This recording will help children and their parents bridge the communication gap between them and our remaining fluent Elders. All families, communities and regions have distinctive ways of talking (accents), but all still speak the same language: Lingít. There are a variety of accents from different families and villages, but just as in English, no matter how different a speech style is, it is still considered to be the same language. Fluent speakers from Yakutat to Saxman to Teslin in Canada can easily understand each other.There are more than 50 letters or symbols used to write the Lingít language. Some letters look and sound the same as in English, but nearly half of the sounds in Lingít are not used in English. English-looking letters are used to write the non-English sounds so learning to read and write Lingít can be very confusing for a non-speaker and very easy for a fluent speaker.

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