Quileute Language Committee

Quileute Language Committee
The Quileute Language Committee was a language revitalization entity created by the Quileute Nation at La Push, Washington on the Pacific Coast, and made up of Quileute speaking tribal members, the goal of which was to provide language material for the revitalization and teaching of the severely endangered Quileute language (Chimakuan), the last surviving language in a family of two. The Quileute Language Committee was aided by the linguist James V. Powell, then a PhD candidate at the University of Hawai'i (currently Professor Emeritus at the University of British Columbia), who helped with the creation of two Quileute language textbooks, a Quileute dictionary of some 9,000 words, and minor Quileute teaching materials. In addition, the Quileute Language Committee and Powell created the Quileute alphabet (based on the Latin alphabet) and regularized Quileute spelling. The Quileute Language Committee was active in the mid-1970s (most of its work was published in 1975 and 1976), when only 10 elders were left speaking Quileute. Today, the Quileute Language Committe does not exist as such. However, in 2007 the Quileute Nation Tribal Council set up a two-year Quileute Revitalization Project with the goal of encouraging the use of Quileute words in everyday village life, and Quileute language lessons are taught at the tribal school.

Links for the Quileute Language Committee
Though the Quileute Language Committee is no longer in existence, the following links should be helpful:

Quileute Nation language website

Quileute Nation website