talk was like music. I wish I could have heard it.

By: kate

kate — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 09:34:00 +0000

I just wanted to comment on this as a senior undergraduate student in archaeology and anthropology…

I showed the article about the “last Eyak speaker”, which I saw over a year ago, to my teacher (who is part of the Lummi Nation) and she told me they have published stories claiming that many times before.

I consider the media attention on “lost” languages and peoples seems to be the modern form of the myth of the Native peoples disappearing. That being said, many languages were not spoken for decades because of oppressive laws and policies in the US. Now many groups are coming together to regain the knowledge of their language through historical and ethnological research and oral history. The Mohegan tribe, for example, is finalizing a dictionary of their dialect of the Algonquin language family in this way.

Hope that was informative! I am impressed with your openmindedness in writing about this — I am often very disappointed in regular news articles on archaeology/anthropology topics because they sensationalize things so much. I liked this article.

I would be interested in reading an article about what you can learn about Ishi, since his story is long and fraught with drama to be sure. A real contrast to the way things are done these days in anthropology, and very emotional.

By: Tony

Tony — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 17:38:00 +0000

The study of languages has been a hobby of mine for many years and I found this to be a very interesting tidbit. And these were only some of the extinct languages in the US. Think of the numbers worldwide!

By: Sam

Sam — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 06:06:00 +0000

Supposedly, in the Yana language, it was considered taboo to say one’s own name. Because of this, Ishi’s true name was never revealed (as he was the last Yana standing, so to speak), so he just referred to himself as “man”. His true name has been lost to the ages…a sad, but fascinating article!

By: Michael

Michael — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 04:59:00 +0000

A few years ago, I read a book called “Spoken Here” about different near-extinct or extinct languages. Most of the examples cited for America were Native American languages and the efforts being made to record them and create dictionaries.

By: NFAH

NFAH — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 02:09:00 +0000

Even more interesting is the number of languages being lost in more recent “western discoveries” like Australia. The rate of language extinction is far greater there…

By: Tanya Bart

Tanya Bart — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 01:24:00 +0000

Just discovered this site today – yours is the first item I have read in its entirety. Quite interesting and certainly can lead one into further research on other lost or endangered languages – I am following my curiosity regarding the abundance of deaf population on Martha’s Vineyard…

By: spilyay

spilyay — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 21:37:00 +0000

I know this is meant to highlight just some, but there are many, many more languages that are endangered or extinct in the U.S.

By: Emma Chaseden

Emma Chaseden — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 21:20:00 +0000

What a fascinating topic! As an amateur linguistic I’m always amazed by the diversity of languages that come and go and the stories of last survivors.

Small point: Marie Smith Jones died January 2008, not 2009.