This practical, easy-to-use Navajo dictionary is intended primarily for Navajo children learning to read and write the language in bilingual classrooms. It presents over 1,500 noun and 330 verb entries, all selected because they are words used in and around the school. But the audience for this book has always been larger than just youngsters: it has proven useful for anyone wanting to learn Navajoaadults and children alike.

For each of the thirty-six letters in the Navajo alphabet, this dictionary provides first a listing of nouns followed by verbs. For most of the nouns and all of the verbs, an illustration is also included to aid in learning by providing a visual reference. While the dictionary is organized using the Navajo alphabet, the index gives non-native speakers a complete list of all the English translations from Navajo.

Originally published in 1983 as part of a Ramah Navajo School Board, Inc., initiative to develop bilingual educational materials in the Navajo language, this book has remained in print and helped an entire generation of students learn Navajo. Its re-publication by the University of New Mexico Press, in cooperation with the Ramah Navajo School Board, Inc., helps fulfill each institution's respective mission of promoting cultural literary.

In Navajo, verbs are the building blocks of meaning. By adding prefixes to a verb root, one can often generate a complete thought. This dictionary provides conjugations for almost sixty percent of all Navajo verbs with English translations. It is arranged in alphabetical order by the verb roots in Navajo and sample sentences of each verb are included as separate listings.

"Alyse Goodluck Neundorf (1942-2004), teacher, linguist, interpreter, artist, writer and a former 'Miss Navajo, ' was the author of this work on the Navajo verb--the last of her contributions in the field of Navajo linguistics. . . .

"The "[Navajo/English Dictionary of Verbs]" lists 350 Navajo verbs in paradigm form, conjugated for the Imperfective, Perfective, and Future modes. It was her intention that it be used both by students of Navajo and teachers of the language."--from the Foreword by Robert Young