Mary Joachina Yee (née Mary Joachina Ygnacio Rowe; 1897–1965) was a Barbareño Chumash linguist. She was the
last first-language speaker of the
Barbareño language, a member of the
Chumashan languages
Chumashan is an extinct and revitalizing family of languages that were spoken on the southern California West Coast of the United States, coast by Native Americans in the United States, Native American Chumash people, from the Coastal plains an ...
that were once spoken in southern California by the
Chumash people
The Chumash are a Native Americans in the United States, Native American people of the central and southern coastal regions of California, in portions of what is now Kern County, California, Kern, San Luis Obispo County, California, San Luis O ...
.
Biography
Mary Rowe-Yee was born in 1897 in an
adobe
Adobe (from arabic: الطوب Attub ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for mudbrick. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is use ...
house near Santa Barbara, California, the home of her grandmother. In the late 1890s, Mary was one of only a handful of children brought up to speak any Chumash language. She memorized several old Chumash stories.
In her fifties, Mary Yee began to take part in the analysis, description, and documentation of her language, for many years working closely with the linguist
John Peabody Harrington
John Peabody Harrington (April 29, 1884 – October 21, 1961) was an American linguist and ethnologist and a specialist in the indigenous peoples of California. Harrington is noted for the massive volume of his documentary output, most of whic ...
, who had also worked with Mary's mother Lucretia García and her grandmother Luisa Ygnacio.
Yee and Harrington corresponded with each other in Chumash. After retiring in 1954, Yee worked with Harrington nearly every day.
She also worked with linguist Madison S. Beeler. Over the course of her work she became a linguist in her own right, analyzing paradigms and word structure.
[
Yee's story appears in the documentary film, ''6 Generations: A Chumash Family History'' (2010) which was co-written by her daughter Ernestine Ygnacio-De Soto. Posthumously, she published a children's book, ''The Sugar Bear Story'' (2005), illustrated by her daughter Ernestine Ygnacio-De Soto.]
Publication
*
See also
* List of last known speakers of languages
References
External links
* Image collection
Native Americans on the Central Coast
from OAC include photos of Yee, her mother, grandmother, and extended family and tribe
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yee, Mary
1897 births
1965 deaths
American women linguists
Native American linguists
Last known speakers of a Native American language
Chumash people
People from Santa Barbara, California
20th-century American linguists
Linguists of Chumashan languages
Native American people from California
20th-century Native American women
20th-century Native American people