Brent Galloway facts for kids

Brent Douglas Galloway (born April 8, 1944 – died August 6, 2014) was an American linguist. He was famous for studying and helping to save Native American languages that were in danger of disappearing. He focused on languages from the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia. He earned his Ph.D. in linguistics from the University of California, Berkeley in 1977, doing a lot of research in the field.

Early Life and Education

Brent Galloway was born in Oakland, California. He studied linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley. He earned three degrees there:

• a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) in 1965
• a Candidate of Philosophy (C.Phil.) in 1971
• a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) in 1977

During his studies, he did important research on Native American languages. He worked with speakers of the Haisla language, Upriver Halkomelem, and Nooksack languages. For Nooksack and Samish, he worked with the very last people who spoke these languages fluently.

His Work with Languages

From 1975 to 1980, Galloway started and led the Halkomelem Language Program. This program was at the Coqualeetza Education Training Centre in Sardis, British Columbia.

Developing the Halkomelem Language

He created a special writing system, called an orthography, for the Stó:lō Halkomelem language. This system was officially adopted and is now widely used in the Fraser Valley. He also wrote the first grammar book for Upriver Halkomelem in 1977. A grammar book explains how a language works.

Galloway believed that some words in Halkomelem "hold all the knowledge of the culture." The language has many rich stories and traditions. These stories show a way of looking at the world that is very different from English or other European languages.

Other Language Projects

Starting in 1984, he worked on the Samish dialect. This is a form of the Northern Straits Salish language.

In 1988, Galloway joined the Department of Indian Languages, Literatures, & Linguistics. This was at the Saskatchewan Indian Federated College. He was the head of this department from 1988 to 1994. He continued to work a lot on teaching and preserving Halkomelem and Nooksack languages. In 1994, he also began to study the Gullah language. This language is spoken in the Low Country of South Carolina and Georgia.

Key Works and Publications

Galloway created many important resources for the languages he studied. His work helped to preserve these languages for future generations.

Some of his main works include:

• A dictionary for Samish, called "A Phonology, Morphology, and Classified Word List for the Samish Dialect of Straits Salish" (1990).
• A dictionary for Gullah (around 1994), co-authored with Virginia Mixson Geraty.
• "Grammatical Sketch and Classified Word List of Upriver Halkomelem" (1980), co-authored with George Adams, a tribal elder.
• "Classified Word List of the Nooksack Language" (2008).
• Dictionary of Upriver Halkomelem (2009).
• Nooksack Place Names (2011), co-authored with Allan Richardson.

He also wrote about 100 articles and papers. These described Halkomelem and Nooksack, and some were about Assiniboine and Samish. His work was based on his own research in the field and recordings he made.

Later Career and Music

Galloway also wrote papers about his ideas on cognitive semantics. This is a way of understanding how language connects to our thoughts. He called his theory Multi-Dimensional Semantics.

He retired in August 2008 from First Nations University of Canada. He was then given the title of Professor Emeritus. He held this position until he passed away in Regina, Saskatchewan, six years later.

Dr. Galloway was also a talented composer of classical music. He started composing in 1956. He mainly wrote pieces for piano, then for synthesizer and orchestra. His orchestral pieces The Night Before Christmas and Mexican Colors were performed by the Regina Symphony Orchestra.