Flutes of Fire

Leanne Hinton is professor emerita at the University of California, Berkeley, and a founding member of the board of the Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival. She has authored many articles and several books on language revitalization, including Flutes of Fire: Essays on California Indian Languages; The Green Book of Language Revitalization in Practice (edited with Ken Hale); and How to Keep Your Language Alive: A Commonsense Approach to One-on-One Language Learning (with Matt Vera and Nancy Steele). She has worked with AICLS to develop and implement the Master-Apprentice Language Learning Program and the Breath of Life Language Workshops, both of which have expanded throughout the US and internationally. In 2005 she received the Cultural Freedom Award from the Lannan Foundation for her work on the revitalization of endangered languages. Leanne lives in Berkeley, California, with her husband, Gary Scott, and delights in family time with their four children and seven grandchildren.

Contents



Introduction: The California Mosaic

1. California’s First Languages



Part I: California Languages at Work and Play: Four Portraits

2. Song: Overcoming the Language Barrier

3. Coyote Talk

4. Upriver, Downriver: The Vocabulary of Direction

5. Language and the Structure of Thought



Part II: Language and History

6. What Language Can Tell us about History

7. Native Californian Names on the Land

8. History Through the Words Brought to California by the Fort Ross Colony (by Robert L. Oswalt)



Part III: Words

9. California Counting

10. Specialized Vocabulary in the Languages of California

11. “Slapping with the Mouth” and Other Interesting Words: Instrumental Prefixes in Kashaya

12. Men’s and Women’s Talk

13. Songs Without Words



Part IV: Language and Dominion

14. On the Origin of California Tribal Names

15. A Pinenut by Any Other Name

16. Languages Under Attack (with Vera Mae Fredrickson)



Part V: Writing and Documentation

17. Writing Systems

18. Ashes, Ashes: John Peabody Harrington—Then and Now



Part VI: New Speakers Carry the Torch

19. Rebuilding the Fire: Tribes Working Together to Save Their Languages

20. Stories of Language Reclamation

21. In Our Own Words



Acknowledgments

Appendix: Reference Guide to Linguistic Symbols

Bibliography

Index

About the Author