page_title: Edward Sapir
section_title: Work with Ishi
hierarchical_section_title: Edward Sapir / Life / In Ottawa / Work with Ishi
caption_attribution_description: English: Ishi, last yahi indian Ishi, the last known member of the Yahi tribe, with anthropologist Alfred L. Kroeber. Español: Alfred L. Kroeber con Ishi.
context_page_description: Edward Sapir was an American anthropologist-linguist, who is widely considered to be one of the most important figures in the early development of the discipline of linguistics.
  Sapir was born in German Pomerania. His family emigrated to the United States of America when he was a child. He studied Germanic linguistics at Columbia, where he came under the influence of Franz Boas, who inspired him to work on Native American languages. While finishing his Ph.D. he went to California to work with Alfred Kroeber documenting the indigenous languages there. He was employed by the Geological Survey of Canada for fifteen years, where he came into his own as one of the most significant linguists in North America, the other being Leonard Bloomfield. He was offered a professorship at the University of Chicago, and stayed for several years continuing to work for the professionalization of the discipline of linguistics. By the end of his life he was professor of anthropology at Yale, where he never really fit in. Among his many students were the linguists Mary Haas and Morris Swadesh, and anthropologists such as Fred Eggan and Hortense Powdermaker.
context_section_description: In 1915 Sapir returned to California, where his expertise on the Yana language made him urgently needed. Kroeber had come into contact with Ishi, the last native speaker of the Yahi language, closely related to Yana, and needed someone to document the language urgently. Ishi, who had grown up without contact to whites, was monolingual in Yahi and was the last surviving member of his people. He had been adopted by the Kroebers, but had fallen ill with tuberculosis, and was not expected to live long. Sam Batwi, the speaker of Yana who had worked with Sapir, was unable to understand the Yahi variety, and Krober was convinced that only Sapir would be able to communicate with Ishi. Sapir traveled to San Francisco and worked with Ishi over the summer of 1915, having to invent new methods for working with a monolingual speaker. The information from Ishi was invaluable for understanding the relation between the different dialects of Yana. Ishi died of his illness in early 1916, and Kroeber partly blamed the exacting nature of working with Sapir for his failure to recover. Sapir described the work: "I think I may safely say that my work with Ishi is by far the most time-consuming and nerve-racking that I have ever undertaken. Ishi's imperturbable good humor alone made the work possible, though it also at times added to my exasperation".
caption: Alfred Kroeber and Ishi
exif: {}