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Jannea Thomason
History and Structure of the English Language
Dr. Urschel
7 March 2013
The Navajo Language: Culture and Code
Native Americans have suffered much at the hands of white Americans through the
years. As the living conditions changed, the people adapted and survived, and their language
suffered as well. Despite this, the Navajo language and traditions have survived and can claim a
place in American heroism. The Navajo Code was an innovation in code that was never broken
during its use in the Pacific theater of World War Two. The Code, which will be capitalized here
to distinguish it from others, is credited for changing the tides of America’s fate in the war.
Historians and cryptologists have studied the Code to discover its strengths and learn how it was
so successful. Looking at it from a linguistic viewpoint provides a whole new perspective on the
Code. The Code is a mastery of language, and the Navajo language was the ideal of for a code.
The Navajo people and their language have been with America since its land formed.
Tribal legends go back to the creation of their homeland and their ties to it then on. Descending
from Anasazi cliff dwellers, the Navajo lived a peaceful, self-sufficient “beauty way” (True
Whispers). The Navajo people were slowly pushed from their lands until they ended up on a
small tract of land on the corners of New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah. The area was surrounded
by the sacred mountains. Due to increasing violence and threats, the Navajo had signed a treaty
that was martially enforced, which led to The Long Walk of three hundred miles in 1863.
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In exchange for their land, the government was to provide education and opportunity for
the Navajo children. Apart from what the treaty said, the reality was a cultural genocide for the
sake of “progress.” Children were taken from parents by force, sometimes snatched unknown to
them, to boarding schools and were “Anglicized.” The language and its speakers were seen as
savage and demonic. Children were forced to give up their native language and traditions.
Language is steeped in culture. The culture builds a language and with it expresses itself.
The Navajo language is grown from the cultural practices and beliefs. The Navajo are driven by
natural rhythms and needs. The time of day is told by the sun, not o’clock like in English, but
sun rising, sun setting, after sun high, and so on. When meals are eaten and when people sleep is
driven by the internal clock rather than conventional time. Work is done when it is needed.
“Thank you” and “please” do not exist in the Navajo language. If a person needs something he
or she should not have to beg for it; it is given to him or her (Bixler). They do not bother
themselves with chatter or useless talk; they master nonverbal cues. The common English
question of “How are you?” is not used; instead, the Navajo say, “Where are you going?” a much
more action focused question.
On the Navajo reservation there was little talking; they did not talk while they worked or
in passing. This led to the belief that the “savages” were dumb or uncivilized. This taciturn,
judicial use of language does not mean the language was primitive and shallow. It is the
opposite, showing a greater respect for language and a use different from European languages.
“Rhetoric in such a universe has as its primary function not discovery but use, and it’s carefully
prescribed, sanctioned by ancestral tradition, and functional in maintaining the world as it ought
to be” (Philipsen 134). The Navajo language was not used to discover and create change but to
preserve life. The language has traditional ties and practices revolving around language, which
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was a way of life. This is seen in ancestral prayers. The whole prayer must be memorized and
spoken correctly, or it will not be effective. Politics were a group discussion; all problems were
discussed, resolved, and then not talked about anymore. Over-talking on a subject is dangerous
in the Navajo view. Language is sacred to the Navajo. Words have power to shape the world.
Through ritual chants and prayers they can change the course of a man, and words, also, have the
power to change people through discussion and name using (Philipsen). This power words had
led to great respect of words and precision of their use.
Despite hardships the tribe the tribe faced, the Navajo remained the largest in the United
States and flourished. When resources became endangered during the Depression, the Stock
Reduction Program was put into place by the government. The Navajos only economic way of
life was sheep herding. With the slaughter of a large percentage of sheep, the reservation began
to fade into poverty and insignificance. The Navajo reservation was ignored by the world and
had little value anymore for the white society. This insignificance lasted until Pearl Harbor,
when the Navajo Council approved the Navajo nation to support the United States in World War
Two.
Native American languages had been used in World War One for communication.
Comanche, Choctaw, Creek, Menominee, Chippewa, and Hopi were all used for message
sending by translation. They were inefficient because the languages had few words relating to
modern warfare. The idea quickly fell to the wayside, but not before Germany sent spies
disguised as students onto reservations to learn the languages. The Navajo reservation which was
overlooked by society was overlooked by the Germans as well (Bixler).
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After Pearl Harbor, one of the few white native Navajo speakers Philip Johnston
approached Major General Clayton B. Vogel with his idea of the Code. He had served in WWI
and had known how the other Native American languages had been used and had failed. His idea
was to use the Navajo language to construct a unique lexicon for the Code (Escue). After hearing
the language spoken, the Major General was sold on the idea and began the program. The United
States was going to ask the help of people they did not even recognize as citizens, but as
President George W. Bush put it, the ancient warriors were needed for the modern war (True
Whispers).
Recruiting began on the reservation, and men rushed to enlist. Many did not have birth
certificates and fabricated their age enlisting as eighteen, when they were really fourteen or
sixteen. Recruiters went into missionary schools looking specifically for Navajos who were
English speakers still fluent in Navajo. From a school where they were punished for their
language, these men were going to save America with it. The men were shocked the military was
interested in their language because of the language persecution they received. Basic training
was no different to the Navajo than the harsh missionary schools and they prospered in the
military environment. Twenty-nine men were pulled from Platoon 382 after basic training and
taken to Camp Pendleton to create the Code (Nez).
These twenty-nine men were the first of many Code Talkers that were trained in the
Code. Not just any Navajo speaker could be used, of the 4,600 Navajos that served, only 420
were Code Talkers (Escue). A majority of Navajo speakers were illiterate or knew little English.
There were also some white Americans who tried to enter the program and failed. They spoke a
pidgin Navajo, the trader language. Only native speakers could be used; the language could not
even be taught to those willing to learn. The few outsiders who spoke the language were exposed
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to it as children. Johnston was a missionary child who grew up speaking Navajo. The language is
next to impossible to learn without childhood exposure.
When children are young, they have undifferentiated grammar giving them a greater
language learning potential. Once they learn one language, they lose certain potentials to grasp
easily other grammatical forms. The Navajo grammar and the language in general are
fundamentally different from English and all European languages. Learning the language while
the grammar is not solidified allows for a better grasp of the odd concepts and structures of the
Navajo language compared to English. Unless the language is learned as a child, the language
clashes with all the person’s concepts about language and is hard to comprehend and even harder
to produce.
The Navajo language is an Apachean language in the Na-Dene family in the larger root
of Athabaskan languages. The language is constructed of thirty-two consonants and eight vowels
both long and short. The language is not as simple as the alphabet presents it to be because it is
one of a few Athabaskan languages that is two-toned. Based on the evidence from the Navajo
language, the language family is assumed to be “the most resistant to change” (Rice 247-248).
The Navajo language did not change over time, nor did it change with the English and other
languages it encountered. The fact the language did not change was partially from their
traditional concepts of language. They used language to shape the world and to organize society
not to bring about changes to tradition. This is reflected in the language over time.
The language family has no ties to European languages; therefore, its grammar and
structure are different. One of the biggest gaps between the languages, which is easily observed,
is verb usage. In European languages, a verb tells an action and other words modify the
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conditions of the action. In Navajo, the verb tells the action, as well as, the time of action, whom
the action is for or about, how the action is done, what the action is done from, and other minor
aspects depending on the action. The verb differs depending on what is being dumped from a
bucket and what container food is being passed in (Goossen). In the end one verb is a whole
sentence of detail. The noun was like this as well. The word changed depending on the
description of the noun, for example, firewood was many different words each was from a
different type of wood. Another difference is the use of signal words instead of intonation to
show when questions and quotes are being used. Concepts vital to English language, such as
possession, do not exist in Navajo.
The Code was created from this structurally different, generally unknown language. The
twenty-nine original creators worked thirteen weeks to create and perfect the Code. The
foundation of the Code was the creation of an alphabet. A Navajo word was assigned to each
English letter based on an English translation. For example, “A” was assigned the Navajo word
“wol-la-chee” meaning “red Ant” in English. The vowels and most common consonants, “T, N,
S, H, R, D, L,” were assigned three more words, and they eventually had a total of eight in order
to avoid repetition that could be decoded (Nez).
Like the other Native American languages, Navajo did not have direct translations for
military terms, so the group associated terms natural to them for objects. They created a unique
lexicon of over two-hundred terms. The meaning of a Navajo word was matched to an English
word based on what the creators decided. The connection was arbitrary like in all language.
Because of this, a native speaker would not be able to understand the Code. Planes were named
after birds, and boats were named after fish. A carrier plane was called “eagle,” which is “atsah”
in Navajo because they knew eagles carried their food. Weaponry was another common wartime
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vocabulary Navajo did not have translation for. Instead, they matched Navajo words with
similarity or connection. Bombs were “eggs,” and hand grenades were “potatoes.” Countries and
leaders were given names they came up with based on how they would be viewed from a Navajo
perspective. Hitler was “mustache smeller,” and the United States was “our mother.”
The scene the Code was to enter and change was rather bleak. The codes the United
States was using were computer generated and easily broken (True Whispers). The equipment
was bulky and labor intensive. They took a long time to translate, so they did not work for the
close combat messages that were needed immediately. The divisions were resorting to cuss-word
saturated English that the Japanese heard and understood just as easily as the marines. United
States troops were firing on their own men, and the Japanese knew their every move.
Once the Code was complete it was put into action and tested. The elite code breakers of
the United States, who had broken the German and Japanese codes, including the illustrious code
Purple, were not able to break it (Singh). It remains the only code never broken in all military
history. The Code entered the in the middle of the battle at Guadalcanal, but the commanding
officer was reluctant to use it. He ran a test against “Shackle,” the current code they were using.
The Navajo pair transmitted and translated the message in two-and-a-half minutes, but the
Shackle message was finished in four hours (Nez). The Navajo Code was sent by a hand-charged
radio one man could carry, which gave communication mobility never had before. From that
moment on, the Code was the only one used for the rest of the war. All six marine divisions in
the area immediately demanded a pair of Code Talkers. Every American victory from then on
involved Code Talkers.
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There are several aspects of the Navajo language that made the Code unbreakable. The
Navajo was the largest tribe in the United States but in ratio to the languages of the world there
were few native speakers. The language was indigenous to the United States and therefore
relatively unknown by the world. The Code Talkers held the knowledge of the Code that
changed the tides of the war. This information and power would be hard to keep quiet for many
white American males who value pride and staying one-up on others. The Navajo did not
believe in possession, so bragging was not a part of their culture. The Navajo instead were not
openly friendly or willing to engage in pointless banter. The chance of them accidentally giving
away secrets was small.
The secrecy of the Code was increased by the fact it was not written down anywhere
except in the training facility in the United States. Even if some word were found, “[the] words
must be heard before they can be spoken” (Nez 53-54). The written word would be impossible to
connect to the sound for a foreigner. Despite this impossibility, they took every precaution to
keep it unwritten. The Code was put to complete memory. For the Navajo, this was right in step
with how they lived out their language. Navajo was not a written language; therefore, it was
learned orally. The oral story and religious traditions set up men to be able to precisely memorize
a large lexicon.
The greatest strength of the Code was an aspect of language far more prevalent in Navajo
than in European languages, meaning directly related to specific vocal sound. The Code was only
orally transmitted and translated. Pronunciation, tone, and intonation were all directly related to
the meaning of the Navajo words spoken. “Therefore, they were well suited to this war of words:
a battle concept unknown to the Anglo soldier, who believed ‘actions speak louder than words’”
(Bixler 37). There are rising and falling tonal changes within words as well as glottal stops.
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Verbs that incorporate a meaning of a whole sentence could be changed in pronunciation by two
letters, and the meaning would be changed by several words. Pronunciation must be exact for
meaning to be conveyed clearly. Words such as “medicine” and “mouth” are pronounced the
same and differentiated only by tone (Nez). There are ten different ways to pronounce the vowel
“A” due to all of these distinctions. This oral aspect of language was far more complicated than
common languages and strengthened this Code to unbreakable status. The natural language of
one is meaningless to a non-native speaker.
Not only was their language the reason the Code succeeded, the men themselves were
raised prepared for this type of action. Working together was a fundamental Navajo practice, so
the pair of talkers fell into a natural rhythm that aided the ease of transmission. The Navajo were
adept at fighting and surviving in the jungle terrain. They could blend in to the point of
invisibility behind less cover than other soldiers. They were excellent scouts of the area and were
adept at avoiding poisonous animals and terrain pitfalls (Paul). The Navajo were clan oriented
and considered the clan more important than the individual. Their well-being was dependent on
the group which allowed the men to form a protective camaraderie with their platoons.
This unbreakable Code changed the war in the United States’ favor. Every pivotal battle
in the Pacific theater after Guadalcanal was won with the help of the Code Talkers. The famous,
horrifically graphic battle for Iwo Jima involved one-hundred Code Talkers, three who died there
(True Whispers). The Code cut friendly fire to zero and hid their movements from the Japanese
who were tunneled all through the island. The Japanese became so frustrated with the Code they
began to watch for the signal, trace it back to the area, and bomb it. Because of this, the Code
Talkers had to send a message, get up, and run to a new area. According to Signal Officer
Howard Connor, the United States would not have conquered Iwo Jima without the Code Talkers
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(Nez). With the Code Talkers, the United States was able to take the island that became the
launching point of the atomic bombs and the end of the war in the Pacific. In the end, the Code
saved two million lives because of faster, secure communication.
After the war was over, soldiers returned home heroes, but the Navajo Code Talkers
quietly returned to the reservations. They were sworn to secrecy; they could not speak a single
word of what they had done. Because of this, they received no recognition or awards. After
twenty years of silence, in 1968 the Code was declassified. President Ronald Reagan crated Code
Talker Day and instituted the creation of a Code Talker G.I. Joe. No other recognition was
received until 2001. President George W. Bush recognized all the Code Talkers, including the
five originators left, with gold and silver medals with beautiful Native American features. In the
President’s speech, he recognizes the whole Navajo nation as well, “‘[The United States] pays
honor to the community and tradition the produced these men’” (True Whispers).
Several Code Talkers went on to become chairmen on the Navajo Council. Peter
McDonald followed an older Code Talker Mr. Nakai as chairman and spoke on the Navajo way
of life and the steps they were taking to be a successful force in society as well as hold on to
traditional beliefs. “‘Yes, we are on a ‘long march’ again-a march forward and upward- a march
toward achievement for all that is good for our people’” (Paul 144). The Code Talkers became
national heroes for Navajo children providing them with a history to be proud of, which was a
building point for success in the world.
Educators realized they should try to preserve the language and traditions instead of
destroying them. The Navajo Community College hosts tribal elders who teach the language and
traditions to the students (Paul). A written language was recorded, and native speakers were
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taught to read their own language. The children benefitted in their English acquisition by reading
their native language. According to Larry Foster, the former Chief of Staff of the Navajo Nation,
the Navajo language would not be spoken today if not for the Code Talkers (True Whispers).
They created a legacy that has preserved and launched their nation into success in the United
States.
The Navajo nation began as a powerful, peaceful tribe and slowly dwindled to meager
standings by the white Americans. The Code Talkers in World War Two changed the fate of the
Navajo people and their language. The oppressed language saved the United States in the war.
The Code was never broken and was successful as a military code. Portable, fast, and precise the
Code achieved feats never done before in military history. Its strength came from its unique
lexicon built from a globally unknown language perfect for code talking. The Navajo language
was an oral language which created complex pronunciation and a grammar structured unlike
European languages. The Navajo had grown up respecting the power of words and using them
with deliberate precision. The Navajo language was the strength of the unbroken Code.
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Works Cited
Bixler, Margaret T. Winds of Freedom: The Story of the Navajo Code Talkers of World War II.
Darien, CT: Two Bytes Pub., 2002. Print.
Escue, Lynn. "Coded Contributions: Navajo Talkers and the Pacific War." (n.d.): 13-20. Web.
Feb. 2013.
Goossen, Irvy W. Navajo Made Easier. Flagstaff: Northland, 1967. Print.
Nez, Chester. "Unbreakable." (n.d.): 53-59. Web. Feb. 2013.
Paul, Doris Atkinson. The Navajo Code Talkers. Philadelphia: Dorrance, 1973. Print.
Philipsen, Gerry. "Navajo World View and Cultural Patterns of Speech: A Case Study in
Ethnorhetoric." (2003): n. pag. Web. Feb. 2013.
Rice, Keren. "Athabaskan Languages and Serial Founder Effects." (2011): n. pag. Web. Feb.
2013.
Singh, Simon. The Code Book: The Evolution of Secrecy from Mary, Queen of Scots, to
Quantum Cryptography. New York: Doubleday, 1999. Print.
True Whispers. Prod. Gale A. Hard and Valarie Red-Horse. PBS Home Video, 2002. DVD.