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Youth keep Tulalip language and culture alive

by Micheal Rios, Tulalip News

During the weeks of July 17-28, the Greg Williams court was home to the 20^th Annual Lushootseed Day Camp. The camp was open to children age five to twelve who wanted to learn about their culture and Lushootseed language through art, songs, games, weaving and storytelling. Each year the Lushootseed Department teams up with the Cultural Resources Department, along with a select number of vital community volunteers, to hold two one-week camps. Each camp has openings for up to 50 participants, but, just as with years past, the camp’s first week total of 37 kids was easily eclipsed by the 70+ kids who attended the second week.

A new format brought a renewed sense of excitement and vigor to both the teachers and youth who participated. In previous years, all youth performed in one large play, which marks the end of camp. This year, the youth were divvied up into five smaller groups. Each group were taught a unique, traditional Lushootseed short story, and then performed that story in the form of a play at the camp’s closing ceremony. The stories taught were Lady Louse, Bear and Ant, Coyote and Rock, Mink and Tetyika, and Nobility at Utsaladdy.

Throughout the duration of camp, the children participated in eight different daily activities. The following list is what each group accomplished throughout the week:

Camp students use a Nintendo DSi tp learn their lines. photo/Micheal Rios — Camp students use a Nintendo DSi to learn their lines.
photo/Micheal Rios

Art – painting, making candle holders and storybook drawings.

Games – played various outside games to bolster team building.

Songs – learned and practiced songs both traditional and created.

Language – learned key Lushootseed words that were in their play, various Lushootseed phrases and Lushootseed word games.

Play – learned, practiced and performed the plays Lady Louse, Bear and Ant, Coyote and Rock, Mink and Tetyika, and Nobility at Utsaladdy.

Technology – children learned and practiced Lushootseed materials related to the play using the Nintendo DSi handheld games created by Dave Sienko.

Traditional Teachings – learned various traditional stores and values.

Weaving – paper weaving, story mats, friendship bracelets, bookmarks and hand sewing.

“This year’s camp was dedicated to Edward ‘Hagen’ Sam for the songs, stories and teachings he has passed down,” explained Lushootseed language teacher and co-coordinator of the camp, Natosha Gobin, during the camp’s closing ceremony. “Through the recordings of stories and songs, Hagen continues to pass on many teachings that our department utilizes on a daily basis. Also, we give special acknowledgement to his son, William ‘Sonny’ Sam, for the gifts he gave to our department on behalf of his father.

Story figures, Mink and Tetyika, trolling for fish. Photo/Micheal Rios — Story figures, Mink and Tetyika, trolling for fish.
Photo/Micheal Rios

Celum Hatch reviews lines of ‘Coyote and Rock’ with costumed performers. Photo/Micheal Rios — Celum Hatch reviews lines of ‘Coyote and Rock’ with costumed performers.
Photo/Micheal Rios

“We would also like to honor Auntie Joy and Shelly Lacy for the vital work they did in the early years of Language Camp that have allowed us to continue hosting it as we celebrate the 20^th year! They laid the foundation for camp and we raise our hands to them in gratitude for all they have done and continue to do for our youth and community.”

While the plays and closing ceremony for week one’s camp was held in the Greg Williams court, due to a loss in the community week two’s camp held their closing ceremony in the Kenny Moses Building. Regardless of the venue, both week one and two’s young play-performers made their debut to large community attendance, as family and friends came out in droves to show their support.

“We are so thankful to all the teachers, all the staff, and all the parents who volunteered to be a part of Language Camp and help our young ones learn our language. Our language is so important to us. It makes my heart happy that my children get to be here, that our children get to be here, to hear the words of our ancestors and to speak the words of our ancestors,” said ceremonial witness and former Board of Director, Deborah Parker. “Our kids continue to honor our ancestors by learning their songs and stories, then to perform them for us. I just hope and pray we continue to speak the words of our ancestors, to speak our Lushootseed language.”

When the plays had concluded and the ceremonial witnesses had shared a few words, there was a giveaway. The camp participants gave handmade crafts to their audience members, which preceded a light lunch of fried chicken, macaroni salad, baked beans and cupcakes.

Reflecting on this year’s 20^th Annual Language Camp, Natosha Gobin beamed with pride, “No matter what goes on behind the scenes in planning and preparing for camp, it is always a success! We had over 100 youth attend camp and they all enjoyed each activity they participated in. I am extremely proud of my co-workers for their hard work and dedication to their activities. I believe that every year camp is offered, we continue to leave a lasting impression on our young participants, just as they do for us.”

For any questions, comments or to request Lushootseed language materials to use in the home, please contact the Lushootseed Department at 360-716-4499 or visit www.TulalipLushootseed.com

The ‘Berry Picking Song’ is performed to bless the meal. Photo/Micheal Rios — The ‘Berry Picking Song’ is performed to bless the meal.
Photo/Micheal Rios

Kaylee Baley narrates ‘Bear and Ant.’ Photo/Micheal Rios — Kaylee Baley narrates ‘Bear and Ant.’
Photo/Micheal Rios

Contact Micheal Rios, mrios@tulaliptribes-nsn.gov

Keeping Lushootseed Language Alive In the Voices of Youth

Maria Martin teaches Lushootseed to preschoolers at the Tulalip Montessori School.KUOW PHOTO/BEN GAULD — Maria Martin teaches Lushootseed to preschoolers at the Tulalip Montessori School.
KUOW PHOTO/BEN GAULD

By Ben Gauld, KUOW

In Maria Martin’s preschool classroom at the Tulalip Montessori School, the children were learning to count to ten.

“Two!” they shouted.

But this lesson wasn’t in English. “In Lushootseed!” Martin instructed her class.

“Saliʔ!” their tiny voices rang out.

Linguists estimate that by the end of the century, 80% of all world languages will fall out of use. Maria Martin is trying to prevent her language from vanishing.

Lushootseed is the language of many tribes in the Puget Sound region, including the Muckleshoot, Puyallup, and Duwamish. It’s been around for hundreds of years, but is in danger of going extinct.

Only a few tribal leaders are fluent in Lushootseed. “You hear people saying how amazing it is that you can speak it, how they wish they could, but they don’t have time,” Martin explained.

One of Martin’s “worst fears” is that her language “dies out and nobody speaks it anymore. Because that’s a big part of who we are.” If the language is lost, according to Martin, “it just seems that much easier to lose everything else.”

“It’s Something To Be Celebrated”

When a language dies, more than just words stop being spoken. Stories stop being told. Songs stop being sung. Preserving cultural values and history is much harder without a way to share them.

“How are you going to sing songs you don’t know the meanings to?” Martin asked. “How are you going to provide any traditional connections without the language? I feel you need to know the language, if only some of it, to really understand the whole culture.”

If Lushootseed is going to survive, Martin believes it must carry on in the voices of youth. The Tulalip Montessori School offers classes in Lushootseed to children ages three though five. They learn to count, sing songs, and tell stories in the language. The lessons in Lushootseed provide a way for the kids to experience their cultural heritage, which they couldn’t find in most preschools.

Martin said the community’s response has been overwhelmingly positive. She sees parents post Facebook videos of their kids singing Lushootsheed songs, or saying Lushootseed words. “You see that pride in the parents. ‘Hey, my child knows this.’ It’s something to be celebrated.”

When Martin was a child, she attended the same school where she now teaches. She hopes to be the inspiration that some of her teachers were to her.

“I was lucky enough to start out in Montessori and learn some Lushootseed, but after I left I didn’t get much exposure. It wasn’t offered in school anymore,” she explained. She said that much more work needs to be done.

An Evolving Language

The Tulalip tribes are working to train more teachers, and get language programs into higher levels of school.

But for Lushootseed to remain relevant, it must also adapt to the changing lifestyles of its speakers.

David Sienko is not a Native tribe member, but he’s been working with the Tulalip Tribes for the past decade. He’s a media developer in charge of all the technological aspects of the Tribes: managing the website, creating weather forecasts in Lushootseed, and anything that helps to reconcile the language with the technology of today.

“Technology has changed,” said Sienko. “So we have to create new words for modern life, and in doing so that’s going to help preserve the language.”

For example, tqad ti səxʷč̓əɬab means “turn off the TV.” And x̌alalikʷ čəd ʔal ti səxʷʔayilali means “I am typing on the computer.”

Sienko is confident that Lushootseed won’t go extinct any time soon. “All the Lushootseed-speaking tribes are really putting in a concerted effort, and they are starting to work together more readily,” he explained.

Ultimately, it is up to the next generation to keep Lushootseed alive. That’s why Maria Martin does her work.

“The kids inspire me to get up every day and come into work,” she said. “Next year they might go onto kindergarten and forget all about me. But for that little bit there was something there. Maybe they’ll have the chance to take away what I took away.”

RadioActive is KUOW’s program for high school students. This story was produced in RadioActive’s Spring Workshop. Listen to RadioActive stories, subscribe to the RadioActive podcast and stay in touch on Facebook and Twitter.

Senators Introduce Bipartisan Bill to Promote Preservation of Native American Languages

Press release, United States Senate

WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Senators Tom Udall (D-N.M.), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.), Jon Tester (D-Mont.), Al Franken (D-Minn.), and Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) announced they have introduced the Esther Martinez Native American Languages Preservation Act, a bill to provide grants to Native American language educational organizations to preserve disappearing Native languages in Indian Country. The bill reauthorizes the Native American Languages Program until 2020, and includes improvements to expand the program’s eligibility to smaller-sized classes and allow for longer grant periods.

The senators’ bill reauthorizes legislation that first passed in 2006 with Udall’s leadership, named for the Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo master storyteller Esther Martinez. The Esther Martinez Native American Preservation Act amends the Native American Languages Act of 1990 to strengthen Native language education by creating and funding Native language nests, Native language survival schools, and Native American language restoration programs. The program’s current authorization expired in 2012, but annual appropriations have continued during the lapse.

“Esther Martinez was one of New Mexico’s strongest advocates for preserving Native heritage and language, and I’m proud to introduce this legislation to honor and continue her work. Grants through the Esther Martinez Native American Languages Preservation Act help families and communities keep their languages alive, preserving the deep history and culture behind them,” Udall said. “Language education is about more than tradition; it fosters pride and an interconnectedness between generations and has been linked to higher academic achievement among Native youth. I’m pleased to support the continuation and expansion of these important grants in New Mexico and across the country.”

“Preserving Native language is central to cultural identity, and that’s what Esther Martinez fought for,” Heinrich said. “Languages like Keres, Tewa, Tiwa, Towa, Zuni, Diné, Eastern Apache and Western Apache, make us a stronger, more culturally rich and historically grounded nation. Simultaneously, the preservation and instruction of these languages raises high school graduation rates and college enrollment for tribal students. Teaching and preserving these languages should be a central educational priority. This bill helps to achieve that goal.”

“The spoken language of our Native peoples is the thread that weaves together generations, enriching tribal communities and strengthening their sovereignty and culture,” said Heitkamp. “Throughout North Dakota, we have seen the benefits of enabling Native American children to learn their native languages – helping them understand their history and culture while also giving them the tools they need to learn and grow. This bipartisan bill will enable these critical programs continue to give Native American children the head start they deserve while also helping make sure their sacred bonds and ancestral stories are protected and strengthened for future generations.”

“Preserving native languages connects students with generations of rich history and culture,” Tester said. “This bill strengthens cultural identity, helps keep students in school, and preserves the vibrant history of Indian Country. We need to act to ensure the survival of native languages before it is too late.”

“Language is key to maintaining cultural heritage,” said Franken. “The Native American Languages Program promotes learning of Dakota, Ojibwe, and other languages throughout Indian Country. This legislation is about not only teaching the words themselves but also passing along the history and culture those words represent.”

“Once nearly extinct, the Hawaiian language lives today through thousands of speakers in Hawai‘i and across the country,” Schatz said. “Visiting schools in Hawai‘i, I have seen first-hand how critical Native language schools and programs are in preserving the Hawaiian language and culture. Our legislation will help strengthen language programs and ensure the Hawaiian language and many other indigenous languages continue to thrive for generations to come.”

Based on recommendations from tribes and the administration, the senators included improvements to the program in this bill to reduce the class size eligibility for the grants and allow longer grant periods of up to five years. The bill reduces the number of students required for eligibility from 10 to five for Native American language nests, which provide childcare and instruction for children up to age seven and their parents. The bill also reduces the class size required for eligibility from 15 to 10 students for Native language survival schools, which aim for their students to achieve Native language fluency, and provide teacher training and development to support successful language learning. The urgent need to protect and preserve Native American languages is clear and applications for grants through the program roughly doubled from fiscal year 2013 to 2014, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.

Lushootseed 101 offered at Northwest Indian College

Lushootseed 101 offered at Northwest Indian College through Winter, January 7 through March 27.

Classes are Monday-Thursday (with an online lesson on Fridays) at the Tulalip Administration Building Room 263 – 3:30-4:20

This is a great opportunity for anyone working with our youth to become familiar with the language and help expose our youth to the hearing it spoken within the community!

Language factors into race for Navajo president

by FELICIA FONSECA, Associated Press

FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (AP) – Chris Deschene says he has the resume to preside over the country’s largest American Indian reservation. He’s a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, served in the Marines, owns a private law practice, and aims to defend tribal tradition in the Navajo Nation’s top elected post.

But his critics say he’s missing at least one thing, and it’s crucial. They say he doesn’t know how to speak Navajo fluently and should be disqualified from the presidential race because it is a requirement for candidates under tribal law. Deschene says fluency is a matter of opinion and that his language skills are getting better every day.

The issue came to a head when several Navajo citizens and presidential candidates filed grievances against Deschene, saying he shouldn’t appear on the ballot in November’s general election. The challenges were dismissed this week as being untimely or lacking standing, but they can be appealed to the tribe’s Supreme Court.

The Navajo language is a vital part of the tribe’s culture, most commonly spoken among elderly Navajo people as their first language and less so among younger generations. Most tribal members grow up hearing it at home and in prayers and songs recited during ceremonies. It is perhaps most well-known outside the reservation for its use during World War II in a code that the Japanese couldn’t break.

When Navajos sign up to run for tribal president, they attest to being fluent in the language. Kimmeth Yazzie of the Navajo Election Administration says the document is taken at face value, and election officials aren’t allowed to investigate the qualifications. That authority is delegated to the tribe’s Office of Hearings and Appeals when candidates for the same office file a challenge within a certain timeframe.

Deschene, 43, said he has never misled voters into believing he thoroughly knows the language. He speaks Navajo in online advertisements, in the homes of elders and says he’s well-versed in traditional songs and ceremonies.

“I’ve made a commitment to the language, and I’ve stated a number of times that my personal goal is to be completely fluent by the end of my first term,” said Deschene, of LeChee on the western side of the reservation.

Percy Deal, one of Deschene’s critics on the language issue, commended Deschene for his willingness to learn Navajo but said he should become fluent and seek office again in four years. Deschene should understand as a lawyer, former Democratic nominee for Arizona secretary of state and onetime state representative that he shouldn’t skirt the law, Deal said.

“The laws have to apply to everybody,” he said. “Nobody is above the law.”

Determining whether a person is fluent isn’t easy, said Michele Kiser, who teaches Navajo at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque. She said teachers can take a proficiency test that includes speaking, reading and writing, but there is not a set of defined parameters for determining fluency.

“Fluency is a continuum, really,” she said.

Some 169,000 people speak Navajo at home, more than any other American Indian language, according to census figures released in 2011. But Kiser said that data doesn’t show how many are considered fluent speakers.

Deschene came in second to former Navajo President Joe Shirley Jr. in the tribe’s primary election last month among 17 candidates, earning him a spot in the general election. Traditional, conservative voters tend to choose candidates who can speak Navajo, understand them and who have a strong cultural upbringing, said Manley Begay, who is Navajo and a professor in applied indigenous studies at Northern Arizona University.

“Clearly there were some of the traditionalists supporting Chris Deschene, partly because of his appeal and youthfulness and also some of his ideas and thoughts might resonate with them,” Begay said.

The grievances filed against Deschene were the first over the language requirements, said Richie Nez, chief hearing officer for the Office of Hearings and Appeals.

Other presidential candidates have been challenged on term limits and residency, though living or having a continual presence on the reservation is no longer required.

Shirley lost a bid four years ago to seek a third, consecutive term because Navajo law limits presidents to two back-to-back terms. Shirley argued that Navajos have the right to freely choose their leaders under traditional law.

A presidential candidate in 2002 argued that he met residency requirements for the job despite living off the reservation because his umbilical cord was buried there, forever tying him to the land. Edward T. Begay’s name was placed on the primary ballot as a matter of fairness, after the tribe’s high court determined all candidates were not treated equally.

Video: Last Fluent Wukchumni Speaker Fights to Save Her Language

New York TimesThis screen capture shows Marie Wilcox speaking Wukchumni. — New York Times
This screen capture shows Marie Wilcox speaking Wukchumni.

Indian Country Today, 8/24/14

A recent short documentary by Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee for the New York Times profiles Marie Wilcox, of the Wukchumni, a Yokuts Tribe native to Central California.

Wilcox, who was born on Thanksgiving Day in 1933, grew up speaking mostly Wukchumni.

“I left my Indian language behind when my grandma died,” she says in the video. “I didn’t speak the language anymore until my sisters started to teach the kids. Hearing the girls trying to speak their language again made me want to learn again, and I started remembering.”

Her daughter, Jennifer Malone, explains how Wilcox would write words on whatever scraps of paper she had lying around.

“I was very surprised that she could remember all that,” Malone says in the vide. “She just started writing down her words on envelopes and papers.”

Wilcox gathered those scraps of paper up and started typing them slowly into a computer to create a Wukchumni dictionary. It took Wilcox and Malone about seven years to complete the dictionary. Now, Wilcox’s great-grandson, Donovan Treglown, is helping her record the dictionary.

Even Wilcox isn’t sure what the future holds for her language.

“I’m uncertain about my language and who wants to keep it alive, just a few—it’s sad,” she says. “It seems weird that I am the last one. It’ll just be gone one of these days maybe, I don’t know.”

But she isn’t alone, the tribe uses the dictionary Wilcox and her daughter created for weekly language classes.

Cherokee Language Evolving: Syllabary Now Available in Braille

Cherokee NationImage of Cherokee in Braille, which is now available from the Commonwealth Braille and Talking Book Cooperative. — Cherokee Nation
Image of Cherokee in Braille, which is now available from the Commonwealth Braille and Talking Book Cooperative.

By: Cherokee Nation; Source: Indian Country Today

The Cherokee Nation now has its written language, the Cherokee syllabary, available in Braille.

“All Cherokees, regardless of any physical impairment, should be able to read and understand documents and signage in their native language,” said Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Bill John Baker. “Our language programs keep evolving to meet every Cherokee’s needs, whether they are an elder, a young person or someone who is visually or otherwise impaired.”

The tribe’s fluent Cherokee speakers in the Cherokee Language Program partnered with the Commonwealth Braille and Talking Book Cooperative earlier this year to develop a Cherokee version of Braille. Dot patterns were derived from the 86-character Cherokee syllabary.

“It’s exciting that our Cherokee citizens who are visually impaired can now read stories in their first language,” said Roy Boney, language program manager. “We provided copies of our Cherokee syllabary, sample text and other items to be able to make Braille in Cherokee a reality. We want to stay in the forefront by offering the Cherokee language on as many written tools as possible to preserve and protect our native tongue.”

The Cherokee writing system has been in use since its invention by Sequoyah in 1821. Every major technology since then, ranging from the printing press, typewriter and word processor to fonts on the latest computers and smart phones, has adopted Cherokee.

The tribe has translated Cherokee for Apple, Microsoft and Google products.

RELATED: Google it in Cherokee

Cherokee was initially encoded into Unicode, the international standards body that governs how all written languages are used on computer operating systems, in 2000. With the large volume of languages in the Unicode system, however, it wasn’t until now that Cherokee Braille was made compatible with the Braille system.

Now that Cherokee Braille is available, the raised, physical tactile print can be made using special printers.

The Commonwealth Braille and Talking Book Cooperative also developed a program that will convert typed Cherokee syllabary into print-ready Braille so that existing Cherokee documents can easily be converted into tactile books for the blind and visually impaired.

For more information about Cherokee Braille, visit the CBTBC’s website.

Century-old Handwritten Letters Translated from Cherokee for Yale University

Source: Native News Network

TAHLEQUAH, OKLAHOMA – Over 2,000 Century-old journals, political messages and medicinal formulas handwritten in Cherokee and archived at Yale University are being translated for the first time.

Cherokee century-old handwritten letters — Cherokee Their researchers and linguistic specialists have helped adapt 21st century technologies with their traditional culture.

The Cherokee Nation is among a small few, if not the only tribe, that has a language translation department who contracts with Apple, Microsoft, Google and Ivy League universities for Cherokee translation projects.

One of the tribe’s 13 translators, Durbin Feeling, is transcribing some 2,000 documents at Yale’s Beinecke Library, to catalogue and eventually make public.

The documents, spanning from the late 19th to mid-20th century, are from the collection of the late Jack and Anna Kilpatrick, Cherokee researchers.

“Native American communities have endured some of America’s most sustained forms of cultural oppression, and contemporary Indian nations, tribal members and supporters work tirelessly to reverse generations of assimilation-orientated designs. The work of linguists and language speakers in such efforts is particularly essential, especially in keeping alive and vibrant the languages of the first Americans,”

said Ned Blackhawk, Yale professor of history and American studies, and advisory member at Yale’s Native American Cultural Center.

“The Cherokee Nation works at the leading edge of such linguistic activism. Their researchers and linguistic specialists have helped adapt 21st century technologies with their traditional culture and have developed among the most advanced pedagogical practices in the nation,”

Blackhawk said.

The Cherokee Nation translation department is also currently working with museums in Oklahoma and finishing up its largest translation of 500,000 words for Microsoft.

“Our speakers are taking Cherokee history, in the form of our language, and preserving it for our future by incorporating our written alphabet into smart phones and computer language settings, making it possible for our youth to email entirely in Cherokee,”

Principal Chief Bill John Baker said.

“They are one of our most valuable resources, not only passing on their wisdom to our Cherokee Immersion students learning to speak, but for our future who will know more about our lives and way of thinking, revealed in all these translated archived manuscripts.”

Feeling’s first language is Cherokee. He has a master’s degree in linguistics from the University of California, Irvine, and honorary doctorate from Ohio State. He has traveled across the United States and Germany sharing how to speak, read and write the 85 character Cherokee syllabary. He’s also taught Cherokee language and culture at the University of Oklahoma and Northeastern State University.

“Universities and museums often have all these documents and nobody to read them, to tell them what they say,”

Feeling said.

“They’ll choose the ones they’re curious about and let me translate, which benefits us all.”

The Cherokee Nation has a comprehensive language program that includes community language classes, online language courses, employee language classes, a language technology program, an office of translation and an immersion school for preschool through sixth grade and partners with Northeastern State University on a degree program for Cherokee language.

In addition to these initiatives, the Cherokee Nation also shows a strong dedication to language by including protection of language in the Chief’s oath of office, council resolutions supporting language and a quantity of signs on Cherokee Nation property that are written in the Cherokee syllabary.

A Village Invents a Language All Its Own

Linguist Carmel O'Shannessy, back left, with Gracie White Napaljarri, who is a Warlpiri speaker but children in her extended family speak both Warlpiri and Light Warlpiri. Photo: Noressa White via The New York Times — Linguist Carmel O’Shannessy, back left, with Gracie White Napaljarri, who is a Warlpiri speaker but children in her extended family speak both Warlpiri and Light Warlpiri. Photo: Noressa White via The New York Times

By NICHOLAS BAKALAR, The New York Times

There are many dying languages in the world. But at least one has recently been born, created by children living in a remote village in northern Australia.

Carmel O’Shannessy, a linguist at the University of Michigan, has been studying the young people’s speech for more than a decade and has concluded that they speak neither a dialect nor the mixture of languages called a creole, but a new language with unique grammatical rules.

The language, called Warlpiri rampaku, or Light Warlpiri, is spoken only by people under 35 in Lajamanu, an isolated village of about 700 people in Australia’s Northern Territory. In all, about 350 people speak the language as their native tongue. Dr. O’Shannessy has published several studies of Light Warlpiri, the most recent in the June issue of Language.

“Many of the first speakers of this language are still alive,” said Mary Laughren, a research fellow in linguistics at the University of Queensland in Australia, who was not involved in the studies. One reason Dr. O’Shannessy’s research is so significant, she said, “is that she has been able to record and document a ‘new’ language in the very early period of its existence.”

Everyone in Lajamanu also speaks “strong” Warlpiri, an aboriginal language unrelated to English and shared with about 4,000 people in several Australian villages. Many also speak Kriol, an English-based creole developed in the late 19th century and widely spoken in northern Australia among aboriginal people of many different native languages.

Lajamanu parents are happy to have their children learn English for use in the wider world, but eager to preserve Warlpiri as the language of their culture.

Lajamanu’s isolation may have something to do with the creation of a new way of speaking. The village is about 550 miles south of Darwin, and the nearest commercial center is Katherine, about 340 miles north. There are no completely paved roads.

An airplane, one of seven owned by Lajamanu Air, a community-managed airline, lands on the village’s dirt airstrip twice a week carrying mail from Katherine, and once a week a truck brings food and supplies sold in the village’s only store. A diesel generator and a solar energy plant supply electricity.

The village was established by the Australian government in 1948, without the consent of the people who would inhabit it. The native affairs branch of the federal government, concerned about overcrowding and drought in Yuendumu, forcibly removed 550 people from there to what would become Lajamanu. At least twice, the group walked all the way back to Yuendumu, only to be retransported when they arrived.

Contact with English is quite recent. “These people were hunters and gatherers, roaming over a territory,” said Dr. O’Shannessy. “But then along came white people, cattle stations, mines, and so on. People were kind of forced to stop hunting and gathering.”

By the 1970s, villagers had resigned themselves to their new home, and the Lajamanu Council had been set up as a self-governing community authority, the first in the Northern Territory. In the 2006 census, almost half the population was under 20, and the Australian government estimates that by 2026 the number of indigenous people 15 to 64 will increase to 650 from about 440 today.

Dr. O’Shannessy, who started investigating the language in 2002, spends three to eight weeks a year in Lajamanu. She speaks and understands both Warlpiri and Light Warlpiri, but is not fluent.

People in Lajamanu often engage in what linguists call code-switching, mixing languages together or changing from one to another as they speak. And many words in Light Warlpiri are derived from English or Kriol.

But Light Warlpiri is not simply a combination of words from different languages. Peter Bakker, an associate professor of linguistics at Aarhus University in Denmark who has published widely on language development, says Light Warlpiri cannot be a pidgin, because a pidgin has no native speakers. Nor can it be a creole, because a creole is a new language that combines two separate tongues.

“These young people have developed something entirely new,” he said. “Light Warlpiri is clearly a mother tongue.”

Dr. O’Shannessy offers this example, spoken by a 4-year-old: Nganimpa-ng gen wi-m si-m worm mai aus-ria. (We also saw worms at my house.)

It is easy enough to see several nouns derived from English. But the -ria ending on “aus” (house) means “in” or “at,” and it comes from Warlpiri. The -m ending on the verb “si” (see) indicates that the event is either happening now or has already happened, a “present or past but not future” tense that does not exist in English or Warlpiri. This is a way of talking so different from either Walpiri or Kriol that it constitutes a new language.

The development of the language, Dr. O’Shannessy says, was a two-step process. It began with parents using baby talk with their children in a combination of the three languages. But then the children took that language as their native tongue by adding radical innovations to the syntax, especially in the use of verb structures, that are not present in any of the source languages.

Why a new language developed at this time and in this place is not entirely clear. It was not a case of people needing to communicate when they have no common language, a situation that can give rise to pidgin or creole.

Dr. Bakker says that new languages are discovered from time to time, but until now no one has been there at the beginning to see a language develop from children’s speech.

Dr. O’Shannessy suggests that subtle forces may be at work. “I think that identity plays a role,” she said. “After children created the new system, it has since become a marker of their identity as being young Warlpiri from the Lajamanu Community.”

The language is now so well established among young people that there is some question about the survival of strong Warlpiri. “How long the kids will keep multilingualism, I don’t know,” Dr. O’Shannessy said. “The elders would like to preserve Warlpiri, but I’m not sure it will be. Light Warlpiri seems quite robust.”

Technology aids Cherokee language re-emergence

By Ryan Saylor, thecitywire.com

A once dying language last modernized nearly 200 years ago has been given new life in the 21st century, with some hoping it pushes beyond 3,000 the number of people who are fluent in the Native American tongue.

The comeback of the Cherokee language, translated into written form in the early 1800s, has been fueled by the work of the Cherokee Nation, based in Tahlequah, Okla.

According to Roy Boney, a language technology specialist with the tribe, the push for a reemergence of the language was introduced by tribal leaders, who introduced the Cherokee Nation Immersion Charter School for students from 3-years-old to 7th grade.

“I was hired several years ago to develop materials for the school,” Boney said. “They started off in (pre-Kindergarten) and they got to the older grades and needed some technology.”

In searching for solution to the school’s technology problem, Boney and his colleagues in the tribe set out on a mission to find technology that could be blended with the Cherokee language.

“We started searching for a solution to that problem and we discovered the Apple included a Cherokee font and keyboard on their desktops since 2003,” he said.

That led the tribe to work with Apple for inclusion of the language on both the iPhone and iPad devices, Boney explained.

CHEROKEE ON WINDOWS
In continuing the tribe’s quest for more and better technology for immersion classrooms, a partnership was developed with Microsoft to translate the Windows operating system into Cherokee.

“We learned about localization — to translate their software into another language,” Boney said. “We started that project last year and Windows 8 came out in Cherokee.”

According to Carla Hurd, the Local Language Program’s senior program manager at Microsoft, Cherokee was the first Native American language to be included in the operating system.

“There are some indigenous languages, like Maori in New Zealand and Welsh, but the point of Cherokee is it’s the first Native American language we’ve ever done,” she said. “It’s very notable.”

Lois Leach was one of the native Cherokee translators to work on the project. She said the work was long and exhausting, lasting for nine months. Leach said she clocked around 2,000 hours on the project, which she worked on during evenings and weekends in addition to working her full-time job.

‘FOLDER’ ISSUES
Leach said she and other translators were initially unaware of how big of a project they were involved in.

“We really didn’t think it would be this widespread,” she said. “At first, it was just a project were working on. But when we finally did see when it was launched into the computer itself, it was really something. We could not see that far, really, I don’t think.”

One of the challenges faced by the many translators, both Cherokee staff and volunteers, was developing new words and phrases in Cherokee for simple objects on a computer.

“This was really (about) getting into the meanings of things and what we had to do to guide somebody through the computer. It was not that easy,” Leach said.

An example of an English word without a Cherokee equivalent was “folder.”

“Folder — it just said you are putting papers in a container,” she said.

IMMERSION TRAINING
Boney said when all was said and done, Leach and the team of translators provided Microsoft with nearly 180,000 terms and phrases that were included in Windows 8.

He said even though the operating system is being used in the immersion school and is available for free for Microsoft users, there is still amazement by individuals in and out of the tribe regarding Windows 8 in Cherokee.

“People are in awe to see our language in technology,” he said.

While the Windows 8 project was a long, grueling project, this is just the first of many projects to spread the usage of the Cherokee Nation’s native tongue beyond its 3,000 speakers.

The translation team is working on projects with Google, Facebook and Apple in order to expand the language beyond eastern Oklahoma and parts of North Caroline, Boney said.

TRIBAL HISTORY
He believes the tribe’s history is one of the reasons Cherokee is seeing a resurgence as a language.

“What’s been interesting about a lot of this work is historically, the Cherokees were unique in that we had one man (Sequoyah) develop the writing system. That developed a curiosity in the language. A lot of people have heard about it and fascinated by it. We have our own writing system and we have a unique writing system,” Boney said. “I think that’s part of the appeal, is getting that writing system into technology because it is unique.”

Hurd said she was unable to disclose whether Microsoft would be releasing any more Native American language versions of Windows due to company policies.

“We’re always looking to expand our language set, whether that’s Native American or not,” she added.

Leach said she was thrilled to be a part of the Windows 8 project and was looking forward to more translation projects in the future.

“To me, I guess that’s really a good thing because it’s needed in our culture because they were getting to where they were forgetting it,” she said.

Julie Hubbard, communications supervisor with the Cherokee Nation, said individuals across the Fort Smith and eastern Oklahoma region interested in learning Cherokee could attend a class from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., in Evening Shade, Okla., on Monday evenings from now through May 6. Classes are free and open to the public.

Link here for more information on technology and the Cherokee language.