the aboriginal whistler’s language rediscovered…
Wow, that is really interesting. Thank you very much for sharing it! I have never heard of a whistled language before.
When I was a kid, I read that The Canary Islands were so named because of the whistled language used by the indiginous people who lived there. I always thought that was a pretty cool thing.
Canary Islanders also have a really distinctive form of knife that I think is just lovely.
I hope this is preserved and held onto as a useful cultural heritage.
-Patrick
The article and sound clip are fascinating. Thanks for the link! 
Aldon
Yeah, I thought that had died out long ago.
Neat stuff.
Thanks for posting it!
When I read this part of the article:
“I use it for everything: to call to my wife, to tell my kids something, to find a friend if we get lost in a crowd,” Cabello said."
I was reminded that my wife, son and I have a distinctive ‘silbo-type’ whistle call that we use (sparingly) in shopping malls when we lose contact or are not at the agreed upon meeting place at the agreed upon time. (The trick is to whistle and then try NOT look like the person who whistled when everyone looks around to see who the idiot is that’s whistling.) As was the case with the telephone on the Canary Islands, I can see the cell phone eradicating this long standing shopping mall tradition as well. Still, I would bet that a lot of folks and families out there have a shared ‘whistle’ that they use in similar circumstances. When we refer to “ours”, we call it the ‘werp werp’ (with a sort of upswing on the last werp).
This reminds me of a story about whistling in India. In the summer of 1973 I was studying languages at the Central Hindi Institute in New Delhi. Most afternoons I walked across an open field in order to get from our residence to classes in a building that was the equivalent of two or three blocks away. I have been a whistler (as in, “You now how to whistle, don’t ya?”) since childhood, and generally took advantage of the stroll to whistle whatever came to mind–Neil Young rings a bell. One afternoon one of my teachers, a respected linguist affiliated with the Indian Ministry of Education, took me aside. As tactfully as possible, he informed me (probably in better Hindi than I write here) that “Bharat-me Likhne-Parne Logon Nahi Chiriati Hai.”, which translates into English more or less as “In India, people who know how to read and write do not make the sounds of birds.” The suggestion was that whistling is, at best, a rustic or non-literate activity. This notion has an interesting resonance in our culture as well–whistling is considered a rural, rustic and/or agrarian activity. Thus, the long-running “Andy Griffith” and “Mayberry RFD” show(s), clearly dealing with ‘rustic’ life, featured that all too familiar whistled theme song. Speaking of which, what event marked the transition from one show (Andy Griffith Show) to “Mayberry RFD”? Inquiring minds want to know.
Anyway, as you can perhaps discern from this rambling, I have not posted anything to the Board in some time, and this thread seemed to provide the opportunity I was looking for.
Tom D.
(PS: If anyone want to waste a lot of time downloading a huge pdf file, some fair to middling shots of mine appear at the URL given below. The cover shot is mine, as is one full pager pertaining to 9/11 and a few others to boot. The first person to guess which five (5) other shots are mine wins a free 8 X 10" custom print, though it does not have to be one of those shots.)
http://www.nyc.gov/html/law/pdf/annual2002.pdf
Warning: It takes forever to download and the images have lost a lot in the translation.