Roy Boney: Legacy of Steve Jobs includes Cherokee for iPhone

Friday, October 7, 2011  

"I received a text on my iPhone on the morning of October 6 that said, “ᎣᏏᏲ, ᎩᎾᎵ.” It’s a simple Cherokee greeting, akin to “Hello, friend” in English. It’s pronounced “oh-see-yo, gee-na-lee.” It may not seem like much to the casual observer that has been sending and receiving texts for years, but seeing the Cherokee syllabary appear in that tiny bubble on my screen is a profound thing. And I have Steve Jobs to thank for it.

When Sequoyah developed the Cherokee syllabary, he demonstrated the communicative ability of his writing system with the assistance of his daughter ᎠᏲᎧ (“ah-yo-ka”). She was placed in a separate room, and they sent written messages back and forth to each other. The distance between them demonstrated the viability of communicating using the technology of writing, and the syllabary was adopted by the Cherokee Nation council in 1821. Sequoyah called it “talking leaves.” I like to think of this exchange as the first Cherokee text message.

On September 9, 2010, almost 190 years later, Apple released a software update for the iPhone and iPod Touch. It was met with much fanfare as is usually the case when Steve announced new products. This day, though, held special significance for me. It meant that among all the new features, my language hit the world as it never had before. True, our language was used in a variety of technologies through the years since the Cherokee printing press of the 1820s, including typewriters and even Cherokee typing software in the pre-Unicode days. But on that day, by one simple software update, literally millions of people across the world were given the ability to use the Cherokee language on one of the world’s most popular and advanced devices."

Get the Story:
Roy Boney Jr.: Cherokee Artist Roy Boney Jr. Reflects on Steve Jobs (Indian Country Today 10/7)

Also Today:
Apple co-founder Steve Jobs leaves legacy in Cherokee language (The Cherokee Phoenix 10/6)