Native American Languages, Legal Support for

Several federal laws enacted since the late 1960s support the Native American interest in strengthening and continuing to develop Native American languages. Such laws have provided limited financial assistance as well as a change in federal policy regarding indigenous languages. They have proven useful in the various American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian efforts to teach students in their languages. This entry reviews some of the advocacy efforts to create legislative protection and encouragement for native-language retention.

Historically, the indigenous peoples of North America recognized, as a necessary requirement of trade and other intergroup activity, that the learning and use of other languages were important skills to develop. Examples of this understanding are evident in the development of the Chinook Jargon (used among the Indian Tribes in the Pacific Northwest and Southeast Alaska, and with early Europeans) and in that many native peoples spoke more than one tribal or indigenous language.

As different Native American groups encountered early explorers and settlers from the European nations, they also began to learn those languages. The degree to which this happened depended upon the level and quality of direct contact among Native Americans, early explorers, fur traders, whalers, and missionaries. In addition, as the traditional educational systems of the different native groups were replaced by the more formal schools of the settlers, European languages were introduced in these schools, indigenous languages were dropped, partly because these new trainers and teachers did not know the native language and partly because of a general belief that continued use of indigenous languages would limit the acquisition of English in school, or simply that Indian languages had little or no value for joining the emerging American society.

The level of contact with the Russians, the Spanish, the French, the English, and later the European Americans, or in some cases, governmental requirements for formal schooling, helped determine the speed by which native languages began to disappear. The stories of older relatives, formal governmental and church reports, and the literature on early schools indicate that the different tribal and indigenous groups had a mix of attitudes and experiences regarding the new and formal schools created by early European settlers and missionaries. In some cases, the experiences were positive; in many cases, those experiences were traumatic. A 1928 U.S. Senate report (the Meriam report) documented these experiences and was also the earliest comprehensive federally sponsored report promoting the use of American Indian languages as languages of instruction in schools, and supporting the continued use and development of those languages in the everyday lives of Indian peoples.