Tlingit (, ; , ) is an endangered language indigenous to Southeast Alaska and Western Canada spoken by the Tlingit people. It is generally agreed to form an independent branch of the Na-Dene language family. Although the number of speakers is declining, there are several revitalization and second-language programs in Southeast Alaska.
Missionaries of the Russian Orthodox Church were the first to develop a written version of Tlingit using the Cyrillic script. After the Alaska Purchase, Tlingit language use was suppressed by the United States government, though preservation programs were introduced beginning in the 20th century. Today, Tlingit is spoken natively by perhaps only 100 elders.
Tlingit's placement in the Na-Dene family has provoked much debate over the last century, with most scholars now considering it to form a separate branch in the phylum, the other being Eyak–Athabaskan (including Eyak and the Athabaskan languages). Tlingit has also attracted interest due to its unusual phonology, especially compared to Indo-European languages, and its morphological complexity.
History
The early history of Tlingit is poorly known, mostly because there was no written record until Robert de Lamanon collected numerals and five nouns during the La Pérouse expedition in 1786.Kinkade 1990, p. 98 in The language appears to have spread northward from the Ketchikan–Saxman area towards Icy Bay since certain conservative features are reduced gradually from south to north. In fact, Tlingit northerly expansion into Eyak and Athabaskan territories was still taking place during the time after European contact.de Laguna 1990, p. 203 in
The first Tlingit orthography and literacy program were created by the Russian Orthodox church during the Russian colonization of Alaska. However, following the 1867 purchase of Alaska by the United States, native languages were suppressed in favor of English language homogeneity and assimilation.Worl 1990, p. 151 in It was not until the mid-20th century that the language literacy movement would regain ground, but the total number of speakers continued to decline. Beginning in the late 20th century, revitalization and preservation programs were also introduced.
Classification Tlingit is currently classified as a distinct and separate branch of Na-Dene, an indigenous language family of North America. In 1915, Edward Sapir argued for its inclusion in the Na-Dene family, a claim that was subsequently debated by Franz Boas, P.E. Goddard, and many other prominent linguists of the time. Its inclusion in the family has proven controversial due to lack of common vocabulary despite shared phonological and grammatical features.
Studies in the late 20th century by Heinz-Jürgen Pinnow and Michael E. Krauss showed a strong connection to Eyak and hence to the Athabaskan languages, which led to consensus among American linguists that the Na-Dene family included Tlingit. Jeff Leer has proposed that the seeming lack of shared vocabulary between Tlingit and the Athabaskan languages can be explained by a process of hybridization within Tlingit.
Sapir initially proposed a connection between Tlingit and Haida, but the debate over Na-Dene gradually excluded Haida from the discussion. Haida is now considered an isolate, with some borrowing from its long proximity with Tlingit. However, some contemporary linguists still hold that Haida is part of the Na-Dene family, such as John Enrico, a specialist in Haida.
The first proposal linking Na-Dene and thus Tlingit to the Yeniseian languages of Siberia was made by Italian linguist Alfredo Trombetti in 1923. In the early 2000s, Edward Vajda presented empirical evidence for the existence of this super family, Dene–Yeniseian. Although support for the hypothesis has not been universal, it has been called "the first demonstration of a plausible genealogical link between languages of Eurasia and languages of the Americas".
Geographic distribution The Tlingit language was traditionally spoken from near the mouth of the Copper River at Controller Bay down the open coast of the Gulf of Alaska and throughout almost all of the islands of the Alexander Archipelago in Southeast Alaska. It is characterized by about four distinct dialects, but they are mostly mutually intelligible, indicating relatively recent territorial expansion.Thompson and Kinkade, p. 31 in Almost all of the area where the Tlingit language is endemic is contained within the modern borders of Alaska. The exception is an area known as "Inland Tlingit" that extends up the Taku River and into northern British Columbia and the Yukon around Atlin Lake ( "Big Lake") and Teslin Lake ( < "Big Thread"), as well as around Tagish Lake near the Chilkoot Trail (). There is a small group of speakers (about 30) in Washington as well.
Use and revitalization efforts Tlingit is classified as critically endangered by UNESCO. In 2007, Golla reported a maximum population of 500 speakers in Alaska, and an additional 185 in Canada. The First Peoples' Cultural Council reported 2 fluent speakers in British Columbia out of an ethnic population of 400.Gessner, S., Herbert, T., Parker, A., Thorburn, B., & Wadsworth, A. (2014). Report on the status of B.C. First Nations languages, Second Edition, 2014, pp. 25, 43. First Peoples’ Cultural Council. Accessed 4 July 2025. James A. Crippen estimated in 2019 that between 100 and 200 people in the United States and Canada speak Tlingit as their native language, with the youngest of these over the age of 60.
Tlingit courses are available at the University of Alaska Southeast, taught in part by Lance Twitchell. In 2022, the university began offering these classes for free. Classes offered at a post-secondary level have produced several fluent L2 (second-language) speakers. The Alaska state legislature recognized Tlingit as an official language of Alaska in April 2014 when it passed bill HB 216, lending support to language revitalization.
Dialects Tlingit is divided into roughly four major dialects, all of which are mutually intelligible:
The Northern dialect is spoken in a vast area south from Yakutat () and Lituya Bay () to Angoon () and Sitka (), also covering the area around Hoonah () and Juneau (). The Inland Tlingit dialect, a subdialect of Northern, is spoken in Canada around Atlin Lake and Teslin Lake. The Transitional dialect, having features "in-between" those of the Northern and Southern dialects, was historically spoken in and around Kake ( 'Daylight'), and Wrangell ( ''s Little Lake'). The Southern subdialects of Sanya () and Heinya () are spoken from Sumner Strait south to the Alaska-Canada border, excepting the southern end of Prince of Wales Island, which is the land of the Kaigani Haida (). Tongass Tlingit, the most divergent of the dialects, was once spoken south of Ketchikan () to the Portland Canal, but died in the 1990s.
Most dialects of Tlingit can be classified into two-tone (Northern and Transitional) and three-tone (Southern) systems. Tongass Tlingit, however, has no tone, but rather a four-way register contrast between short, long, glottalized, and "fading" vowels. (In the last type, the onset of the vowel is articulated normally but the release is murmured, essentially a rapid opening of the glottis once articulation is begun, resulting in fading of volume and pitch.)
Jeff Leer has shown that the Tongass vowel system can directly derive the tonal features other dialects, so Krauss has supported the conclusion that the register contrast in Tongass gave rise to the tonal systems. Additionally, the Tongass system is quite similar to both systems of vowel modifications for Eyak and the one reconstructed for Proto-Athabaskan, suggesting that they retained features from Proto-Na-Dene which instead developed into tonal systems in most of the Athabaskan languages and the other dialects of Tlingit.
Phonology
Tlingit has a complex phonological system compared to Indo-European languages such as English or Spanish. It has an almost complete series of ejective consonants accompanying its stop, fricative, and affricate consonants. The only missing consonant in the Tlingit ejective series is . The phonology is also typologically unusual because it has several laterals but no voiced nor labials in most dialects, except for and in recent English loanwords.
Consonants The consonants in the table are given in the IPA, with the popular orthography equivalents in brackets. Dialectal, obsolete, and marginal consonants are given in parentheses.
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center" |+ Tlingit Consonants |- ! rowspan=2 colspan=2| ! rowspan=2 | Labial ! colspan=3 | Alveolar ! rowspan=2 | Postalv./Palatal ! colspan=2 | Velar ! colspan=2 | Uvular ! colspan=2 | Glottal
! plain || sibilant || lateral ! plain || labial ! plain || labial ! plain || labial |- ! rowspan=3 | Plosive/Affricate ! tenuis
| () |- ! aspirated
! ejective
! rowspan=2 | Fricative ! tenuis
| () |- ! ejective
! colspan=2 | Sonorant | ()
| ()
| ()
Phonetic analysis shows that all Tlingit word final non-ejective stops are unaspirated. This analysis also has phonological basis, as words with final non-ejective stops that are suffixed with vowels maintain a non-aspirated pronunciation. This is reflected by the orthography, which uses the graphemes for unaspirated sounds, , when a vowel is suffixed. For example, ('root') becomes ('my root').
Phonetic analysis also shows that the ejective fricatives in Tlingit are in fact true ejectives, with complete closure of the glottis before frication begins and the larynx raising in the same manner as with ejective stops. This contrasts with common analyses in some other languages with ejective fricatives, which considers them a sequence of fricative and glottal stop.
Vowels
Tlingit has eight phonemic vowels, four of these distinguished formally by length. However, shorter vowels are typically also pronounced more centralized, or less tense. + Tlingit Vowels Tense/Long Lax/Short front back front back close non-close
Word onset is always consonantal in Tlingit. Thus, in order to avoid a word starting with a vowel, an initial vowel is always preceded by either or . The former is most common, while the latter occurs in conjunction with the prefix . For example:
But when the perfective prefix is word-initial, the glottal stop appears to ensure that the word begins with a consonant.
In contrast, when prefixed with , the same verbal root (, 'hot') becomes rather than * .
Tone Tone is contrastive in all dialects of Tlingit but Tongass. In the Northern and Transitional dialects, there are high and low tones, and in the Southern dialect there is an additional falling tone. Rather than tone, Tongass Tlingit has a register system of vowel phonation and glottalization that corresponds to the tone systems of other dialects. An illustration of some of these correspondences can be seen below.
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align: center" |- ! colspan=3| Tongass register ! colspan=3| Southern tone ! colspan=3| Northern tone ! rowspan=2| Example translation |- ! || || ! || || ! || || |- | V | short | | V́ | high tone | | V́ | high tone | | 'head' |- | VV | long | | V́V | long high tone | | V́V | long high tone | | 'woman' |- | VV' | long glottalized | | V̂V | long falling tone | | V́V | long high tone | | 'man' |- | VV` | long fading | | V̀V | long low tone | | V̀V | long low tone | | 'land'
Writing system
The very first instance of written Tlingit is from the La Pérouse expedition in 1786, where for example, ('one') was transcribed as "". A more formal orthography based on the Cyrillic alphabet was created by the Russians during their colonization of Alaska. However, after Alaska was acquired by the United States, native language literacy was discouraged, and until the latter half of the 20th century, Tlingit was only written by linguists.