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129-588: The Navajo Nation ( Navajo : Naabeehó Bináhásdzo ), also known as Navajoland , is an Indian reservation of Navajo people in the United States. It occupies portions of northeastern Arizona , northwestern New Mexico , and southeastern Utah . The seat of government is located in Window Rock, Arizona . At roughly 17,544,500 acres (71,000 km; 27,413 sq mi), the Navajo Nation

258-449: A Super Bowl had been carried in a Native American language. In 2013, the 1977 film Star Wars was translated into Navajo. It was the first major motion picture translated into any Native American language. On October 5, 2018, an early beta of a Navajo course was released on Duolingo , a popular language learning app. After many Navajo schools were closed during World War II, a program aiming to provide education to Navajo children

387-535: A bosque means a river-bottom forest usually containing cottonwood trees). The march was very difficult and pushed many Navajos to their breaking point. Many began the walk exhausted and malnourished, others were not properly clothed and were not in the least prepared for such a long journey. They were also treated cruelly by the soldiers leading the march. They were never informed as to where they were going, why they were being relocated, or how long it would take to get there. One account passed through generations within

516-503: A glottalic initiation . Navajo also has a simple glottal stop used after vowels, and every word that would otherwise begin with a vowel is pronounced with an initial glottal stop. Consonant clusters are uncommon, aside from frequent placing /d/ or /t/ before fricatives . The language has four vowel qualities: /a/ , /e/ , /i/ , and /o/ . Each exists in both oral and nasalized forms, and can be either short or long. Navajo also distinguishes for tone between high and low, with

645-541: A root to identify the action and the semblance of a suffix to convey mode and aspect ; however, this suffix is fused beyond separability. The stem is given somewhat more transparent prefixes to indicate, in this order, the following information: postpositional object, postposition, adverb-state, iterativity , number , direct object , deictic information, another adverb-state, mode and aspect, subject, classifier (see later on), mirativity and two-tier evidentiality . Some of these prefixes may be null; for example, there

774-669: A scorched earth policy to starve the Navajo out of their traditional homeland and force them to surrender. By early 1864 thousands of Navajo began surrendering. Some Navajos refused and scattered to Navajo Mountain , the Grand Canyon , the territory of the Chiricahua Apache, and to parts of modern day Utah . Major General James H. Carleton was assigned to the New Mexico Territory in the fall of 1862, it

903-449: A subject–object–verb language. However, some speakers order the subject and object based on "noun ranking". In this system, nouns are ranked in three categories—humans, animals, and inanimate objects—and within these categories, nouns are ranked by strength, size, and intelligence. Whichever of the subject and object has a higher rank comes first. As a result, the agent of an action may be syntactically ambiguous. The highest rank position

1032-498: A "j" despite his personal objections. The Navajo refer to themselves as the Diné ('People'), with their language known as Diné bizaad ('People's language') or Naabeehó bizaad . Navajo is an Athabaskan language ; Navajo and Apache languages make up the southernmost branch of the family. Most of the other Athabaskan languages are located in Alaska, northwestern Canada, and along

1161-478: A band of Navajo freelancing raiding parties broke these rules, for which the entire tribe was penalized. In the eyes of Carleton, he was unsuccessful and enlisted outside resources for aid including famous mountain man Kit Carson. Carson also enlisted neighboring tribes in aiding his campaign to capture as many Navajos as he could. One tribe that proved to be most useful was the Utes. The Utes were very knowledgeable of

1290-702: A central encampment near the village of Cubero. In return they would be offered government protection. Ward was instructed to warn all Navajos who refused to come that they would be treated as enemies; many came. Evans was overseeing the abandonment of Fort Lyon and had been told that the new policy was that the Navajo had to be removed to settlements or pueblos , mentioning the region of the Little Colorado west of Zuni as possibly an ideal place. In November, some Navajo started raiding again. On December 1, Canby wrote to his superior in St. Louis that "recent occurrences in

1419-435: A code based on Navajo. The language was considered ideal because of its grammar, which differs strongly from that of German and Japanese , and because no published Navajo dictionaries existed at the time. By the 1960s, Indigenous languages of the United States had been declining in use for some time. Native American language use began to decline more quickly in this decade as paved roads were built and English-language radio

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1548-511: A company of 52 citizens led by Jose Manuel Sanchez drove off a bunch of Navajo horses, but Captain Wingate followed the trail and recovered them for the Navajo, who had killed Sanchez. Another group of settlers ravaged Navajo rancherias in the vicinity of Beautiful Mountain . Also, during this time, a party of Mexicans and Pueblo Indians captured 12 Navajo in a raid, and three were brought in. On August 9, 1861, Lt. Col. Manuel Antonio Chaves of

1677-484: A fairly high percentage overall but less than among other Americans speaking a different Native American language (85.4 percent). Navajo was the only Native American language afforded its own category in the survey; domestic Navajo speakers represented 46.4 percent of all domestic Native language speakers (only 195,407 Americans have a different home Native language). As of July 2014, Ethnologue classes Navajo as "6b" (In Trouble), signifying that few, but some, parents teach

1806-488: A fairly large phonemic inventory, including several consonants that are not found in English. Its four basic vowel qualities are distinguished for nasality , length , and tone . Navajo has both agglutinative and fusional elements: it uses affixes to modify verbs, and nouns are typically created from multiple morphemes, but in both cases these morphemes are fused irregularly and beyond easy recognition. Basic word order

1935-407: A gunshot from where they had been a short time ago. At least 200 died during the 18-day, 300-mile (500-km) trek. Between 8,000 and 9,000 people were settled on an area of 40 square miles (104 km ), with a peak population of 9,022 by the spring of 1865. There were as many as 50 groups taking one of seven known routes. They each took a different path but were on the same trail. When returning to

2064-399: A healthy speaker base, although this problem has been alleviated to some extent by extensive education programs in the Navajo Nation. In World War II, speakers of the Navajo language joined the military and developed a code for sending secret messages. These code talkers ' messages are widely credited with saving many lives and winning some of the most decisive battles in the war. Navajo has

2193-403: A major language dictionary published that same year, and continued to work on studying and documenting the language in major works for the next few decades. Today an AM radio station, KTNN , broadcasts in Navajo and English, with programming including music and NFL games; AM station KNDN broadcasts only in Navajo. When Super Bowl XXX was broadcast in Navajo in 1996, it was the first time

2322-585: A mediation-style process. While the people were held at Bosque Redondo, the U.S. Army handled severe crimes. Lesser crimes and disputes remained in the purview of the villages' chiefs. After the Navajo return from Bosque Redondo in 1868, listed criminal offenses were handled by the US Indian Agent of the Bureau of Indian Affairs with support of the U.S. Army, while lesser disputes remained under Navajo control. In 1892, BIA Agent David L. Shipley established

2451-531: A military word, code talkers used descriptive words. For example, the Navajo did not have a word for submarine , so they translated it as iron fish . These Navajo code talkers are widely recognized for their contributions to WWII. Major Howard Connor, 5th Marine Division Signal Officer stated, "Were it not for the Navajos, the Marines would never have taken Iwo Jima." Navajo lands were initially colonized by

2580-552: A people". The traditional Navajo homeland spans from Arizona through New Mexico . Navajo built houses, planted crops, and raised livestock there. Groups or bands raided and traded with each other, making and breaking treaties. This included interactions between the Navajo, Spanish , Mexican , Pueblos , Apache , Comanche , Ute , and later American settlers . Any of them could be victims of these conflicts and also instigate conflicts to pursue their interests. Hostilities escalated between American settlers and Navajos following

2709-483: A source of prestige. Also during this period, under the Indian Reorganization Act (IRA) of 1934, the federal government was encouraging tribes to revive their governments according to constitutional models shaped after that of the United States. Because of the outrage and discontent about the herd issues, the Navajo voters did not trust the language of the proposed initial constitution outlined in

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2838-531: A term used in many languages as an endonym . Among the Navajo populace, both terms are employed. In 2017, the Navajo Nation Council rejected legislation to change the name to "Diné Nation", citing potential "confusion and frustration among Navajo citizens and non-Navajos". In Navajo, the geographic entity with its legally defined borders is known as Naabeehó Bináhásdzo . This contrasts with Diné Bikéyah and Naabeehó Bikéyah for

2967-524: A trading post made a trip to DC to lobby for a reservation for this Band and it was granted. This Band is part Navajo and part Apache. The campaign to subdue the Navajo by the Army was supplemented by raids by New Mexican and Ute slavers who fell on isolated bands of Navajo, killing the men, taking the women and children captive, and capturing horses and livestock. During the army campaign the Ute scouts attached to

3096-413: A trait of fusional languages. In general, Navajo verbs contain more morphemes than nouns do (on average, 11 for verbs compared to 4–5 for nouns), but noun morphology is less transparent. Depending on the source, Navajo is either classified as a fusional agglutinative or even polysynthetic language, as it shows mechanisms from all three. In terms of basic word order , Navajo has been classified as

3225-561: A voluntary basis, at market rates, through this program if their tribe participated. Through March 2017, under the Tribal Nations Buy-Back Program, individual Navajo members received $ 104 million for purchase of their interests in land; 155,503 acres were returned to the Navajo Nation for its territory by the Department of Interior under this program. In the traditional Navajo culture, local leadership

3354-557: Is subject–object–verb , though it is highly flexible to pragmatic factors. Verbs are conjugated for aspect and mood , and given affixes for the person and number of both subjects and objects , as well as a host of other variables. The language's orthography , which was developed in the late 1930s, is based on the Latin script . Most Navajo vocabulary is Athabaskan in origin, as the language has been conservative with loanwords due to its highly complex noun morphology. The word Navajo

3483-526: Is an exonym : it comes from the Tewa word Navahu , which combines the roots nava ('field') and hu ('valley') to mean 'large field'. It was borrowed into Spanish to refer to an area of present-day northwestern New Mexico , and later into English for the Navajo tribe and their language. The alternative spelling Navaho is considered antiquated; even the anthropologist Berard Haile spelled it with

3612-689: Is available on the Navajo Nation Office of Legislative Services, as well as a section for amendments beginning from January 2014 to December 2022. There is a map that outlines the boundaries of the Navajo Nation, available on the Navajo Land Department's Website. Also, see Dine Land Use's website for the history of the Navajo Nation's land base. Lands within the boundaries of the Navajo Nation are composed of Public, Tribal Trust, Tribal Fee, Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Private, State, and BIA Indian Allotment Lands. Within

3741-399: Is called the "checkerboard area". It resulted in the loss of much Navajo land. In the southeastern area of the reservation, the Navajo Nation has purchased some ranches, which it refers to as its Nahata Dził , or New Lands. These lands are leased to Navajo individuals, livestock companies, and grazing associations. In 1996, Elouise Cobell ( Blackfeet ) filed a class action lawsuit against

3870-406: Is held by humans and lightning. Other linguists such as Eloise Jelinek consider Navajo to be a discourse configurational language , in which word order is not fixed by syntactic rules, but determined by pragmatic factors in the communicative context. In Navajo, verbs are the main elements of their sentences, imparting a large amount of information. The verb is based on a stem , which is made of

3999-558: Is mandatory: Béégashii cow sitį́. 3 . SUBJ -lie( 1 ). PERF Béégashii sitį́. cow 3.SUBJ-lie( 1 ).PERF 'The (one) cow lies.' Béégashii cow shitéézh. 3 . SUBJ -lie( 2 ). PERF Long Walk of the Navajo The Long Walk of the Navajo , also called the Long Walk to Bosque Redondo ( Spanish : larga caminata del navajo), was the deportation and ethnic cleansing of

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4128-534: Is most closely related to Western Apache , with which it shares a similar tonal scheme and more than 92 percent of its vocabulary, and to Chiricahua-Mescalero Apache . It is estimated that the Apachean linguistic groups separated and became established as distinct societies, of which the Navajo were one, somewhere between 1300 and 1525. Navajo is generally considered mutually intelligible with all other Apachean languages. The Apachean languages, of which Navajo

4257-533: Is one, are thought to have arrived in the American Southwest from the north by 1500, probably passing through Alberta and Wyoming. Archaeological finds considered to be proto-Navajo have been located in the far northern New Mexico around the La Plata, Animas and Pine rivers, dating to around 1500. In 1936, linguist Edward Sapir showed how the arrival of the Navajo people in the new arid climate among

4386-405: Is only a plural marker ( da/daa ) and no readily identifiable marker for the other grammatical numbers. Navajo does not distinguish strict tense per se; instead, an action's position in time is conveyed through mode, aspect, but also via time adverbials or context. Each verb has an inherent aspect and can be conjugated in up to seven modes. For any verb, the usitative and iterative modes share

4515-812: Is rooted in their clans and oral history. The clan system of the Diné is integral to their society. The system has rules of behavior that extend to the manner of refined culture that the Navajo people call "walking in beauty". The philosophy and clan system were established long before the Spanish colonial occupation of Dinétah, through to July 25, 1868, when Congress ratified the Navajo Treaty with President Andrew Johnson , signed by Barboncito , Armijo , and other chiefs and headmen present at Bosque Redondo , New Mexico. The Navajo people have continued to transform their conceptual understandings of government since signing

4644-399: Is that the sudden rise of xeroderma pigmentosum is directly related to widespread contamination from uranium mining. Navajo artist Richard K. Yazzie created a mural entitled Long Walk Home for the city of Gallup, New Mexico. It is located at the intersection of Third and Hill streets. It is rendered in the four "sacred colors", black, white, blue and yellow. A famous song was composed by

4773-421: Is the largest Indian reservation in the United States, exceeding that of ten U.S. states . It is one of the few reservations whose lands overlap the nation's traditional homelands. In 2010, the reservation was home to 173,667 out of 332,129 Navajo tribal members; the remaining 158,462 tribal members lived outside the reservation, in urban areas (26%), border towns (10%), and elsewhere in the U.S. (17%). In 2020,

4902-554: Is the marker of the Continuative aspect (to play about). Navajo distinguishes between the first, second, third, and fourth persons in the singular, dual, and plural numbers. The fourth person is similar to the third person, but is generally used for indefinite, theoretical actors rather than defined ones. Despite the potential for extreme verb complexity, only the mode/aspect, subject, classifier, and stem are absolutely necessary. Furthermore, Navajo negates clauses by surrounding

5031-499: Is then that he would subdue the Navajos of the region and force them on the long walk to Bosque Redondo. Upon being assigned the territory Carleton set boundaries in which the Navajos would not engage in any sort of conflict. They were prohibited from trespassing onto lands, raiding neighboring tribes, and engaging in warfare with both the Spaniards and European Americans. A majority of the Navajos were abiding by these requirements, but

5160-401: Is usually encoded directly in the verb through the use of various prefixes or aspects, though this is by no means mandatory. In the following example, the verb on the right is used with the plural prefix da- and switches to the distributive aspect. Some verbal roots encode number in their lexical definition (see classificatory verbs above). When available, the use of the correct verbal root

5289-399: The 37th parallel in the north; the southern border as a line running through Fort Defiance ; the eastern border as a line running through Fort Lyon ; and in the west as longitude 109° 30′. As drafted in 1868, the boundaries were defined as: the following district of country, to wit: bounded on the north by the 37th degree of north latitude, south by an east and west line passing through

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5418-524: The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) attempted to mitigate environmental damage due to over-grazing on reservations. Significant pushback was given by the Navajo, who did not feel that they had been sufficiently consulted before the measures were implemented. BIA Superintendent John Collier 's attempt to reduce livestock herd size affected responses to his other efforts to improve conditions for Native Americans. The herds had been central to Navajo culture, and were

5547-473: The Navajo people by the United States federal government and the United States army . Navajos were forced to walk from their land in western New Mexico Territory (modern-day Arizona and New Mexico ) to Bosque Redondo in eastern New Mexico . Some 53 different forced marches occurred between August 1864 and the end of 1866. In total, 10,000 Navajos and 500 Mescalero Apache were forced to

5676-541: The New Mexico Volunteer Militia took command of a garrison of three companies numbering 8 officers and 206 men at Fort Fauntleroy . Chaves was later accused of holding back supplies intended for the 1,000 or more Navajos who had remained close to the fort and was maintaining only lax discipline. Horse races began on September 10 and continued into the late afternoon of September 13. Col. Chaves permitted Post Sutler A. W. Kavanaugh to supply liquor to

5805-605: The Spanish in the early seventeenth century, shortly after this area was annexed as part of the Spanish viceroyalty of New Spain . When the United States annexed these territories in 1848 following the Mexican–American War , the English-speaking settlers allowed Navajo children to attend their schools. In some cases, the United States established separate schools for Navajo and other Native American children. In

5934-535: The "Navajo Nation", which is displayed on its seal. In 1994, the Tribal Council rejected a proposal to change the official designation from "Navajo" to "Diné" , a traditional name for the people. Some people said that Diné represented the people in their time of suffering before the Long Walk , and that Navajo is the appropriate designation for the future. In the Navajo language , Diné means "the People",

6063-629: The Arizona and Utah portions of the Navajo Nation, there are a few private and BIA Indian Allotments in comparison to New Mexico's portion, which consists of a checkerboard pattern of all the aforementioned lands. The Eastern Agency, as it is referred to, consists of primarily Tribal Fee, BIA Indian Allotments, and BLM Lands. Although there are more Tribal Fee Lands in New Mexico, the Navajo Nation government intends to convert most or all Tribal Fee Lands to Tribal Trust, which has some benefits according to

6192-542: The Arizona–New Mexico border in 1912, when the states were admitted to the union. Unlike many reservations in the U.S., it has since expanded several times since its formation, reaching its current boundaries in 1934. In English , the official name for the area was "Navajo Indian Reservation", as outlined in Article II of the 1868 Treaty of Bosque Redondo . On April 15, 1969, the tribe changed its official name to

6321-569: The Bosque Redondo. There was inept management of the supplies purchased for the reservation . The army spent as much as $ 1.5 million a year to feed the Native Americans. In 1868 the experiment—meant to be the first Indian reservation west of Indian Territory —was abandoned. A memorial site honoring those who were incarcerated at Bosque Redondo is located at Fort Sumner, New Mexico. The Treaty of Bosque Redondo between

6450-403: The Bureau of Indian Affairs. The Title II Amendment of 1989 established the Navajo Nation government as a three-part system (changes to the judicial branch had already begun in 1958). Two branches are independent of the council (where all government decision making was centralized before the change). The president and vice-president are elected every four years. The Executive nominates judges of

6579-803: The Confederates down the Rio Grande . The United States government again determined to eliminate Navajo raiding and raids on the Navajo. James H. Carleton was ordered to relieve Canby as Commander for the New Mexico Military Department in September ;1862. Carleton ordered Colonel Christopher "Kit" Carson to proceed to Navajo territory and to receive the Navajo surrender on July 20, 1863. When no Navajos showed up, Carson and another officer entered Navajo territory in an attempt to persuade Navajos to surrender and used

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6708-534: The District Courts, and the Supreme Court. The nation consists of several divisions, departments, offices, and programs as established by law. In 2006, a committee for a "Navajo Constitution" began advocating for a Navajo constitutional convention. The committee's goal was to have representation from every chapter on the Navajo Nation represented at a constitutional convention. The committee proposed

6837-660: The Intergovernmental Relations Committee of the council. As of 2006, 44 chapters were LGA certified. The Navajo Nation is divided into five agencies. The seat of government is located at the Navajo Governmental Campus in Window Rock/ Tségháhoodzání . These agencies are composed of several chapters each, and reflect the five Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) agencies created in the early formation of

6966-655: The Interior for Secretarial Review , through the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). Most conflicts and controversies between the federal government of the United States and the Nation are settled by negotiations outlined in political agreements. The Navajo Nation Code consists of codified rules and laws of the Navajo Nation. The Navajo Nation Code has 26 titles, covering subjects from the Navajo Nation Government to Commerce and Trade to Water. The 2010 version

7095-459: The Long Walk and were able to successfully increase the size of their reservation since then, to over 16 million acres (70,000 km ). After relating 20 pages of material concerning the Long Walk, Howard Gorman, age 73 at the time, concluded: As I have said, our ancestors were taken captive and driven to Hwéeldi for no reason at all. They were harmless people, and, even to date, we are

7224-489: The Navajo Agency of the Bureau of Indian Affairs , developed and published a practical orthography in 1937. It helped spread education among Navajo speakers. In 1943 the men collaborated on The Navajo Language , a dictionary organized by the roots of the language. In World War II , the United States military used speakers of Navajo as code talkers —to transmit top-secret military messages over telephone and radio in

7353-657: The Navajo Court of Indian Offenses and appointed judges. Previously, judicial authority was exercised by the Indian Agent. In 1950, the Navajo Tribal Council decided that judges should be elected. By the time of the judicial reorganization of 1958, the council had determined that, due to problems with delayed decisions and partisan politics, appointment was a better method of selecting judges. The president makes appointments, subject to confirmation by

7482-404: The Navajo Nation Council consisted of 88 representatives. The Navajo voted for the change in an effort to have a more efficient government and to curb tribal government corruption associated with council members who established secure seats. In 1927, agents of the U.S. federal government initiated a new form of local government entities called Chapters , modeled after jurisdictional governments in

7611-491: The Navajo Nation Council; however, the president is limited to the list of names vetted by the Judiciary Committee of the council. The current judicial system for the Navajo Nation was created by the Navajo Tribal Council on 16 October 1958. It established a separate branch of government, the "Judicial Branch of the Navajo Nation Government", which became effective 1 April 1959. The Navajo Court of Indian Offenses

7740-597: The Navajo Nation's flag by a dark-brown rectangle. As no physical boundaries or signposts were set in place, many Navajo ignored these formal boundaries and returned to where they had been living prior to the U.S. occupation. A significant number of Navajo had never lived in the Hwéeldi (near Fort Sumner). They remained or moved near the Little Colorado and Colorado rivers, on Naatsisʼáán ( Navajo Mountain ), and some lived with Apache bands. The first expansion of

7869-793: The Navajo Nation. The five agencies within the Navajo Nation are Chinle Agency in Chinle, Arizona; Eastern Navajo Agency in Crownpoint, New Mexico; Western Navajo Agency in Tuba City, Arizona ; Fort Defiance Agency in Fort Defiance, Arizona ; and Shiprock Agency in Shiprock, New Mexico . The BIA agencies provide various technical services under direction of the BIA's Navajo Area Office at Gallup, New Mexico . Agencies are divided into chapters as

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7998-683: The Navajo Tribal Court of Appeals. Subsequently, the Supreme Judicial Council was criticized for bringing politics directly into the judicial system and undermining "impartiality, fairness and equal protection". In December 1985, the Navajo Tribal Council passed the Judicial Reform Act of 1985, which eliminated the Supreme Judicial Council. It redefined the "Navajo Tribal Court of Appeals" as the "Navajo Nation Supreme Court", and redefined "Trial Courts of

8127-628: The Navajo Tribe" as "District Courts of the Navajo Nation". Navajo courts are governed by Title 7, "Courts and Procedures", of the Navajo Tribal Code. From 1988 to 2006, there were seven judicial districts and two satellite courts. As of 2010, there are ten judicial districts, centered respectively in Alamo (Alamo/Tó'hajiilee) , Aneth , Chinle , Crownpoint , Dilkon , Kayenta , Ramah , Shiprock , Tuba City and Window Rock . All of

8256-592: The Navajo country have so demoralized and broken up [the Navajo] nation that there is now no choice between their absolute extermination or their removal and colonization at points so remote...as to isolate them entirely from the inhabitants of the Territory. Aside from all considerations of humanity, the extermination of such a people will be the work of the greatest difficulty." By 1862, the Union Army had pushed

8385-477: The Navajo lands, they reformed their group to become one; this group was ten miles (16 km) long. Some of these Navajos escaped and hid with Apaches that were running from Gen. Crook on what is known as Cimmaron Mesa southeast of present-day NM Highway 6 and I-40; later they relocated to Alamo Springs northwest of Magdalena, NM and are known as the Alamo Band of the Diné (Navajos). Nelson Anthony Field who had

8514-409: The Navajo language to relay secret messages. At the end of the war the code remained unbroken. The code used Navajo words for each letter of the English alphabet. Messages could be encoded and decoded by using a simple substitution cipher where the ciphertext was the Navajo word. Type two code was informal and directly translated from English into Navajo. If there was no word in Navajo to describe

8643-523: The Navajo language, and no English, while five English language teachers instruct in the English language. Kindergarten and first grade are taught completely in the Navajo language, while English is incorporated into the program during third grade, when it is used for about 10% of instruction. According to the Navajo Nation Education Policies, the Navajo Tribal Council requests that schools teach both English and Navajo so that

8772-425: The Navajo when they were set free about their return to their homeland, Shí naashá (I am going) . A supposed remnant of the Long Walk from Bosque Redondo, a rug called Woven Sorrow, figures prominently as a valuable antique in the plot of The Shape Shifter by Tony Hillerman , published in 2006. Anne Hillerman mentioned the Long Walk in a subsequent novel in the series, Cave of Bones (2018). The story of

8901-467: The Navajo word for "corn" is naadą́ą́ʼ , derived from two Proto-Athabaskan roots meaning "enemy" and "food", suggesting that the Navajo originally considered corn to be "food of the enemy" when they first arrived among the Pueblo people. During World Wars I and II, the U.S. government employed speakers of the Navajo language as Navajo code talkers . These Navajo soldiers and sailors used a code based on

9030-469: The Navajos could not manufacture for themselves. The signers of the document were: W. T. Sherman (Lt. General), S. F. Tappan (Indian Peace Commissioner), Navajos Barboncito (Chief), Armijo, Delgado, Manuelito , Largo, Herrero, Chiquito, Muerte de Hombre, Hombro, Narbono, Narbono Segundo and Ganado Mucho. Those who attested the document included Theo H. Dodd (Indian Agent) and B. S. Roberts (General 3rd Cav). On June 18, 1868,

9159-473: The Navajos shows the attitude of the U.S. Army: It was said that those ancestors were on the Long Walk with their daughter, who was pregnant and about to give birth [...] the daughter got tired and weak and couldn't keep up with the others or go further because of her condition. So my ancestors asked the Army to hold up for a while and to let the woman give birth, but the soldiers wouldn't do it. They forced my people to move on, saying that they were getting behind

9288-521: The Navajos. A dispute emerged about which horse won a race. A shot rang out, followed by a fusillade. Almost immediately 200 Navajo, well-armed and mounted, advanced toward the Guard, shooting at the men. They were fired upon by the soldiers and scattered, leaving 12 dead and forty prisoners. On hearing this, General Canby demanded a report from Chaves, who did not comply. Canby sent Captain Andrew W. Evans to

9417-481: The Navajos. The Mescaleros and the Navajo had a long tradition of raiding each other; the two tribes had many disputes during their encampment. Furthermore, the initial plan was for around 5,000 people, nowhere near the 10,000 men, women, and children who eventually resided in the camp. Water and firewood were major issues from the start; the water was brackish, and the round grove of trees was quite small. Nature and humans both caused crop failures every year. The corn crop

9546-967: The North American Pacific coast. Most languages in the Athabaskan family have tones . However, this feature evolved independently in all subgroups; Proto-Athabaskan had no tones. In each case, tone evolved from glottalic consonants at the ends of morphemes; however, the progression of these consonants into tones has not been consistent, with some related morphemes being pronounced with high tones in some Athabaskan languages and low tones in others. It has been posited that Navajo and Chipewyan , which have no common ancestor more recent than Proto-Athabaskan and possess many pairs of corresponding but opposite tones, evolved from different dialects of Proto-Athabaskan that pronounced these glottalic consonants differently. Proto-Athabaskan diverged fully into separate languages c.  500 BC . Navajo

9675-473: The Treaty of 1868. Social, cultural, and political academics continue to debate the nature of modern Navajo governance and how it has evolved to include the systems and economies of the "western world". In the mid-19th century, primarily in the 1860s, most of the Navajo were forced to abandon their homes due to a series of military campaigns by the U.S. Army conducted with a scorched-earth policy and sanctioned by

9804-456: The Tribal Council to establish the current judicial, legislative, and executive model. This was a departure from the system of "Council and Chairmanship" from the previous government body. Conceptual additions were made to the language of Navajo Nation Code Title II, and the acts expanded the new government on April 1, 1990. Qualifications for the position of president include fluency in the Navajo language (this has seldom been enforced and in 2015

9933-470: The U.S. government. The Army burned their homes and agricultural fields, and stole or killed livestock, to weaken and starve the Navajo into submission. In 1864, the main body of Navajo, numbering 8,000 adults and children, were marched 300 miles (500 km) on the Long Walk to imprisonment in Bosque Redondo. The Treaty of 1868 established the "Navajo Indian Reservation" and the Navajo people left Bosque Redondo for this territory. The borders were defined as

10062-450: The US such as counties or townships. Each chapter elected officers and followed parliamentary procedures. By 1933, more than 100 chapters operated across the Navajo Nation. The chapters served as liaisons between the Navajo and the federal governments, respectively. They also acted as voting precincts for the election of tribal council delegates. They served as forums for local tribal leaders but

10191-447: The United States and many of the Navajo leaders was concluded at Fort Sumner on June 1, 1868. Some of the provisions included establishing a reservation, restrictions on raiding, a resident Indian Agent and agency, compulsory education for children, the supply of seeds, agricultural implements and other provisions, rights of the Navajos to be protected, establishment of railroads and forts, compensation to tribal members, and arrangements for

10320-438: The army unit engaged in this activity and left destruction of Navajo infrastructure to the main army unit. Following the surrender of the Navajo, the Utes continued to raid the Navajo as did New Mexican slavers. A large number of slaves were taken and sold throughout the region. Like some internment camps involving several tribes, the Bosque Redondo had serious problems. About 400 Mescalero Apaches were placed there before

10449-510: The assistance of Sally Midgette (Navajo). This work is organized by root , the basis of Athabaskan languages. A 1991 survey of 682 preschoolers on the Navajo Reservation Head Start program found that 54 percent were monolingual English speakers, 28 percent were bilingual in English and Navajo, and 18 percent spoke only Navajo. This study noted that while the preschool staff knew both languages, they spoke English to

10578-496: The chance to establish their own bilingual education programs. However, qualified teachers who were fluent in Native languages were scarce, and these programs were largely unsuccessful. However, data collected in 1980 showed that 85 percent of Navajo first-graders were bilingual, compared to 62 percent of Navajo of all ages—early evidence of a resurgence of use of their traditional language among younger people. In 1984, to counteract

10707-508: The chapters had no authority within the structure of the Navajo Nation government. In 1998, the Navajo Tribal Council passed the "Local Governance Act" (LGA), which expanded the political roles of the existing 110 chapters. It authorized them to make decisions on behalf of the chapter members and to take over certain roles previously delegated to the council and executive branches. This included entering into intergovernmental agreements with federal, state and tribal entities, subject to approval by

10836-469: The children most of the time. In addition, most of the children's parents spoke to the children in English more often than in Navajo. The study concluded that the preschoolers were in "almost total immersion in English". An American Community Survey taken in 2011 found that 169,369 Americans spoke Navajo at home—0.3 percent of Americans whose primary home language was not English. Of primary Navajo speakers, 78.8 percent reported they spoke English "very well",

10965-558: The children would remain bilingual, though their influence over the school systems was very low. A small number of preschool programs provided the Navajo immersion curriculum, which taught children basic Navajo vocabulary and grammar under the assumption that they have no prior knowledge in the Navajo language. Navajo has a fairly large consonant inventory. Its stop consonants exist in three laryngeal forms: aspirated , unaspirated, and ejective —for example, /tʃʰ/ , /tʃ/ , and /tʃʼ/ . Ejective consonants are those that are pronounced with

11094-470: The convention be held in the traditional naachid /modern chapter house format, where every member of the nation wishing to participate may do so through their home chapters. The committee was formed by former Navajo leaders Kelsey Begaye , Peterson Zah , Peter MacDonald , Ivan Gamble (a writer/social activist), and other local political activists. Prior to Long Walk of the Navajo , judicial powers were exercised by peace chiefs ( Hózhǫ́ǫ́jí Naatʼááh ) in

11223-512: The corn agriculturalists of the Pueblo area was reflected in their language by tracing the changing meanings of words from Proto-Athabaskan to Navajo. For example, the word * dè: , which in Proto-Athabaskan meant "horn" and "dipper made from animal horn", in Navajo became a-deeʼ, which meant "gourd" or "dipper made from gourd". Likewise, the Proto-Athabaskan word * ł-yəx̣s "snow lies on the ground" in Navajo became yas "snow". Similarly,

11352-457: The council changed the law to repeal this requirement). Term limits allow only two consecutive terms. The Navajo Nation Council, formerly the Navajo Tribal Council, is the legislative branch of the Navajo Nation. As of 2010, the Navajo Nation Council consists of 24 delegates, representing the 110 chapters, elected every four years by registered Navajo voters. Prior to the November 2010 election,

11481-422: The districts also have family courts, which have jurisdiction over domestic relations, civil relief in domestic violence, child custody and protection, name changes, quiet title, and probate. As of 2010, there were 17 trial judges presiding in the Navajo district and family courts. The Navajo Nation Presidency, in its current form, was created on December 15, 1989, after directives from the federal government guided

11610-462: The federal government on behalf of an estimated 250,000–500,000 plaintiffs, Native Americans whose trust accounts did not reflect an accurate accounting of money owed them under leases or fees on trust lands. The settlement of Cobell v. Salazar in 2009 included a provision for a nearly $ 2 billion fund for the government to buy fractionated interests and restore land to tribal reservations. Individuals could sell their fractionated land interests on

11739-483: The forced relocation is the setting of the youth fiction novel The Girl Who Chased Away Sorrow , written in 1999 by Ann Turner . In the 1979 Stephen King novel The Long Walk (written under the pen name Richard Bachman ) two Hopis are among one hundred teenage boys who participate in a competitive and voluntary death march which serves as a macabre annual spectacle in a totalitarian re-imagining of America. Scott O'Dell 's Newbury Award-winning book Sing Down

11868-443: The fort and almost took control. Truces and treaties committed the Army to protect the Navajo. However, the Army allowed other Native American tribes and Mexicans to steal livestock and enslave Navajos. A truce was signed on February 15, 1861. They were again promised protection, but as part of the truce, two of the Navajo's four sacred mountains were taken from them, as well as about one-third of their traditional land. In March,

11997-464: The fort, named Fort Lyon on September 25, who took command. Manuel Chaves, suspended from command, was confined to Albuquerque pending court-martial. (The charges were dismissed after two months.) In February 1861, Chaves took the field with 400 militia and ransacked Navajo land, without federal authority. With Confederate troops moving into southern New Mexico, Canby sent Agent John Ward into Navajo lands to persuade any who might be friendly to move to

12126-607: The freezing temperature of the winter months. The "Long Walk" started at the beginning of spring 1864. Bands of Navajo led by the Army were relocated from their traditional lands in eastern Arizona Territory and western New Mexico Territory to Fort Sumner (in an area called the Bosque Redondo or Hwéeldi by the Navajo) in the Pecos River valley (Bosque Redondo is Spanish for "round forest"—in New Mexican Spanish

12255-440: The general idea of "Navajoland". Neither of these terms should be confused with Dinétah , the term used for the traditional homeland of the Navajo. This is located in the area among the four sacred Navajo mountains of Dookʼoʼoosłííd ( San Francisco Peaks ), Dibé Ntsaa ( Hesperus Mountain ), Sisnaajiní ( Blanca Peak ), and Tsoodził ( Mount Taylor ). The Navajo people 's tradition of governance

12384-456: The internment camp in Bosque Redondo. During the forced march and internment, up to 3,500 people died from starvation and disease over a four-year period. In 1868, the Navajo were allowed to return to their ancestral homeland following the Treaty of Bosque Redondo . Some anthropologists state that the "collective trauma of the Long Walk...is critical to contemporary Navajos' sense of identity as

12513-596: The lands of the Navajos and were very familiar with Navajo strongholds as well. Carson launched his full-scale assault on the Navajo population in January 1864. He destroyed everything in his path, eradicating the way of life of the Navajo people. Hogans were burned to the ground, livestock was killed off, and irrigated fields were destroyed. Navajos who surrendered were taken to Fort Canby and those who resisted were murdered. Some Navajos were able to escape Carson's campaign but were soon forced to surrender due to starvation and

12642-416: The language to their offspring and that concerted efforts at revitalization could easily protect the language. Navajo had a high population for a language in this category. About half of all Navajo people live on Navajo Nation land, an area spanning parts of Arizona , New Mexico , and Utah ; others are dispersed throughout the United States. Under tribal law, fluency in Navajo is mandatory for candidates to

12771-547: The language's historical decline, the Navajo Nation Council decreed that the Navajo language would be available and comprehensive for students of all grade levels in schools of the Navajo Nation . This effort was aided by the fact that, largely due to the work of Young and Morgan, Navajo is one of the best-documented Native American languages. In 1980 they published a monumental expansion of their work on

12900-657: The language, organized by word (first initial of vowel or consonant) in the pattern of English dictionaries, as requested by Navajo students. The Navajo Language: A Grammar and Colloquial Dictionary also included a 400-page grammar, making it invaluable for both native speakers and students of the language. Particularly in its organization of verbs, it was oriented to Navajo speakers. They expanded this work again in 1987, with several significant additions, and this edition continues to be used as an important text. The Native American language education movement has been met with adversity, such as by English-only campaigns in some areas in

13029-469: The late 1990s. However, Navajo-immersion programs have cropped up across the Navajo Nation. Statistical evidence shows that Navajo-immersion students generally do better on standardized tests than their counterparts educated only in English. Some educators have remarked that students who know their native languages feel a sense of pride and identity validation. Since 1989, Diné College , a Navajo tribal community college , has offered an associate degree in

13158-552: The late 19th century, it founded boarding schools, often operated by religious missionary groups. In efforts to acculturate the children, school authorities insisted that they learn to speak English and practice Christianity. Students routinely had their mouths washed out with lye soap as a punishment if they did speak Navajo. Consequently, when these students grew up and had children of their own, they often did not teach them Navajo, in order to prevent them from being punished. Robert W. Young and William Morgan , who both worked for

13287-413: The legislation. This contributed to their rejection of the first version of a proposed tribal constitution. In the various attempts since, members found the process to be too cumbersome and a potential threat to tribal self-determination. The constitution was supposed to be reviewed and approved by BIA. The earliest efforts were rejected primarily because segments of the tribe did not find enough freedom in

13416-530: The low tone typically regarded as the default. However, some linguists have suggested that Navajo does not possess true tones, but only a pitch accent system similar to that of Japanese . In general, Navajo speech also has a slower speech tempo than English does. Navajo is difficult to classify in terms of broad morphological typology : it relies heavily on affixes —mainly prefixes—like agglutinative languages, but these affixes are joined in unpredictable, overlapping ways that make them difficult to segment,

13545-655: The number of monolingual Navajo speakers have been in the decline, and most younger Navajo people are bilingual. Near the 1990s, many Navajo children have little to no knowledge in Navajo language, only knowing English. In 1968, U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Bilingual Education Act , which provided funds for educating young students who are not native English speakers. The Act had mainly been intended for Spanish-speaking children—particularly Mexican Americans —but it applied to all recognized linguistic minorities. Many Native American tribes seized

13674-612: The number of tribal members increased to 399,494, surpassing the Cherokee Nation as the largest tribal group by enrollment. The U.S. gained ownership of what is today Navajoland in 1848 following the Mexican-American War. The reservation was first established in 1868 within New Mexico Territory , initially spanning roughly 3,300,000 acres (13,000 km); it subsequently straddled what became

13803-614: The office of the President of the Navajo Nation . Both original and translated media have been produced in Navajo. The first works tended to be religious texts translated by missionaries, including the Bible. From 1943 to about 1957, the Navajo Agency of the BIA published Ádahooníłígíí ("Events" ), the first newspaper in Navajo and the only one to be written entirely in Navajo. It was edited by Robert W. Young and William Morgan, Sr. (Navajo). They had collaborated on The Navajo Language ,

13932-409: The once-scattered bands of people who call themselves Diné , set off together on the return journey, the "Long Walk" home. This is one of the few instances where the U.S. government permitted a tribe to return to their traditional boundaries. The Navajo were granted 3.5 million acres (14,000 km ) of land inside their four sacred mountains. The Navajo also became a more cohesive tribe after

14061-467: The orders of the President, shall ever be permitted to pass over, settle upon, or reside in, the territory described in this article. Though the treaty had provided for one hundred miles by one hundred miles in the New Mexico Territory , the size of the territory was 3,328,302 acres (13,470 km; 5,200 sq mi)—slightly more than half. This initial piece of land is represented in the design of

14190-402: The others. The soldier told the parents that they had to leave their daughters behind. "Your daughter is not going to survive, anyway; sooner or later she is going to die," they said in their own language. "Go ahead," the daughter said to her parents, "things might come out all right with me," But the poor thing was mistaken, my grandparents used to say. Not long after they had moved on, they heard

14319-529: The pattern of small family farms common among Americans. This was intended to extinguish tribal land claims for such territory. The land allocated to these Navajo heads of household was initially not considered part of the reservation. Further, the federal government determined that land "left over" after all members had received allotments was to be considered "surplus" and available for sale to non-Native Americans. The allotment program continued until 1934. Today, this patchwork of reservation and non-reservation land

14448-483: The proposed forms of government. In 1935 they feared that the proposed government would hinder development and recovery of their livestock industries; in 1953 they worried about restrictions on development of mineral resources. They continued a government based on traditional models, with headmen chosen by clan groups. The Navajo Nation must submit all proposed laws to the United States Secretary of

14577-517: The region around Aneth, Utah in 1905 was confirmed by Congress in 1933. The eastern border was shaped primarily as a result of allotments of land to individual Navajo households under the Dawes Act of 1887. This experiment was designed to assimilate Native Americans into mainstream American culture. The federal government proposed to divide communal lands into plots assignable to heads of household – tribal members – for their subsistence farming, in

14706-422: The return of Navajos to the reservation established by the treaty. The Navajo agreed for ten years to send their children to school and the U.S. government agreed to establish schools with teachers for every thirty Navajo children. The U.S. government also promised for ten years to give to the Navajos annually: clothing, goods, and other raw materials, not exceeding the value of five dollars per person, that

14835-575: The same stem, as do the progressive and future modes; these modes are distinguished with prefixes. However, pairs of modes other than these may also share the same stem, as illustrated in the following example, where the verb "to play" is conjugated into each of the five mode paradigms: The basic set of subject prefixes for the imperfective mode, as well as the actual conjugation of the verb into these person and number categories, are as follows. The remaining piece of these conjugated verbs—the prefix na- —is called an "outer" or "disjunct" prefix. It

14964-494: The same, holding no harm for anybody...Many Navajos who know our history and the story of Hwéeldi say the same. Not all the Navajo were captured and forced to take the long walk. Geneticists believe that a genetic bottleneck developed among the small, isolated, uncaptured groups. This produced the consequence of otherwise rare genetic diseases, for example xeroderma pigmentosum , stemming from recessive genes achieving greater dominance. An alternative put forth by some Navajo

15093-469: The scalping of respected Navajo leader Narbona in 1849. In August 1851, Colonel Edwin Vose Sumner established Fort Defiance for the U.S. government (near present-day Window Rock, Arizona ) and Fort Wingate (originally Fort Fauntleroy near Gallup, New Mexico ). Prior to the Long Walk, treaties were signed in 1849, 1858, and 1861. Friction between invading American settlers and Navajo groups

15222-605: The site of old Fort Defiance, in Canon Bonito, east by the parallel of longitude which, if prolonged south, would pass through old Fort Lyon, or the Ojo-de-oso, Bear Spring, and west by a parallel of longitude about 109º 30' west of Greenwich, provided it embraces the outlet of the Canon-de-Chilly [Canyon de Chelly], which canyon is to be all included in this reservation, shall be, and the same hereby, set apart for

15351-468: The smallest political unit, similar to municipalities or small U.S. counties. The Navajo capital city of Window Rock is located in the chapter of St. Michaels, Arizona . The Navajo Nation also operates executive offices in Washington, DC to facilitate government-to-government relations and for lobbying services and congressional relations. Navajo language The language has struggled to keep

15480-451: The subject of Navajo. This program includes language, literature, culture, medical terminology, and teaching courses and produces the highest number of Navajo teachers of any institution in the United States. About 600 students attend per semester. One major university that teaches classes in the Navajo language is Arizona State University . In 1992, Young and Morgan published another major work on Navajo: Analytical Lexicon of Navajo , with

15609-440: The territory occurred on October 28, 1878, when President Rutherford Hayes signed an executive order pushing the reservation boundary 20 miles (32 km) to the west. Further additions followed throughout the late 19th and early 20th century (see map). Most of these additions were achieved through executive orders, some of which were confirmed by acts of Congress. For example, President Theodore Roosevelt 's executive order to add

15738-605: The use and occupation of the Navajo tribe of Indians, and for such other friendly tribes or individual Indians as from time to time they may be willing, with the consent of the United States, to admit among them; and the United States agrees that no persons except those herein so authorized to do, and except such officers, soldiers agents, and employees of the Government, or of the Indians, as may be authorized to enter upon Indian reservations in discharge of duties imposed by law, or

15867-559: The verb with the circum clitic doo= ... =da (e.g. mósí doo nitsaa da 'the cat is not big'). Dooda , as a single word, corresponds to English no . Nouns are not required to form a complete Navajo sentence. Besides the extensive information that can be communicated with a verb, Navajo speakers may alternate between the third and fourth person to distinguish between two already specified actors, similarly to how speakers of languages with grammatical gender may repeatedly use pronouns. Most nouns are not inflected for number, and plurality

15996-463: Was broadcast to tribal areas. Navajo was no exception, although its large speaker pool—larger than that of any other Native language in the United States—gave it more staying power than most. Adding to the language's decline, federal acts passed in the 1950s to increase educational opportunities for Navajo children had resulted in pervasive use of English in their schools. In more recent years,

16125-406: Was eliminated; the sitting judges became judges in the new system. The resolution established "Trial Courts of the Navajo Tribe" and the "Navajo Tribal Court of Appeals", which was the highest tribal court and its only appellate court. In 1978, the Navajo Tribal Council established a "Supreme Judicial Council", a political body rather than a court. On a discretionary basis, it could hear appeals from

16254-737: Was funded in the 1950s, where the number of students quickly doubled in the next decade. The Navajo Nation operates Tséhootsooí Diné Bi'ólta', a Navajo language immersion school for grades K-8 in Fort Defiance, Arizona . Located on the Arizona-New Mexico border in the southeastern quarter of the Navajo Reservation , the school strives to revitalize Navajo among children of the Window Rock Unified School District . Tséhootsooí Diné Bi'ólta' has thirteen Navajo language teachers who instruct only in

16383-485: Was infested with army worms and failed repeatedly. The Pecos River flooded and washed out the head gates of the irrigation system. In 1865 Navajo began leaving. By 1867 the remaining Navajo refused to plant a crop. Comanches raided them frequently, and they raided the Comanche, once stealing over 1,000 horses. The non-Indian settlers also suffered from the raiding parties who were trying to feed their starving people on

16512-468: Was organized around clans , which are matrilineal kinship groups. Children are considered born into the mother's family and gain their social status from her and her clan. Her eldest brother traditionally has a strong influence on rearing the children. The clan leadership have served as a de facto government on the local level of the Navajo Nation. In 1933, during the Great Depression ,

16641-560: Was widespread between 1846 and 1863. Manuelito and Barboncito reminded the Navajo that the US Army was sending troops to wage war, that it had flogged a Navajo messenger, and that it opened fire on tribal headsman “Agua Chiquito”, during talks for peace. They argued that the army had refused to bring in feed for their animals at Ft. Defiance, took over the prime grazing land, and killed Manuelito's livestock there. On April 30, 1860, Manuelito and Barboncito with 1,000 Navajo warriors attacked

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