Native American Languages as Heritage Mother Tongues

Abstract

This article examines current efforts to revitalise, stabilise, and maintain Indigenous languages in the USA. Most Native American languages are no longer acquired as a first language by children. They are nonetheless languages of identity and heritage, and in this sense can and should be considered mother tongues. The article begins with a discussion of the concept of heritage mother tongues. This is followed by an overview of the present status of Native American languages, the historical and ideological bases of Native American language shift, and the policy framework for current language reclamation efforts. I then discuss four cases of grass-roots or ‘bottom up’ language planning that illustrate the ways in which Native American communities are working around and through historical and institutional constraints to reclaim and maintain their heritage mother tongues. I conclude with a reflection on the challenges and possibilities these efforts raise, their significance as part of a global language rights movement, and their potential to strengthen linguistic and cultural diversity in the USA.

Keywords:

• Native American/Indigenous languages
• language endangerment
• language revitalisation
• language planning and policy

Acknowledgements

I thank Professor Harold Schiffman of the University of Pennsylvania for graciously reviewing and commenting on an earlier draft of this article, and Professor Norvin Richards of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for his very helpful feedback on the Wôpanâak Language Revitalisation Project. I am indebted to Editor Eoghan MacAogain for his attentive editing. Any errors are my own.

Notes

Schiffman's (1998: 1) translation of Herder's work bears remarkable resemblance to the Native American discourses cited here: ‘Maternal language was our first world, it conveyed the first sensations that we felt….all is thus perpetuated, and language becomes a stock’. In another parallel to Native American discourses, Schiffman notes the life-giving properties of the spoken word in the Judeo-Christian tradition, in which God speaks the world into existence (Book of Genesis, ch. 1: 3) (H. Schiffman, personal communication, 27–28 July 2007; see also Schiffman, 1996: ch. 3).

Tribal sovereignty is complex, as political incorporation into the USA has been different for American Indians, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians, and among American Indian tribes themselves. The sovereignty of some tribes is recognised by states but not by the federal government; some tribes are not recognised either by states or the federal government. Native Hawaiians, whose internationally recognised sovereign kingdom was illegally overthrown by the US government in 1893 and who were officially incorporated into the USA upon Hawaiian statehood in 1959, are still fighting for federal recognition, although the US Congress acknowledged the illegality of the takeover in the 1993 Hawaii Apology Act (US Congress, 1993). The experience of Alaska Natives is different still. Nevertheless, all Native American share a distinct status as Indigenous peoples, which entails sovereignty and a singular legal–political relationship with the US government.