"I speak a little Cherokee." It's intimidating introducing yourself to a roomful of strangers with words that seem to bunch up in your mouth, rather than trip off your tongue, but everyone was game.

Patrick Del Percio first showed an interest in learning the Cherokee language at the age of seven, when their family visited a living history museum portraying a 1760s Cherokee village. Del Percio ...

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — It’s a language only a few thousand people in the United States know, but the University of Arkansas is hoping to change that by offering students the chance to learn Cherokee.

Jakeli Swimmer keeps a little black notebook nearby while he teaches. The worn pages of the spiral notebook are covered in his scrawled notes and doodles of legends he has heard since childhood. The ...