Editing Washo language (section)

{{short description|Indigenous language isolate spoken in the Western United States}}
{{use mdy dates|date=July 2024}}
{{Infobox language
| name             = Washo
| nativename       = {{lang|was|wá꞉šiw ʔítlu}}
| map              = Washo lang.png
| mapcaption       = Pre-contact distribution of the Washo language
| states           = [[United States]]
| region           = [[California]]–[[Nevada]] border
| ethnicity        = [[Washoe people]]
| speakers         = 20
| date             = 2011
| ref              = <ref name=Golla>Victor Golla (2011) ''California Indian Languages''</ref>
| familycolor      = hokan
| family           = [[Hokan]]? or [[language isolate]]
| iso2             = was
| iso3             = was
| glotto           = wash1253
| glottorefname    = Washo
| altname          = Washoe
|revived=1994
}}
{{Infobox ethnonym|person= [[Washoe people|Wá:šiw]]|people= [[Washoe people|Waší:šiw]]|language= [[Washo language|Wá:šiw ʔítlu]]|country=Waší:šiw Ɂítdeh}}
'''Washo''' {{IPAc-en|ˈ|w|ɒ|ʃ|oʊ}}<ref>Laurie Bauer, 2007, ''The Linguistics Student's Handbook'', Edinburgh</ref> (or Washoe; endonym {{lang|was|wá꞉šiw ʔítlu}})<ref>{{cite web |title=The Washo Project: wá꞉šiw ʔítlu |url=http://washo.uchicago.edu/dictionary/results.php?AttestationID=4312&SearchBy=SearchGloss&SearchKey=washo |work=The Washo Project |publisher=[[University of Chicago]] |access-date=9 September 2011 }}</ref> is an [[endangered language|endangered]] [[Native Americans in the United States|Native American]] [[language isolate]] spoken by the [[Washo people|Washo]] on the [[California]]–[[Nevada]] border in the drainages of the [[Truckee River|Truckee]] and [[Carson River|Carson]] Rivers, especially around [[Lake Tahoe]]. While there were only 20 elderly native speakers of Washo as of 2011,<ref name=Golla>Victor Golla (2011) ''California Indian Languages''</ref> since 1994 there had been a small immersion school that has produced a number of moderately fluent younger speakers. The immersion school has since closed its doors and the language program now operates through the Cultural Resource Department for the Washoe Tribe. The language is still very much endangered; however, there has been a renaissance in the language revitalization movement as many of the students who attended the original immersion school have become teachers.

Ethnographic Washo speakers belonged to the [[Great Basin]] culture area and they were the only non-[[Numic languages|Numic]] group of that area.<ref>d'Azevedo 1986</ref> The language has borrowed from the neighboring [[Uto-Aztecan]], [[Maiduan]] and [[Miwokan]] languages and is connected to both the [[Linguistic areas of the Americas#Great_Basin|Great Basin]] and [[Linguistic areas of the Americas#Northern_California|Northern California]] [[sprachbund|sprachbunds]].