Chumashan is an extinct and revitalizing family of languages that were spoken on the southern California coast by Native American Chumash people , from the Coastal plains and valleys of San Luis Obispo to Malibu , neighboring inland and Transverse Ranges valleys and canyons east to bordering the San Joaquin Valley , to three adjacent Channel Islands : San Miguel , Santa Rosa , and Santa Cruz .
9-487: The Chumashan languages may be, along with Yukian and perhaps languages of southern Baja California such as Waikuri , one of the oldest language families established in California, before the arrival of speakers of Penutian , Uto-Aztecan , and perhaps even Hokan languages . Chumashan, Yukian, and southern Baja languages are spoken in areas with long-established populations of a distinct physical type. The population in
18-411: A symmetrical six-vowel system. The distinctive high central vowel is written various ways, including <ɨ> "barred I," <ə> "schwa" and <ï> "I umlaut." Contemporary users of the languages favor /ɨ/ or /ə/ . Striking features of this system include The Central Chumash languages have a complex inventory of consonants. All of the consonants except / h / can be glottalized; all of
27-506: The 1770s and 1830s: Roland Dixon and Alfred L. Kroeber suggested that the Chumashan languages might be related to the neighboring Salinan in a Iskoman grouping. Edward Sapir accepted this speculation and included Iskoman in his classification of Hokan . More recently it has been noted that Salinan and Chumashan shared only one word, which the Chumashan languages probably borrowed from Salinan (the word for 'white clam shell', which
36-505: The Chumashan languages are now extinct or dormant, language revitalization programs are underway with four of these Chumashan languages. These languages are well-documented in the unpublished fieldnotes of linguist John Peabody Harrington . Especially well documented are Barbareño , Ineseño , and Ventureño . The last native speaker of a Chumashan language was Barbareño speaker Mary Yee , who died in 1965. Six Chumashan languages are attested , all now extinct. However, most of them are in
45-434: The core Chumashan area has been stable for the past 10,000 years. However, the attested range of Chumashan is recent (within a couple thousand years). There is internal evidence that Obispeño replaced a Hokan language and that Island Chumash mixed with a language very different from Chumashan; the islands were not in contact with the mainland until the introduction of plank canoes in the first millennium AD. Although some say
54-405: The form of the language spoken in the vicinity of each mission was distinct enough to qualify as a different language. There is very little documentation of Purisimeño. Ineseño, Barbareño and Ventureño each had several dialects, although documentation usually focused on just one. Island Chumash had different dialects on Santa Cruz Island and Santa Rosa Island , but all speakers were relocated to
63-468: The mainland in the early 19th century. John Peabody Harrington conducted fieldwork on all the above Chumashan languages, but obtained the least data on Island Chumash, Purisimeño, and Obispeño. There is no linguistic data on Cuyama, though ethnographic data suggests that it was likely Chumash (Interior Chumash). The languages are named after the local Franciscan Spanish missions in California where Chumashan speakers were relocated and aggregated between
72-399: The process of revitalization, with language programs and classes. Contemporary Chumash people now prefer to refer to their languages by native names rather than the older names based on the local missions. Obispeño was the most divergent Chumashan language. The Central Chumash languages include Purisimeño, Ineseño, Barbareño and Ventureño. There was a dialect continuum across this area, but
81-404: Was used as currency). As a result, the inclusion of Chumashan into Hokan is now disfavored by most specialists, and the consensus is that Chumashan has no identified linguistic relatives. The Chumashan languages are well known for their consonant harmony (regressive sibilant harmony). Mithun presents a scholarly synopsis of Chumashan linguistic structures. The Central Chumash languages all have
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