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Penutian is a proposed grouping of language families that includes many Native American languages of western North America, predominantly spoken at one time in British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and California. The existence of a Penutian stock or phylum has been the subject of debate among specialists. Even the unity of some of its component families has been disputed. Some of the problems in the comparative study of languages within the phylum are the result of their early extinction and limited documentation.
Yokuts, formerly known as Mariposa, is an endangered language spoken in the interior of Northern and Central California in and around the San Joaquin Valley by the Yokuts people. The speakers of Yokuts were severely affected by disease, missionaries, and the Gold Rush. While descendants of Yokuts speakers currently number in the thousands, most of the constituent dialects are now extinct.
Utian is a family of indigenous languages spoken in Northern California, United States. The Miwok and Ohlone peoples both spoke languages of the Utian language family. It has recently been argued that the Utian languages and Yokuts languages are sub-families of the Yok-Utian language family. Utian and Yokutsan have traditionally been considered part of the Penutian language phylum.
Wintuan is a family of languages spoken in the Sacramento Valley of central Northern California.
The Miwok or Miwokan languages, also known as Moquelumnan or Miwuk, are a group of endangered languages spoken in central California by the Miwok peoples, ranging from the Bay Area to the Sierra Nevada. There are seven Miwok languages, four of which have distinct regional dialects. There are a few dozen speakers of the three Sierra Miwok languages, and in 1994 there were two speakers of Lake Miwok. The best attested language is Southern Sierra Miwok, from which the name Yosemite originates. The name Miwok comes from the Northern Sierra Miwok word miw·yk meaning 'people' or 'Indians.'
The Yuki–Wappo or Yukian languages are a small language family of western California consisting of two distantly related languages, both now extinct.
Yok-Utian is a proposed language family of California. It consists of the Yokuts language and the Utian language family.
Stephen Powers (1840–1904) was an American journalist, ethnographer, and historian of Native American tribes in California. He traveled extensively to study and learn about their cultures, and wrote notable accounts of them. His articles were first published over a series of years in the Overland Monthly journal, but collected in The Tribes of California (1877) published by the US Geological Survey.
Klamath, also Klamath–Modoc and historically Lutuamian, is a Native American language spoken around Klamath Lake in what is now southern Oregon and northern California. It is the traditional language of the Klamath and Modoc peoples, each of whom spoke a dialect of the language. By 1998, only one native speaker remained, and by 2003, this last fluent Klamath speaker who was living in Chiloquin, Oregon, was 92 years old. As of 2006 there were no fluent native speakers of either the Klamath or Modoc dialects; however, as of 2019, revitalization efforts are underway with the goal of creating new speakers.
The Takic languages are a putative group of Uto-Aztecan languages historically spoken by a number of Indigenous peoples of Southern California. Takic is grouped with the Tubatulabal, Hopi, and Numic languages in the northern branch of the Uto-Aztecan family.
Tamcan or Tammukan was a local tribe of Delta Yokuts-speaking natives in the U.S. that once lived on the lower reaches of California's San Joaquin River in what is now eastern Contra Costa County and western San Joaquin County, California. The Tamcans were absorbed into the system of the Spanish missions in California in the early nineteenth century; they moved to Mission San José, near the shore of San Francisco Bay, between 1806 and 1811. At the mission, they and their descendants intermarried with speakers of the San Francisco Bay Ohlone, Plains Miwok, and Patwin Indian languages. Mission Indian survivors of these mixed groups gathered at Alisal, near Pleasanton in Contra Costa County, in the late nineteenth century.
The Ohlone languages, also known as Costanoan, are a small family of indigenous languages spoken by the Ohlone people. The pre-contact distribution of these languages ranged from the southern San Francisco Bay Area to northern Monterey County. Along with the Miwok languages, they are members of the Utian language family. The most recent work suggests that Ohlone, Miwok, and Yokuts are branches of a Yok-Utian language family.
Palewyami, also known as Altinin and Poso Creek Yokuts, was a Yokuts dialect of California.
Victor Golla (1939–2021) was a linguist and a leading expert on the indigenous languages of California and Oregon, especially the Pacific Coast Athabaskan subgroup of the Athabaskan language family and the languages of the region that belong to the Penutian phylum. He was emeritus professor of anthropology at Humboldt State University and lived in Trinidad, California.
Tulamni was a dialect of the Buena Vista Yokuts language spoken by the Yokuts around Buena Vista Lake, California.
Choynimni is a dialect of Kings River Yokuts historically spoken along the Kings River between Sanger and Mill Creek. The language is the best documented dialect of Kings River Yokuts.
Hometwoli was a dialect of Buena Vista Yokuts spoken in the southern portion of the Tulare Basin of California near Kern Lake.
Northern Valley Yokuts is a dialect network within the Valley Yokuts division of the Yokutsan languages spoken in the Central Valley of California. Among the languages belonging to the network are Chawchila, Nopṭinṭe, Kechayi, Dumna, Dalinchi, Toltichi, and Chukchansi. Of these, Kechayi, Dumna, Dalinchi, Toltichi, and Chukchansi are frequently grouped under the label Northern Hill dialects.
Yawelmani Yokuts is an endangered dialect of Southern Valley Yokuts historically spoken by the Yokuts living along the Kern River north of Kern Lake in the Central Valley of California. Today, most Yawelmani speakers live on or near the Tule River Reservation.
Delta Yokuts also termed Far Northern Valley Yokuts is an extinct dialect network of Valley Yokuts, an indigenous Yokutsan language of California. Delta Yokuts dialects were spoken from directly northeast of modern Stockton to the confluence of the Merced and San Joaquin rivers near modern Hills Ferry.
References
- ↑ Golla, Victor (2011-08-02). California Indian Languages. University of California Press. ISBN 9780520266674.
- ↑ Whistler, Kenneth W.; Golla, Victor (1986). "Proto-Yokuts Reconsidered". International Journal of American Linguistics. 52 (4): 317–358. doi:10.1086/466028. ISSN 0020-7071. JSTOR 1265536. S2CID 144822697.
 Yokuts nation | |||||
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| People |
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| History and geography | |||||
| Languages & subtribes | Yokuts language (Proto-Yokuts • Yok-Utian languages) • Buena Vista Yokuts • Chukchansi dialect • Delta Yokuts • Gashowu Yokuts • Hometwoli dialect • Kings River Yokuts • Northern Valley Yokuts • Palewyami Yokuts • Southern Valley Yokuts • Tulamni • Tule-Kaweah Yokuts • Valley Yokuts • Yawdanchi dialect | ||||
| Culture & spirituality | |||||
| Reservations and rancherías | |||||