Roscinda Nolasquez


Roscinda Nolasquez was a Cupeño, and the last speaker of the Cupeño language of Southern California. She grew up speaking Cupeño and did not speak English until her early teens. In 1903, the Cupeño people had to relocate to the Pala Indian Reservation where Nolasquez lived much of rest of her life. In the early 1960s, she continued to speak Cupeño with several elderly residents in Pala.
Nolasquez made a serious effort late in her life to help document and preserve the Cupeño language, working among others with linguists Jane Hill and Roderick Jacobs. Together with Hill she edited a collection of bilingual Cupeño-English oral histories.

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