Sociolinguistic Status of the Seri Language - ROUGH DRAFT
1.0 Introduction
Seri is an indigenous language spoken by less than 1,000 people on the west coast of Sonora, Mexico (Lewis, Simons, & Fennig 2016). The language is generally considered to be an isolate despite former attempts to include it in the proposed Hokan language family or link it to the now extinct Salinian language (Campbell, 1997; Marlett, 2007; Marlett, 2008; Marlett, 2011). SIL International has had a presence within the Seri community since 1951 when Edward and Mary Beck Moser moved to Sonora to study the nearly unrecorded language (“Edward W. Moser”, n.d.). Seri is classified as Vulnerable by UNESCO (Moseley, 2010) and this paper will argue that historical trauma
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The same year, local hacienda owner and rancher Pascual Encinas drove his cattle into Seri land and tried to “train” the Seri to work for him (Sheridan, 2000, p. 112). When this failed, his well-armed men attacked the Seri who were armed only with handcrafted weapons. By 1855, the Seri population had dropped to a mere 500 (Bowen & Moser, 1996). While much has already been lost - including the 6-band structure of the Seri people, cultural knowledge, and at least 2 extinct dialects (Bowen and Moser, 1996; Moser, 1963; Marlett, 2014) - much still stands to be lost. The Seri population reached a low of approximately 200 speakers in the 1950s (Gordon, 2005) and, while population size is not an inherent signifier of language wellbeing, the small number of speakers puts Seri on a cultural and linguistic precipice due to the concurrent threat of colonization. The following sections will explore the ongoing pressures which further jeopardize the sociolinguistic status of the language.
3.0 Economic Wave The Seri are known among local populations for their extended refusal to submit to colonization. Their fierce opposition to Spanish and, later, Mexican attempts to exterminate or assimilate their population gained them notoriety as the “Savage Seris of Sonora” (David and Dawson, 1945). Because of this impressive resistance, the Seri are currently experiencing delayed effects of the economic wave as described by Nettle and Romaine (2000).
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Olsson, Tore C. Sharecroppers and Campesinos: The American South, Mexico, and the Transnational Politics of Land Reform in the Radical 1930s. The Journal of Southern History Volume LXXXI, No. 3, August 2015.
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