Cia-Cia

The Cia-Cia are a group of former hunter-gatherers from the mountains of Buton who now make up the island's poorest subsistence farmers.

To Save Its Dying Tongue, Indonesian Isle Orders Out for Korean 2009

To entice them to use Hangeul, linguists from Seoul National University offered to produce a version of the script, adapted to the sounds of Cia-Cia (pronounced chee-ah chee-ah), and provide textbooks and crash courses in using the alphabet, which is entirely new to the Cia-Cia.

To Save Its Dying Tongue, Indonesian Isle Orders Out for Korean 2009

Uri Tadmor, a specialist in Indonesian languages with the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, notes that Cia-Cia speakers already write standard Indonesian, which uses the Roman alphabet, so "why force them to learn another script?"

To Save Its Dying Tongue, Indonesian Isle Orders Out for Korean 2009

But he says the alphabet does a good job capturing certain oddities in Cia-Cia -- like d and b sounds that are pronounced while sucking air into the lungs.

To Save Its Dying Tongue, Indonesian Isle Orders Out for Korean 2009

Karaoke tapes available in Bau-Bau's bustling market feature Cia-Cia.

To Save Its Dying Tongue, Indonesian Isle Orders Out for Korean 2009

Lapela, an 84-year-old Cia-Cia community leader who dresses in traditional striped shirts and wears a long wispy beard, says that since the language has lasted 500 years without a script he wonders why it needs one now.

To Save Its Dying Tongue, Indonesian Isle Orders Out for Korean 2009

In the past, Cia-Cia speakers have made ad hoc attempts to write their language in the Roman script.

To Save Its Dying Tongue, Indonesian Isle Orders Out for Korean 2009

"They want to preserve their language and culture," says Lee Ho-young, the Seoul National University linguist who is leading the project and who co-wrote the new Cia-Cia textbook.

To Save Its Dying Tongue, Indonesian Isle Orders Out for Korean 2009

Some linguists say the modified Hangeul script prepared for the Cia-Cia is ill-suited to the language.

To Save Its Dying Tongue, Indonesian Isle Orders Out for Korean 2009

Hoping for a breakthrough, the South Korean linguists traveled to Buton in July to launch the program and attended a Cia-Cia tribal dance.

To Save Its Dying Tongue, Indonesian Isle Orders Out for Korean 2009