Kumeyaay People - Language

Language

Nomenclature and tribal distinctions are not widely agreed upon. The general scholarly consensus recognizes three separate languages: Ipai, Kumeyaay proper (including the Kamia), and Tipai in northern Baja California (e.g., Langdon 1990). However, this notion is not supported by speakers of the language (actual Kumeyaay people) who contend that within their territory, all Kumeyaay (Ipai/Tipai) can understand and speak to each other, at least after a brief acclimatization period. All three languages belong to the Delta–California branch of the Yuman family, to which several other linguistically distinct but related groups also belong, including the Cocopa, Quechan, Paipai, and Kiliwa.

The meaning of the term Kumeyaay is unknown, but Ipai or Tipai both mean "people." Some Kumeyaay in the southern areas also refer to themselves as MuttTipi, which means "people of the earth."

Read more about this topic:  Kumeyaay People

Famous quotes containing the word language:

    The reader uses his eyes as well as or instead of his ears and is in every way encouraged to take a more abstract view of the language he sees. The written or printed sentence lends itself to structural analysis as the spoken does not because the reader’s eye can play back and forth over the words, giving him time to divide the sentence into visually appreciated parts and to reflect on the grammatical function.
    J. David Bolter (b. 1951)

    One can say of language that it is potentially the only human home, the only dwelling place that cannot be hostile to man.
    John Berger (b. 1926)

    You can’t write about people out of textbooks, and you can’t use jargon. You have to speak clearly and simply and purely in a language that a six-year-old child can understand; and yet have the meanings and the overtones of language, and the implications, that appeal to the highest intelligence.
    Katherine Anne Porter (1890–1980)