Language
Historically, the Seminole spoke two mutually unintelligible Muskogean languages, Mikasuki and Creek. Creek was the dominant language in politics and society, so Mikasuki speakers also learned Creek. As of 2002, about one-quarter of the tribe still spoke Creek, and most of these, English; the remainder spoke only English. Mikasuki is extinct in Oklahoma (the latter is spoken among a majority of Miccosukee and Seminole in Florida).
English is the primary language of most of the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma. The tribe is establishing a Seminole Nation Language Program to revitalize its traditional Creek language.
Read more about this topic: Seminole Nation Of Oklahoma
Famous quotes containing the word language:
“All official institutions of language are repeating machines: school, sports, advertising, popular songs, news, all continually repeat the same structure, the same meaning, often the same words: the stereotype is a political fact, the major figure of ideology.”
—Roland Barthes (1915–1980)
“Had Dr. Johnson written his own life, in conformity with the opinion which he has given, that every man’s life may be best written by himself; had he employed in the preservation of his own history, that clearness of narration and elegance of language in which he has embalmed so many eminent persons, the world would probably have had the most perfect example of biography that was ever exhibited.”
—James Boswell (1740–95)
“These are our grievances which we have thus laid before his majesty with that freedom of language and sentiment which becomes a free people, claiming their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)