The Tongva language (also known as Gabrielino, Gabrieleño, or Kizh) is a dormant and reawakening Uto-Aztecan language spoken by the Tongva, a Native American people who have lived in and around modern-day Los Angeles for thousands of years. It has not been a language of everyday conversation since the 1940s. The Tongva people now speak English but a few are attempting to revive their language by using it in everyday conversation and ceremonial contexts. Presently, Tongva is also being used in language revitalization classes and in some public discussion regarding religious and environmental issues. Tongva is closely related to Serrano. The names of several cities and neighborhoods in Southern California are of Tongva origin, and include Pacoima, Tujunga, Topanga, Azusa, Cahuenga in Cahuenga Pass and Cucamonga in Rancho Cucamonga.
The last fluent native speakers of Tongva lived in the early 20th century. The language is primarily documented in the unpublished field notes of John Peabody Harrington made during that time. The "J.P. Harrington Project", developed by The Smithsonian through University of California, Davis, approximately 6,000 pages of his notes on the Tongva language, were coded for documentation by a Tongva member, who took three years to accomplish the task. Alleged native speakers of Tongva who have died as late as the 1970s have not been verified as having been fluent speakers.
The dwarf planet 50000 Quaoar was named after the Tongva creator god, also called Chinigchinix.
Language revitalization
The Gabrielino language is a subgroup of Takic, a subfamily of Uto-Aztecan, which is usually divided into three subgoups: Serrano-Kitanemuk, Gabrielino (including the Fernandeño dialect) and Cupan. As of 2012, members of the contemporary Tongva (Gabrieleño) tribal council are attempting to revive the language, by making use of written vocabularies, by comparison to better attested members of the Takic group to which Tongva belonged, and by offering classes.
In 2004, Pamela Munro, now UCLA emeritus professor of linguistics, was asked to serve as a linguistic mentor to Tongva people who wanted to learn about their language at the Breath of Life Workshop, a biennial event in Berkeley staged by the Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival. Since then, she has taught monthly Tongva language classes in which adults and children practice pronunciation, master the use of grammatical particles, sing songs and play word games. She calls her work "a reclamation effort" for the language. Munro has compiled a Tongva dictionary of over 1,000 words, and also maintains a Tongva language Facebook page to which she posts Tongva words, phrases and songs. According to Munro, there are no audio recordings of people speaking the Tongva language, but that there are a few scratched wax cylinder recordings of Tongva songs.
Phonology
Consonants The following is a list of the consonants and vowels of the Tongva language as used by the Tongva Language Committee, based on linguist Pamela Munro's interpretation of the fieldnotes of J. P. Harrington. In parentheses is the spelling of the specific sound. There are multiple orthographies for the Tongva language.
LabialAlveolarPalatalVelarLabio-velarGlottalNasalm n ng Stopvoiced(b )(d )(g )voicelessp t ch k kw ʼ Fricative(f )s sh x h Approximantv l y w Tapr Consonants are used in loanwords.
Vowels FrontCentralBackshortlongshortlongshortlongClosei ii u uu Mide ee o oo Open a aa
Morphology Tongva is an agglutinative language, where words use suffixes and multiple morphemes for a variety of purposes.
Vocabulary
Collected by C. Hart Merriam (1903) Source:McCawley, William. The First Angelinos: The Gabrielino Indians of Los Angeles. Malki Museum Press, 1996
(Merriam refers to them as the Tongvā)
Numbers Po-koo Wěh-hā Pah-hā Wah-chah Mah-har Pah-vah-hā Wah-chah-kav-e-ah Wa-ha's-wah-chah Mah-ha'hr-kav-e-ah Wa-hās-mah-hah'r Wa-hā's-mah-hah'r-koi-po-koo Wa-hā's-mah-hah'r-koi-wěh-hā
grizzly bear hoó-nahr hoon-nah (subject) hoon-rah (object)
black bear pí-yah-hó-naht
Collected by Dr. Oscar Loew (1875) Source: Numbers pu-guʼ ve-heʼ paʼ-hi va-tchaʼ mahaʼr pa-vaʼhe vatchaʼ-kabyaʼ vehesh-vatchaʼ mahar-kabyaʼ vehes-mahar puku-hurura vehe-hurura
bear unar
Collected by Alexander Taylor (1860) Source: Numbers po-koo wa-hay pa-hey wat-sa mahar pawahe wat-sa-kabiya wa-hish-watchsa mahar-cabearka wa-hish-mar
Taylor claims "they do not count farther than ten"
Collected by Charles Wilkes, USN (1838–1842) Source: Numbers pukū wehē pāhe watsā
bear hundr
Other sources desert fox: erowNative Languages of the Americas Pacoima = from the root word Pako enter, meaning the entrance Tujunga = from the root word old woman tux'uu Tujunga means Mountains of Health according to long-time residents. Azusa = from the word -shuuk 'Ashuuksanga = his grandmother
The Lord's Prayer Source:
The Lord's Prayer is called ʼEyoonak in Tongva. The following text was derived from old Mission records.
Toponymy The table below gives the names of various missions in the Tongva language.Munro, Pamela, et al. Yaara' Shiraaw'ax 'Eyooshiraaw'a. Now You're Speaking Our Language: Gabrielino/Tongva/Fernandeño. Lulu.com: 2008.
English Tongva Los Angeles Yaa San Bernardino Wa'aach San Gabriel Shevaa San Pedro Chaaw Santa Ana Hotuuk Santa Monica Kecheek Santa Catalina Pemu
See also Cahuilla language Chumashan languages
References
External links Native-languages.org: Gabrieliño (Tongva) Language Gabrielino language — overview at the Survey of California and Other Indian Languages. The Limu Project — active in Native California languages revitalization. 2002 Tongva speech spoken at Cal Poly Pomona during the opening of a Tongva ethnobotanic garden; speech begins at 35:10. Keepers of Indigenous Ways: Tongva Language History & classes