This introduction to our language pages makes some brief comments on the Potawatomi language , efforts to save and revitalize it , and the contents of these language pages .
Linguists classify it as a separate language that became a distinct entity long ago.
Most Potawatomi who are involved with the language feel strongly that this is so. The most important characteristic of the language is that it is oral . English, by comparison, is a written language. Pretty much all of us started school when we were young and quickly learned that words have definite shapes and boundaries, defined by blank spaces. In a truly oral language, that isn't the case.