The Tübatulabal are an indigenous people of Kern River Valley in the Sierra Nevada range of California.

[5] The valley of the Kern River has been the home of three distinct bands which are collectively named Tübatulabal.

The name Tübatulabal (“a people that go to the forest to gather tubat (piñon nuts)”) loosely translates as "pine-nut eaters.

At one point in history the Yokuts also called the Tübatulabals, "Pitanisha" (place where the rivers fork).

Acorns, piñon nuts, and game animals were key elements in Tubatulabal subsistence.

[4] Located in the Kern Valley, the tribe had contact with the Poso Creek Yokuts to the southwest and the Tule-Kaweah Yokuts west, as well as to Western and Southern Numic speaking groups to the north and east (Western and Eastern Mono, and Timbisha (Panamint)).

On their southern border were living the Kawaiisu, and further south the Tübatulabal had ties with Kitanemuk, Serrano, and Tataviam (Alliklik) peoples who spoke the Takic branch of Uto-Aztecan.

The Tübatulabal were significant participants and go-betweens in the trade networks connecting the Great Basin, the southern deserts, the Central Valley, and the coastal groups.

Tribal families shared in their basket making designs, materials, and weaving techniques.

Her baskets were also used to process piñon nuts picked from Walker Pass, Kennedy Meadows, and Greenhorn Mountain areas.

Today, in Mountain Mesa, California, the Tübatulabal tribe has a Pakanapul Language Program that teaches the "paka'anil" dialect.

James Andreas spent his last 10 years teaching the Pakanapul Language Team the "paka'anil" dialect.

[13] The Tubatulabal people of the Kern river valley have survived historical trauma.

Of the three bands of the Tubatulabal, the Pahkanapul were the only ones to survive the Keyesville massacre of 1863, where 35 Tübatulabal and Mono people were killed by United States Army troops and American settlers led by Captain Moses A.