Acjachemem Language Preservation Project

During the summer of 1996, the Juaneño Band of Mission Indians was informed that the Acjachemem language reels were available on film and tape from the Smithsonian Institute. We immediately applied for and received a grant from the Lannan Foundation to purchase them.  At the same time, we received many generous donations from tribal members and supportive friends. 

There were thousands of pages of words and phrases in our language available.  The task of reproducing them was daunting.  The information was not yet online, so we set about copying the information we received on paper to try to slowly put it into a database.  We knew it would take a while, even years, for us to complete the project. 

The Acjachemem words and phrases were mostly recorded and translated in Spanish by Anastacia Majel, a fluent speaker of our language.  The Spanish spoken in San Juan Capistrano is a distinct Spanish dialect, or as the people called it, Capo Spanish.  Anastacia spoke this dialect, and John P. Harrington understood it very well. When questioned, many of the elders in San Juan Capistrano told us that they knew and understood Capo Spanish as well.  Appreciating this, we organized meetings with the elders in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s at the Harrison House in San Juan Capistrano.  We passed around copies of Harrington’s notes of the Spanish translations for our elders to translate into English.  With much appreciation to them for their diligence and work on the project, we were successful in completing the Spanish translations to English in the pages we had printed at the time.  There was much excitement among the elders to realize that the language would be available to us in the future.

At the same time, we organized language classes at the Harrison House with the words we identified from the initial pages that were translated.  The classes were well received and participation was enthusiastic.  This gave us a preliminary experience of the language that we all heard about but did not have full access to. 

When the Smithsonian Institute finally put the Harrington reels online we realized that we did not have the complete inventory of the language.  Retrieving the rest of the inventory was time consuming and costly.  The process has taken many years to complete, with on and off starts, but we have finally put as many words and phrases of the Acjachemem language from Anastacia Majel that was found on Harrington’s reels into a database. 

Words cannot express how grateful and forever thankful we are to our elders (many who have passed on) for their encouragement and participation.  They include Lillian Robles, Jerry Olivares, Helen McMullen, Dolores Manriquez, Alfred Cruz, Lupe Acuna, John and Anita Espinoza. Also, many thanks to those who have helped in some special way to further the study and completion of our language development project and database.  Those include Darrell Johnston, Belvie Olivares,  Terry Lam and Araceli D’Antin.  If I have forgotten to include anyone, please accept my sincere apology. 

A very special thank you to Lisa Woodward for her introduction, guidance, participation and encouragement.

Many Acjachemem tribal members knew we were undertaking this large project and were excited to finally have it completed.  The pride amongst the Acjachemem in their culture and heritage is inspiring and humbling.

After many years of collaboration and hard work, it is such a pleasure to finally present this Acjachemem language collection to the Acjachemem people and to those interested in further study.                                                   

Sonia Carmen, Acjachemem Tribal Elder