Native American Languages

Native American Languages

Photographer: Annina Zuber
Cherokee Model: Ylona (who´s wearing our Turquoise Indian Headdress - 95cm)

We wanted to take a closer look at the Native American culture and so we put today´s spotlight on the Native Indian languages. It´s time to prove that there’s more to their culture and history than just their impressive headdresses.

The Indigenous Indians have a long and rich history. With numerous tribes living in different places, there were over 300 different languages.

It was the Native American women that were responsible for passing their languages on to their children to assure that their way of speaking would not be forgotten. Surveys estimated that the ´Top 3´ of today´s most spoken Indian languages are Navajo (approx. 150.000 speakers), Cree (approx. 70.000 speakers) and the Inuit languages (approx. 65.000 speakers). Most of these languages were oral, but some tribes had created their own writing systems. 

Unfortunately, European colonizers destroyed many of these languages as they suppressed their use to establish their own languages for official communication. The overseas suppressors even insisted that Natives had to learn their European languages in school and destroyed texts in Indigenous languages. Thankfully, however, many of the indigenous people were able to preserve their language.

In the North American region, most languages used a few vowels whereas in the West, they used many consonants.

The Native American communities are still famous for their linguistic diversity that has left an eternal mark on other language families. Hopefully today, with the recognition that cultural preservation is important, the existing Native American languages will continue to be celebrated and remembered.

"We will be known forever by the tracks we leave." - Proverb from the Dakota