ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the Yugtun language. It is the language spoken in my own community of Toksook Bay in South Central Alaska. Yugtun means a way of speaking a Yup’ik language; Yup’ik refers to one person. Central Yup’ik is the most prolific indigenous spoken language in Alaska. The fast-paced language shift that this community is suffering from – a shift from a Yup’ik-dominant to an English-dominant community in one generation – has led to language revitalization programmes. The Yugtun language and culture in Toksook Bay have been remarkably resilient. The traditional lifestyle is still very much alive and the heritage language is still the default language used among villagers today. The Yugtun community has been more successful in language maintenance than surrounding communities because it does not separate Yup’ik language from Yup’ik culture. This chapter starts by describing the language situation in the area. Then, the three
main themes are discussed. First, the way to incorporate sociolinguistic information in determining who “speaks” Yugtun is briefly discussed. Second, there is the village and its culture. Village autonomy is discussed, as well as the role of the individual in the community, the role of elders and leadership, life orientation, ceremony and rituals. These points are illustrated largely through the importance of dance – the role of dance in communication and in information continuation in this community is explained in detail. Finally, education as a sociolinguistic factor is discussed, particularly the conflicting educational ideologies between the community and the dominant, Western culture. Assumptions underlying how language in communities works or how it should work underlie such a conflict. These three approaches will reveal how culture is part of the language and that
without culture there is no fully-fledged language – a theme which is touched upon in mainstream sociolinguistic theory but not seen as an indispensable factor. It
reveals a unique and intricate connection between language and the passing on of cultural information to subsequent generations. Sociolinguistic descriptions and general approaches usually focus on language utterances and the analysis thereof in correlation with well-known social factors, such as age, gender and class. Aspects of the local culture – and how they not only relate to, but are part of the language – are often mentioned in passing as being relevant but are not usually investigated in a systematic way. The current chapter shows some, perhaps unexpected, aspects of a complete sociolinguistic analysis of small speech communities.
