Marquesan for All: Te ‘Eo No Te Paotu is a concise and dependable beginner’s guide to the Marquesan language that is accessible to both French and English speakers. It invites modern-day scholars, travelers, and the Marquesan Islanders ('enata / 'enana) of French Polynesia to speak more English and Marquesan. With this book, you can help invigorate an indigenous language that is vital to these islands, yet spoken by only about 20,000 people.

For more than a century, scientists and scholars have referred to the language spoken in the Marquesas Islands as “endangered,” and until recently it was entirely absent from schools and rarely written down. Under 19th and 20th century French colonialism, its use was strongly discouraged and even forbidden under threat of punishment. But 'enata / 'enana have privately and courageously held onto their language. And it has survived.

How did I learn Marquesan?

Well, I’m still learning…but the shortest answer is, slowly. I first started taking detailed notes on Marquesan during my fourth trip to the islands, in 2006. There were no books or other language references around so I just peppered everyone I knew with questions, for hours and then years until I had a book in my hands. I was lucky to have some very patient and dear friends to help me. My adoptive family and especially my Marquesan father, Manuhi Timau, and Vaitahu’s former mayor, Tehaumate Tetahiotupa, were my go-to professors.

In 2010, after many hours of note-taking, formatting, and editing with Tehaumate’s help, I published The Marquesan Phrasebook / Livre des Phrases Marquisiennes. Marquesan for All: Te ‘Eo No Te Paotu is a slimmed down descendant of that first effort. Like the Phrasebook, its goal is to encourarge Marquesans to speak more Marquesan and—bonus!—provide them with some English basics, to boot.

This picture shows me with two of my Marquesan siblings and best friends, Marie and Tetahi Timau, in 2013 (photo credit: Stephanie Hsu).