Instruct: Given a question, retrieve relevant documents that can help answer the question.
Query: What is the language of the Navajo's called?
Navajo or Navaho (/ˈnævəhoʊ, ˈnɑː-/;[3] Navajo: Diné bizaad [tìnépìz̥ɑ̀ːt] or Naabeehó bizaad [nɑ̀ːpèːhópìz̥ɑ̀ːt]) is a Southern Athabaskan language of the Na-Dené family, by which it is related to languages spoken across the western areas of North America. Navajo is spoken primarily in the Southwestern United States, especially on the Navajo Nation. It is one of the most widely spoken Native American languages and is the most widely spoken north of the Mexico–United States border, with almost 170,000 Americans speaking Navajo at home as of 2011. The language has struggled to keep a healthy speaker base, although this problem has been alleviated to some extent by extensive education programs on the Navajo Nation.
The Navajo Language Academy (NLA; Navajo "Diné Bizaad Naalkaah") is a non-profit educational and advocacy organization which focuses on the Navajo language.
Only one Navajo word has been fully absorbed into the English language: hogan (from Navajo hooghan) – a term referring to the traditional houses.[88] Others with limited English recognition include chindi (an evil spirit of the deceased),[89] and Kayenta (a place name, from tééʼndééh 'game pit where wild animals fall into deep water').[90] The taxonomic genus name Uta may be of Navajo origin.[91] It has been speculated that English-speaking settlers were reluctant to take on more Navajo loanwords compared to many other Native American languages, including the Hopi language, because the Navajo were among the most violent resisters to colonialism.[92]
She returned to work with Navajo during the middle 1930s and continued until the early 1950s. She started a Navajo school in which she worked with students to develop a practical orthography for the Navajo language. During the 1940s, she undertook a broader analysis of Navajo language, belief system, and religious practice which culminated in the two volume study, "Navaho Religion," published in 1950 by the Bollingen Foundation. An extensive collection of her notes on Navajo ethnology and language is held by the Museum of Northern Arizona.
Peggy Speas has been heavily involved with the preservation of North American Native Languages, with focus on Navajo. She is a founding member of the Navajo Language Academy, where she has served as president for two years. Founded in 1997, the Academy is a nonprofit organization which promotes the study and preservation of Navajo. In the end of 1999, she finished her term as an associate editor on the journal, "Language". Speas is a co-author on the book "Diné Bizaad Bináhoo'aah": Rediscovering the Navajo Language, which is now used as the official state textbook for the Navajo language in New Mexico. In 2011, she was recognized as a Spotlight Scholar for her over 20 years of work in preserving North American Native Languages.
However, data collected in 1980 showed that 85 percent of Navajo first-graders were bilingual, compared to 62 percent of Navajo of all ages– early evidence of a resurgence of use of their traditional language among younger people.[25] In 1984, to counteract the language's historical decline, the Navajo Nation Council decreed that the Navajo language would be available and comprehensive for students of all grade levels in schools of the Navajo Nation.[23] This effort was aided by the fact that, largely due to the work of Young and Morgan, Navajo is one of the best-documented Native American languages. In 1980 they published a monumental expansion of their work on the language, organized by word (first initial of vowel or consonant) in the pattern of English dictionaries, as requested by Navajo students. The Navajo Language: A Grammar and Colloquial Dictionary also included a 400-page grammar, making it invaluable for both native speakers and students of the language. Particularly in its organization of verbs, it was oriented to Navajo speakers.[26] They expanded this work again in 1987, with several significant additions, and this edition continues to be used as an important text.[21]
Philip Johnston, a civil engineer for the city of Los Angeles, proposed the use of the Navajo language to the United States Marine Corps at the beginning of World War II. Johnston, a World War I veteran, was raised on the Navajo reservation as the son of a missionary to the Navajo and was one of the few non-Navajo who spoke the language fluently. Many Navajo enlisted shortly after Pearl Harbor and eagerly contributed to the war effort. "What happened to the Navajo were social conflicts", Navajo code talker Albert Smith said. "But this conflict involved Mother Earth being dominated by foreign countries. It was our responsibility to defend her."
The museum and its director Manuelito Wheeler (Navajo) have a great interest in reviving and preserving the Navajo language, and in making it accessible to a greater number of Navajos. They worked with LucasFilm to create a Navajo-dubbed version of "Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope"; the project was completed in 2013. In 2015 they spent a full year collaborating with Pixar on a Navajo-language version of "Finding Nemo". Great care was taken in selecting Navajo voice actors and in producing linguistically accurate dubbing. The film, "Nemo Hádéést'íí", premiered in Albuquerque in 2016 and played in select cities throughout the southwest. It was very well received by Navajo audiences.
The Long Walk of the Navajo , also called the Long Walk to Bosque Redondo (), refers to the 1864 deportation and attempted ethnic cleansing of the Navajo people by the government of the United States of America. Navajos were forced to walk from their land in what is now Arizona to eastern New Mexico. Some 53 different forced marches occurred between August 1864 and the end of 1866. Some anthropologists claim that the "collective trauma of the Long Walk...is critical to contemporary Navajos' sense of identity as a people".
The Navajo Nation operates Tséhootsooí Diné Bi'ólta', a Navajo language immersion school for grades K-8 in Fort Defiance, Arizona. Located on the Arizona-New Mexico border in the southeastern quarter of the Navajo Reservation, the school strives to revitalize Navajo among children of the Window Rock Unified School District. Tséhootsooí Diné Bi'ólta' has thirteen Navajo language teachers who instruct only in the Navajo language, and no English, while five English language teachers instruct in the English language. Kindergarten and first grade are taught completely in the Navajo language, while English is incorporated into the program during third grade, when it is used for about 10% of instruction.[41]
Robert W. Young and William Morgan (Navajo), who both worked for the Navajo Agency of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, developed and published a practical orthography in 1937. It helped spread education among Navajo speakers.[20] In 1943 the men collaborated on The Navajo Language, a dictionary organized by the roots of the language.[21] In World War II, the United States military used speakers of Navajo as code talkers– to transmit top-secret military messages over telephone and radio in a code based on Navajo. The language was considered ideal because of its grammar, which differs strongly from that of German and Japanese, and because no published Navajo dictionaries existed at the time.[22]
Blair, Robert W.; Simmons, Leon; & Witherspoon, Gary. (1969). Navaho Basic Course. Brigham Young University Printing Services. Goossen, Irvy W. (1967). Navajo made easier: A course in conversational Navajo. Flagstaff, AZ: Northland Press. Goossen, Irvy W. (1995). Diné bizaad: Speak, read, write Navajo. Flagstaff, AZ: Salina Bookshelf. ISBN0-9644189-1-6 Goossen, Irvy W. (1997). Diné bizaad: Sprechen, Lesen und Schreiben Sie Navajo. Loder, P. B. (transl.). Flagstaff, AZ: Salina Bookshelf. Haile, Berard. (1941–1948). Learning Navaho, (Vols. 1–4). St. Michaels, AZ: St. Michael's Mission. Platero, Paul R. (1986). Diné bizaad bee naadzo: A conversational Navajo text for secondary schools, colleges and adults. Farmington, NM: Navajo Preparatory School. Platero, Paul R.; Legah, Lorene; & Platero, Linda S. (1985). Diné bizaad bee naʼadzo: A Navajo language literacy and grammar text. Farmington, NM: Navajo Language Institute. Tapahonso, Luci, & Schick, Eleanor. (1995). Navajo ABC: A Diné alphabet book. New York: Macmillan Books for Young Readers. ISBN0-689-80316-8 Witherspoon, Gary. (1985). Diné Bizaad Bóhooʼaah for secondary schools, colleges, and adults. Farmington, NM: Navajo Language Institute. Witherspoon, Gary. (1986). Diné Bizaad Bóhooʼaah I: A conversational Navajo text for secondary schools, colleges and adults. Farmington, NM: Navajo Language Institute. Wilson, Alan. (1969). Breakthrough Navajo: An introductory course. Gallup, NM: The University of New Mexico, Gallup Branch. Wilson, Alan. (1970). Laughter, the Navajo way. Gallup, NM: The University of New Mexico at Gallup. Wilson, Alan. (1978). Speak Navajo: An intermediate text in communication. Gallup, NM: University of New Mexico, Gallup Branch. Wilson, Garth A. (1995). Conversational Navajo workbook: An introductory course for non-native speakers. Blanding, UT: Conversational Navajo Publications. ISBN0-938717-54-5. Yazzie, Sheldon A. (2005). Navajo for Beginners and Elementary Students. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Press. Yazzie, Evangeline Parsons, and Margaret Speas (2008). Diné Bizaad Bínáhoo'aah: Rediscovering the Navajo Language. Flagstaff, AZ: Salina Bookshelf, Inc. ISBN978-1-893354-73-9
The Navajo Nation operates Tséhootsooí Diné Bi'ólta', a Navajo language immersion school for grades K-8 in Fort Defiance, Arizona. Located on the Arizona-New Mexico border in the southeastern quarter of the Navajo Reservation, the school strives to revitalize Navajo among children of the Window Rock Unified School District. Tséhootsooí Diné Bi'ólta' has thirteen Navajo language teachers who instruct only in the Navajo language, and no English, while five English language teachers instruct in the English language. Kindergarten and first grade are taught completely in the Navajo language, while English is incorporated into the program during third grade, when it is used for about 10% of instruction.
In 1977, the Inuit Circumpolar Conference (ICC) meeting in Utqiagvik, Alaska, officially adopted Inuit as a designation for all circumpolar native peoples, regardless of their local view on an appropriate term. As a result, the Canadian government usage has replaced the (locally) defunct term Eskimo with "Inuit" ("Inuk" in singular). The preferred term in Canada's Central Arctic is "Inuinnaq", and in the eastern Canadian Arctic "Inuit". The language is often called "Inuktitut", though other local designations are also used. Despite the ICC's 1977 decision to adopt the term "Inuit", this was never accepted by the Yupik peoples, who likened it to calling all Native American Indians "Navajo" simply because the Navajo felt that that's what all tribes should be called.
The Navajo Nation operates Tséhootsooí Diné Bi'ólta', a Navajo language immersion school for grades K-8 in Fort Defiance, Arizona. Located on the Arizona-New Mexico border in the southeastern quarter of the Navajo Nation, the school strives to revitalize Navajo among children of the Window Rock Unified School District. Tséhootsooí Diné Bi'ólta' has thirteen Navajo language teachers who instruct only in the Navajo language, and no English, while five English language teachers instruct in the English language. Kindergarten and first grade are taught completely in the Navajo language, while English is incorporated into the program during third grade, when it is used for about 10% of instruction.[64]
As a linguist, Young worked primarily on programs related to analyzing and expanding documentation of the Navajo language, encouraging its written use, and education in the language. He collaborated with Navajo scholar William Morgan on all his major projects. From the 1940s through the 1950s, they produced a variety of reading materials in Navajo, and three "important works on lexicon and grammar." The first was a dictionary, "The Navajo Language" (1943), organized by root, as one of the principal elements in the verbs of the Athabaskan languages.
The men continued their work of analysis and documentation of Navajo; in 1980, 1987 they published "The Navajo Language: A Grammar and Colloquial Dictionary," representing "a huge increase in descriptive coverage" of the language. The 1987 edition included new appendices and grammar sections. It established itself as the major reference grammar of the Navajo language. Young, Morgan and Sally Midgette also produced the "Analytical Lexicon of Navajo" (1992), which re-organizes the lexicon by root, one of the principle elements in verbs and nouns of Athabaskan languages.
The NLA differs from such related organizations as the Navajo Nation Division of Diné Education, Diné College, and the Navajo Language Teachers Association in focusing on scientific research on the Navajo language and on teaching Navajo people, especially language teachers, how to carry out linguistic research and to use existing reference materials.
Both original and translated media have been produced in Navajo. The first works tended to be religious texts translated by missionaries, including the Bible. From 1943 to about 1957, the Navajo Agency of the BIA published Ádahooníłígíí ("Events"[34]), the first newspaper in Navajo and the only one to be written entirely in Navajo. It was edited by Robert W. Young and William Morgan, Sr. (Navajo). They had collaborated on The Navajo Language, a major language dictionary published that same year, and continued to work on studying and documenting the language in major works for the next few decades.[21] Today an AM radio station, KTNN, broadcasts in Navajo and English, with programming including music and NFL games;[35] AM station KNDN broadcasts only in Navajo.[36] When Super Bowl XXX was broadcast in Navajo in 1996, it was the first time a Super Bowl had been carried in a Native American language.[37] In 2013, the 1977 film Star Wars was translated into Navajo. It was the first major motion picture translated into any Native American language.[38][39]
The vast majority of Navajo vocabulary is of Athabaskan origin.[86] However, the vocabulary size is still fairly small; one estimate counted 6,245 noun bases and 9,000 verb bases, with most of these nouns being derived from verbs.[80] Prior to the European colonization of the Americas, Navajo did not borrow much from other languages, including from other Athabaskan and even Apachean languages. The Athabaskan family is fairly diverse in both phonology and morphology due to its languages' prolonged relative isolation.[86] Even the Pueblo peoples, with whom the Navajo interacted with for centuries and borrowed cultural customs, have lent few words to the Navajo language. After Spain and Mexico took over Navajo lands, the language did not incorporate many Spanish words, either.[87]
In February 1942, a civilian named Philip Johnston came up with the idea of using the Navajo language as military code. Johnston, a missionaries' son, grew up on a reservation and understood the complexity of the Navajo language. By September 1942, the American government had recruited several hundred Native Americans who spoke both Navajo and English to translate English words into the Navajo language to foil enemy understanding. Often working behind enemy lines, the code talkers were commended for their bravery and gained respect from fellow soldiers. Until its declassification in 1968, the code that these Navajo developed remains the only oral military code to never have been broken by an enemy.
Only in respect.
The code itself was composed of carefully selected Navajo words that used poetic circumlocution so that even a Navajo speaker would not be able to understand the communications without training. For example, there were no words in the Navajo language for military machines, weapons, or foreign countries, so these words were substituted with words that did exist in the Navajo language. For example, Britain was spoken as "between waters" (toh-ta), a dive bomber was a "chicken hawk" (gini), a grenade was a "potato" (ni-ma-si) and Germany was "iron hat" (besh-be-cha-he).
Navajo is most closely related to Western Apache, with which it shares a similar tonal scheme[10] and more than 92 percent of its vocabulary. It is estimated that the Apacheean linguistic groups separated and became established as distinct societies, of which the Navajo were one, somewhere between 1300 and 1525.[11] As a member of the Western Apachean group, Navajo's next closest relatives is the Mescalero-Chiricahua language.[12] Navajo is generally considered mutually intelligible with all other Apachean languages.[13]
According to the 2000 Census and other language surveys, the largest Native American language-speaking community by far is the Navajo. Navajo is an Athabaskan language of the Na-Dené family, with 178,000 speakers, primarily in the states of Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. Altogether, Navajo speakers make up more than 50% of all Native American language speakers in the United States. Western Apache, with 12,500 speakers, also mostly in Arizona, is closely related to Navajo but not mutually intelligible with it. Navajo and other Athabaskan languages in the Southwest are relative outliers; most other Athabascan languages are spoken in the Pacific Northwest and Alaska.
The Navajos are speakers of a Na-Dené Southern Athabaskan language known within the language as Diné bizaad (lit. 'People's language'). The language comprises two geographic, mutually intelligible dialects. The Apache language is closely related to the Navajo Language; the Navajos and Apaches are believed to have migrated from northwestern Canada and eastern Alaska, where the majority of Athabaskan speakers reside.[4] Speakers of various other Athabaskan languages located in Canada may still comprehend the Navajo language despite the geographic and linguistic deviation of the languages.[5] Additionally, some Navajos speak Navajo Sign Language, which is either a dialect or daughter of Plains Sign Talk, as well as some being speakers of Plains Sign Talk itself.[6]
Navajo is a "verb-heavy" language — it has a great preponderance of verbs but relatively few nouns. In addition to verbs and nouns, Navajo has other elements such as pronouns, clitics of various functions, demonstratives, numerals, postpositions, adverbs, and conjunctions, among others. Harry Hoijer grouped all of the above into a word-class he called "particles" (i.e., Navajo would then have verbs, nouns, and particles). Navajo has no separate words that correspond to the "adjectives" in English grammar: verbs provide the adjectival functionality.