Siraya update

[James Crippen]

On Fri, May 15, 2009 at 10:20, William J Poser <wjposer at ldc.upenn.edu> wrote:
> Heather,
>
> I think that multilingualism was actually rather common in early times
> in North America. Here in BC, for example, the Ulkatcho Carrier were
> until recently bilingual in Nuxalk (Bella Coola). There is still a
> large joint use area. Many Ulkatcho people can still speak or understand
> Chilcotin even now. (The reason that Ulkatcho people are no longer
> bilingual in Nuxalk is that hardly anybody speaks Nuxalk anymore.)
>
> Similarly, speakers of Carrier proper from the Northwest end of
> Stuart Lake also speak Babine, the neighboring language.

Despite being a very large and powerful society, meaning that they
would expect their neighbors to learn their language and not the other
way around, Tlingit people historically were very often fluent in a
number of languages. I have one friend whose grandparents were
bilingual in Tlingit and Tahltan, and who spoke Alaskan Haida, Coast
Tsimshian, and Chinook Jargon in addition. Many Tahltan people up the
Stikine River were bilingual in Tlingit because of intermarriage with
Tlingit clans from Wrangell.

Up until the early 20th century many if not most Tlingit people on the
northern end of the territory around Yakutat were bilingual in Eyak,
Southern Tutchone, or Ahtna, depending on their clan's history. The
Inland Tlingit who live around Carcross in the Yukon were
traditionally bilingual in Tagish, and indeed at some point there were
probably no monolingual speakers of Tagish because the group ended up
completely merged with the Inland Tlingit people, just like what
nearly happened to the Eyak.

There was also a sizable population of Tlingit people who moved down
to Victoria in British Columbia during the late 19th century, and
these people maintained bilingualism in Tlingit along with whichever
Salishan or Wakashan language was spoken by the families they married
into. Tlingit was prestigious, even though there weren't many people
to speak it to. George Hunt was a famous exemplar, being bilingual in
Tlingit and Kwakwaka'wakw (Kwakiutl), who went on to be an interpreter
for Franz Boas.

The Tlingit have a huge, relatively empty territory in comparison to
some parts of North America, but despite this multilingualism was
common. In areas where the languages are packed together like sardines
in a can, such as on the coasts of Oregon, Washington and southern
British Columbia, it's inconceivable that people *didn't* know the
language of their neighbors who lived a half-day's hike or paddle over
in the next valley.

In the far north of Alaska, basically any Athabaskan community whose
territory bounded that of the Inupiat and Yupik people would have at
least a few people in the village who were bilingual. And many
Athabaskan groups were known for having bilinguals who spoke a
neighboring Athabaskan language as well. People would intentionally
raise bilingual children because they could become interpreters in
trade negotiations, and hence become more affluent and powerful in the
community.

Phil Cash Cash himself has talked about the multilingualism of
ceremonies among the Nez Perce people, where they speak Cayuse,
Sahaptin, Nez Perce, and English all in a highly structured format.

So I would go farther than Bill Poser's statement and assert that
multilingualism was the norm in much (most?) of North America before
colonization. It still is the norm in some places, although now the
outside language for bilinguals is often English, French, or Spanish
rather than the language of some neighboring group.

Cheers,
James