For the generation of CHamorus who grew up without CHamoru language fluency, what the language means for their CHamoru identity is not entirely clear as there has not been a comprehensive study of their ethnolinguistic identity. This chapter explores how young CHamorus articulate their CHamoru identity in relation to the CHamoru language based on interviews with fourteen young CHamorus. The study provides a theoretical model, the CHamoru Identity Language Articulation Model (CHILAM), which identifies decision pathways and processes to explain why some young CHamorus actively learn the language while others do not. The model maps out the various motivating and inhibiting factors that influence participants' learning of the CHamoru language, which provides relevant information for CHamoru language advocates, policymakers, and teachers.
TopI Tinituhon: The Beginning
Guam is one of fifteen islands in the Mariana archipelago. The Marianas is located in the north-west Pacific region of Micronesia. The Indigenous people of the Marianas are the CHamorus. The Marianas was the first island group in Remote Oceania to be settled around 1500 B.C. (Carson, 2014), and the first to be formally colonized by the Europeans in the late 17th century. Despite the CHamorus living under changing colonial administrations for the past 350 years, the CHamorus survived and maintained a distinct identity through cultural adaption.
During the first 250 years under colonial rule, the CHamoru were able to maintain the CHamoru language. While some critics have tried to invalidate the legitimacy of the contemporary CHamoru language by questioning the addition, incorporation, or borrowing of words from other languages, more linguistically-informed writers have argued that CHamorus have “CHamorucized” these foreign words through changing pronunciation and even shifting meaning to fit the CHamoru worldview. For example, the CHamoru word alahas (jewelry) came from the Spanish word alhaja (jewelry), which ultimately came from the Arabic word حَاجَة (ḥāja, “necessary thing; valuable thing”). Despite CHamorus maintaining the CHamoru language through the Spanish colonial period, the CHamoru language began to experience a steep decline post-World War II under American colonialism. As of 2021, the state of the CHamoru language continues to has only worsen. Currently, it is difficult to find fluent CHamoru speakers, especially among CHamoru Millennial1 and Generation Z.2
While the reasons for the decline of the CHamoru language are well researched, how young non-fluent CHamorus articulate their CHamoru identity in relation to the CHamoru language has not been adequately studied. This chapter describes a research project designed to understand how young non-fluent CHamorus view the relationship between CHamoru language fluency and their CHamoru identity. This study may contribute to further understanding of CHamoru identity and how to move forward with the CHamoru language revitalization project. Interviews with young CHamorus inform the research. The study maps out the relationships among the concepts of language and identity to understand the processes of CHamoru identity re-articulation in relation to the CHamoru language by laying out the various motivating and inhibiting variables that actively influence CHamoru language learning among non-fluent young CHamorus.