Origins of the Amerindians

Variations in Indian languages

Games and entertainment

Social and political organization

American Indian Culture areas

Spirituality

Conclusion

Bibliography

B. VARIATIONS IN INDIAN LANGUAGES

One of the most significant facts in American ethnology is the great diversity of languages. The differences in language were indeed great enough to hamper understanding between two neighboring communities and the fact that two languages or dialects were placed in the same language family did not mean that persons speaking one of these dialects could understand the other dialect. Consequently those variations also emphasized the separation of Indians into small groups.

Linguists’ estimations greatly differ but it is generally thought that Native Americans had developed more than 500 mutually incomprehensible well-marked dialects belonging to many different languages. "The languages of the same primary stock were probably related historically and they might even have descended from a common language"¹. Unfortunately scholars have not yet been able to trace in detail the lines of descent or to locate the region in which any ancestral language originated.

Scholars also differ in proposing a comprehensive classification of the Indian languages. They attempted to group tribes with markedly similar vocabularies into language families and then named each language family by selecting the native name of a major group. So doing, some linguists have suggested the reduction of North American Indian languages to six primary stocks. These are Eskimo and Aleut (Far North), Algonquian and related languages (spoken by many tribes of the Eastern Woodlands, the Blackfeet and Cheyenne of the Plains, and various tribes of the Far West), Athabascan and related languages (used by all the tribes of the Mackenzie-Yukon Basin, by the Navajos, and by some west coast peoples), Uto-Aztecan and related languages (of the Shoshonean tribes in the Great Basin and Rocky Mountains area, the Kiowas of the Plains, the majority of the Pueblos), Chinookan and related languages (spoken by a number of scattered Far Western tribes, especially in Oregon and Washington), Siouan and related languages (including the tongues of such widely separated peoples as the Iroquois of the northeast, the Creeks and their neighbors in the southeast, the Sioux and Caddos of the Plains, the Keresan Pueblos, and the Pomos of northern California).

To facilitate intertribal communication, people in small tribes throughout the same region often spoke not only their native language but also the languages of the more important tribes with whom they had frequent contact. In various cases, this language served as a lingua franca for a multilingual region. From the same necessity they have developed certain notable trade jargons (pidgin). Those traders’ languages were simplified and based upon some dominant language, with additions from many others, including European ones, all combined to give birth to a common standard. Among these was the "Chinook jargon" of the Columbia and adjacent territories of the Pacific coast based upon the extinct Chinook language. To these must be added the noted "sign language" of the Great Plains, a gesture code, which suited the needs of ordinary intertribal intercourse. They could communicate much information with hand gestures besides the fact that some of these were so graphic that people who did not know the signs could easily understand them.

Indians had no written language. They managed, however, to perpetuate traditions of events which were of paramount importance as well as many folktales by passing them on by word of mouth. In this oral literature, some tales were handed down from tribe to tribe giving way to many similar tales shared by various communities but translated into many tongues. Some North American tribes developed a type of hieroglyphics to preserve certain texts, transmit ideas and help aid memory though. Nevertheless, Indian culture was primarily oral, with a high value placed on the recounting of tales and dreams.

Logically enough, Indian languages might employ sounds not used in English while lacking sounds common in that language. To illustrate this, at the time of great racial mixings in the 1600s, children who had been christianized were most of the time given Anglo-Saxon (Christian) names by White settlers who could not pronounce Indian names. In the same way, Indian grammatical structures are known to be intricate and often differ from those of English. Grammatical traits, sound systems, and word formation often varied from family to family, but families in a given region often influenced one another. From the grammatical point of view, unlike most European languages, Indians did not make a clear distinction between objects and actions and often expressed them with a single word. Therefore, in many Indian tongues, the ideas conveyed in a whole sentence in English could frequently be included in one word. "This type of language in which elements are added to nouns to form new nouns is called an agglutinative language"². As regards to conjugation, Natives tended to use verbs in a different way, by dealing with duration, repetition instead of time. All Native American languages were almost in the same primitive stage of development, characterized by exact meanings and rich vocabularies. Therefore, the Cherokee, living in a country with plenty of wild fruits, had not just one word for grape, but a distinct descriptive term for each of the three varieties with which he was familiar. We can thus assert that the languages spoken by North American Indians were defined by minute exactness of description and nearly entire absence of broad classification, their vocabularies differing with the need for words to distinguish significant differences in meaning.

These differences handicapped White explorers who believed Native American languages were some kind of "primitive" speaking. In order to overcome communication difficulties, both Indians and White traders created trade jargons combining words from Indian and European languages. The White man also taught the Indians many words. These include the word "king". Unlike the White culture, Indian political authority was not based on royalty, indeed. That is why there were medicine men, war chief and many other kinds of leaders but never kings. This term was introduced by European Americans. In turn, the settlers adopted many Indian words, phrasal compounds and expressions related to the early encounters between the two nations. A great number of those terms remained in the English language. First of all, many American Indian words were taken over directly to describe indigenous flora and fauna (raccoon, for instance) and, naturally, geographic names (Massachusetts). Such phrasal compounds as "to bury the hatchet" (to end hostilities) or "to march in Indian file" (describing the usual Indian marching order) that commonly means forming a single line were also adapted and added to English. Finally, it is also important to note that Indians appeared to be particularly talented in coining names for articles brought over by White traders.

¹" Indians of the United States " Wissler, Clark - p.28
²The people - cultures in America - languages http://www.wsu.edu:8000/~dee/CULAMRCA/LANGUAGE.HTM