Miwok languages

Miwok
Miw·yk
Ethnicity:	Miwok
Geographic distribution:	California, western slopes of Sierra Nevada
Linguistic classification:	Yok-Utian Utian Miwok
Glottolog:	miwo1275[1]

The Miwok or Miwokan languages (/ˈmiːwɒk/;^[2] Miwok: [míwːɨːk]), also known as Moquelumnan, are a group of endangered languages spoken in central California in the Sierra Nevada. There are five somewhat diverse Miwok languages, two of which have distinct regional dialects (Sierra Miwok and Coast Miwok).^[3] 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 we get the name Yosemite.^[4]

Languages

1925 map of the Plains and Sierra Miwok territories

• Eastern Miwok
  • Plains Miwok (†)
  • Bay Miwok (AKA Saclan) (†)
  • Sierra Miwok
    • Northern Sierra Miwok (†)
    • Central Sierra Miwok (nearly extinct)
    • Southern Sierra Miwok (nearly extinct)
• Western Miwok
  • Coast Miwok (†) (Bodega and Marin dialects)
  • Lake Miwok (†)

Notes

1. Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2016). "Miwokan". Glottolog 2.7. Jena: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
2. Laurie Bauer, 2007, The Linguistics Student’s Handbook, Edinburgh
3. Golla, Victor (2011). California Indian Languages. University of California, Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 156.
4. "Origin of the word Yosemite (and linked references)". Yosemite.ca.us. 2011-07-10. Retrieved 2013-12-28.

References

• Broadbent, Sylvia. (1964). The Southern Sierra Miwok Language. University of California publications in linguistics (Vol. 38). Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Broadbent, Sylvia M., and Catherine A. Callaghan. "Comparative Miwok: A Preliminary Survey." International Journal of American Linguistics, vol. 26, no. 4 (1960): 301-316.
• Broadbent, Sylvia M., and Harvey Pitkin. "A Comparison of Miwok and Wintun." In Studies in Californian Linguistics, ed. W. Bright, 19-45. University of California Publications in Linguistics, vol. 34. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1964.
• Keeling, Richard. "Ethnographic Field Recordings at Lowie Museum of Anthropology," 1985. Robert H. Lowie Museum of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley. v. 2. North-Central California: Pomo, Wintun, Nomlaki, Patwin, Coast Miwok, and Lake Miwok Indians

External links

• Miwok language keyboards, Languagegeek