While some Native American languages are at risk of extinction, Navajo continues to be used many people today. There are even a schools run by Navajo Nation that teach almost exclusively in this language. Navajo is part of the Athabaskan language family, which includes native languages from the Pacific Northwest and Alaska. The language is closely related to all Apachean languages and is mutually intelligible among them.
Today, Navajo Nation has a large reservation in the Four Corners region, with members of the tribe mostly found in Arizona and New Mexico. Many Navajo people consider their language to be a central aspect of their tribal identity and stay connected via Navajo-language newspaper and other media.
The Preservation of the Navajo Language
Part of the reason that Navajo remains one of the most widely spoken of the native American languages is the large amount of scholarly attention that it received. In 1937, the linguist Robert W. Young partnered with Navajo William Morgan to begin documenting the language in an orthography. The two later began publishing a newspaper in the Navajo language and created the first dictionary. In addition, they created a grammar book that some people still use today to learn Navajo as well as other resources that non-native speakers can use to become fluent.
Navajo has also played an interesting role in American history, and this has driven some of the attention that it has received. During World War II, Navajo was used as a code language to hide information from the Germans and Japanese. A civil engineer who was raised on a Navajo reservation suggested it, and the plan was enthusiastically embraced.
After all, no Navajo dictionaries existed at the time and the language had almost no grammatical ties to German or Japanese. Additionally, there was a large pool of fluent, native speakers who could code and decode messages quickly without additional, lengthy training. This coding system helped save valuable time during the war effort.
The Basics of Navajo Grammar, Vocabulary, and Writing
Learning Navajo can be daunting because it is an agglutinating language, which means that many different prefixes and suffixes can be added to the original word to refine meaning. However, this can result in single words that are quite long and therefore difficult for non-native speakers to parse. Nouns do not have gender and instead are divided into classes based on animacy that govern how they can interact grammatically.
This has led to the creation of fourth-person pronouns to account for interactions that would be grammatically unacceptable. Verbs are the heart of the Navajo system, and they are modified by prefixes that mark tense, aspect, mood, and grammatical role. Verbs get classified by physical characteristics and can only be used with certain types of objects. For example, there are 11 verbs meaning “to give” in Navajo depending on what type of object is being given.
In terms of vocabulary, Navajo does not readily borrow words from other languages. Instead, the language uses existing words to describe new concepts. Thus, instead of adopting the word telephone, Navajo uses a phrase that most literally means “instrument for talking.” This is another major barrier for learners, as virtually no vocabulary will be familiar.
The writing system can also be tricky to learn. Navajo had no formal writing system until a standardized alphabet was introduced in 1939. However, adoption of the writing system took a long time, and only recently has there been a concerted push to publish more in the language. The writing system is a modification of the Latin alphabet with accents added for unrepresented sounds, as well as to mark tone. Navajo uses four tones that change the meaning of words.
The Future of the Written and Spoken Language
Navajo is in a unique position; it has a growing number of speakers according to census data. This is largely due to efforts by the Navajo Nation to encourage its use in schools and push for incorporation of the language in all areas of life on reservations and in areas with high tribal populations. When the writing system was first standardized, many people did not trust it, either because they were so used to the language being unwritten or because they were afraid of English assimilation given the use of the Latin alphabet. However, with more people embracing the system and schools formally teaching it, literacy rates have skyrocketed and the demand for Navajo content is growing.
Today, Navajo fonts are readily available for producing content in the language. Films are being translated into Navajo and there are television channels and radio stations broadcasting in the language. With Navajo being a primary part of the tribal identity, it is exciting to think about the language’s continued growth. Not too long from now, we may start to see novels and other sorts of creative expression being published in Navajo as the primary language.