From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Mon Dec 1 07:25:52 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2003 00:25:52 -0700 Subject: Latin Capital Letter Turned T/K? In-Reply-To: <00d901c3b62f$d7b3aa60$5ce4fbc1@gktg001> Message-ID: i did not see any such character referenced in the Languages vol 17 of the HBNAI. this seems surprising since they are one and the same entity from which the BAE originated. there a few turned letters but not the ones you are looking for...Boas shows /L/. phil UofA, ILAT On Nov 28, 2003, at 7:42 PM, Don Osborn wrote: > Here are two follow-ups to the questions re particular letters used in > some > transcriptions of some native American languages. There were other > postings > but not a whole lot more info so I'll leave the issue with this. DZO > > 1. > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Peter Constable" > To: > Sent: Friday, November 28, 2003 6:02 PM > Subject: RE: Latin Capital Letter Turned T/K? > > >> -----Original Message----- >> From: unicode-bounce at unicode.org [mailto:unicode-bounce at unicode.org] > On Behalf >> Of D. Starner > >> Has anyone else seen these characters, and >> could provide material for a submission? > > I looked through a lot of materials back in the spring for phonetic > symbols, and didn't record any instances of these. > >> How about the Latin Letters Tresillo and Cuatrillo? Any movement >> on that front? > > I've had them on my list of things to propose. I was trying to find > more > samples of tresillo to get a better idea of range of typographic > variation, and had just started on that when that work got interrupted > by other life events such as moving. I still need to follow up on that. > >> Oh, yes, pictures of the characters... > > Some samples of cuatrillo and tresillo can be found at > http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php? > site_id=nrsi&item_id=RecentCuatrilloUse > > > Peter > > Peter Constable > Globalization Infrastructure and Font Technologies > Microsoft Windows Division > > > 2. > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Peter Constable" > To: > Sent: Friday, November 28, 2003 8:27 PM > Subject: RE: Latin Capital Letter Turned T/K? > >> -----Original Message----- >> From: unicode-bounce at unicode.org [mailto:unicode-bounce at unicode.org] > On Behalf >> Of jameskass at att.net > >> Aren't these turned letters (and several others) used in the Fraser >> script? > > They sure are. > > > Peter > > Peter Constable > Globalization Infrastructure and Font Technologies > Microsoft Windows Division > From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Mon Dec 1 19:13:32 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2003 12:13:32 -0700 Subject: A healthy sign for Yakama language (fwd) Message-ID: A healthy sign for Yakama language Middle-school classes help students keep their culture alive Monday, December 1, 2003 SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/150533_signlanguage01.html By PHILIP FEROLITO YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC TOPPENISH -- Students gaze attentively at Loretta Selam-White as she motions her hand away from her body in a gesture that translates "Go my son" in the Yakama language. Surrounding Selam-White in a large circle, the students follow her lead, listening to the instructions on how to sign. "Go my son," she says, beginning the first verse of the song again. "It should be an inside hand -- the back of your hand should be facing you. "Go my son and earn your feather," Selam-White says, as the 26 students follow her every move further into the first verse. "You don't want your feather here because you don't wear your feather here," she reminds them while pointing to the side of her head. "You want your feather to stand tall back here," she says, holding up two fingers at the crown of her head. Selam-White takes the students through it again before going to the next verse. "Make your people proud of you," she says, turning her body to the right with arm extended as if she was pointing to a group of people. Students replicate every move as the song plays on a tape recorder. Selam-White's special visit adds another cultural piece to Rosemary Miller's class at Toppenish Middle School, where students in grades four through eight are learning the Yakama language. "It's a healing; it's a soothing that they can drift into," says Selam-White, who has taught Yakama sign language for more than 15 years. "They'll be so proud when they're performing it." Eighth-grader Cassandra Wesley, whose signing lessons began at home when she was 10, says the class is a place where she feels comfortable. "Actually, I feel pretty strong about this," she says. "I'm going to try and encourage my little nephews and cousins" to get involved in the class. Signing is integral to the Yakama language, she says, noting that it's still used by some in ceremonies where talking is forbidden. Today, signing has become more of a cultural performance. "And the smiles on those old people's faces; it just touches the elders' hearts," says Selam-White. The language class, which incorporates other aspects of Yakama culture, is open to middle school students and meets every Tuesday and Thursday. Its aim is to keep the Yakama language and culture alive. "There is a lot of interest," Miller says. "It's neat to open it (to non-Indians), because they are excited about our culture." There are many dialects of the Yakama language, because the Yakamas are a confederation of 14 tribes, and Miller says she tries to make it all available to students. "We just encourage them to learn as much as they can and I think that's how our language is going to be saved," says Miller, who has taught with the Toppenish School District for 16 years and recently began teaching the Yakama language. "We're trying to pull in as many elders as we can to come in and teach our culture." © 1998-2003 Seattle Post-Intelligencer From coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU Mon Dec 1 19:35:12 2003 From: coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU (David Lewis) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2003 11:35:12 -0800 Subject: Fwd: [sovernspeakout] FW: White man's language from Turkey Message-ID: > > >First farmers planted the seeds of language > >By Tim Radford in London >November 29, 2003 > >http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/11/28/1069825991027.html > >At last the answer in black and white, or beltz and zuri if you happen to be >Basque, or noir and blanc, if you are French: you owe the words to >Hittite-speaking farmers from Anatolia, who invented agriculture and spread >their words as they sowed their seed 9500 years ago. > >Languages, like people, are related. Russell Gray, of Auckland University, >reports in the magazine Nature that he and a colleague decided to treat >language as if it was DNA and compared selected words from 87 languages to >build an evolutionary tree of the Indo-European languages. This could help >solve an old argument: who picked up the original language and began to >spread gradually evolving versions of it across Europe and Asia? > >For decades the focus has been on a tribe of nomad herders called the >Kurgans from central Asia, who domesticated the horse 6000 years ago and >invaded Europe. > >"It [language] spread not by the sword of conquest, but by the plough," Dr >Gray said. > >Others have argued that the Indo-European family of languages must have >spread with barley and lentils - the first agriculturalists in the Fertile >Crescent would have exported not just their techniques, but also the words >that went with them. > >Dr Gray chose 2449 words from 87 languages, including English, Lithuanian, >Gujarati, Romany, Walloon, Breton, Hindi and Pennsylvania Dutch, and began a >series of comparisons to build up a pattern of descent. > >The choice of words was critical. "For example, English is a veritable fruit >salad of a language, with chunks of vocabulary from the Celts, Romans, >Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Vikings, Normans, and slices of Latin, French, Greek, >and Italian tossed with some more recent garnishes from Arabic, Persian, >Turkish and Hindi. There is even the odd Polynesian borrowing, like tattoo," >he said. > >"Ninety nine per cent of words in the Oxford English Dictionary are in fact >borrowings from other languages." > >But English has a basic vocabulary of 200 words - star, dog, earth, blood, >woman, year and so on - that can be linked to an original shared language. > >The answer is that words were on the move long before horses. Dr Gray's >language tree ended with its roots in Anatolia in modern Turkey about >7500BC, when villagers speaking a form of Hittite kindled pahhur, or fire, >to boil watar, or water, before setting out on pad, or foot, to spread the >good word. > >Dr Gray was trained as a biologist, not a linguist, which some scientists >said could explain the generally cautious reception this week's announcement >in Nature received from linguists. > >"Partly, I think they are irritated," said Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, an >expert on historic population migrations and a professor emeritus at >Stanford Medical School. > >"It is a very good paper." > >The Guardian, The Boston Globe > > From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 4 17:35:42 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2003 10:35:42 -0700 Subject: CALL FOR PAPERS: Workshop on American Indigenous Languages (fwd) Message-ID: CALL FOR PAPERS Workshop on American Indigenous Languages Santa Barbara, CA April 30 - May 2, 2004 The Linguistics department at the University of California, Santa Barbara announces its seventh annual Workshop on American Indigenous Languages (WAIL), which provides a forum for the discussion of theoretical and descriptive linguistic studies of indigenous languages of the Americas. Anonymous abstracts are invited for talks on any topic in linguistics. Talks will be 20 minutes, followed by 10 minutes for discussion.  Individuals may submit abstracts for one single and one co-authored paper.  Abstracts should be 500 words or less and can be submitted by hard copy or email. For hard copy submissions, please send five copies of your abstract and a 3x5 card with the following information: (1) name; (2) affiliation; (3) mailing address; (4) phone number; (5) email address; (6) title of your paper. Send hard copy submissions to:    Workshop on American Indigenous Languages    Department of Linguistics    University of California, Santa Barbara    Santa Barbara, CA 93106 Email submissions are encouraged.  Include the information from the 3x5 card (above) in the body of the email message with the abstract as an attachment. Please limit your abstracts to the following formats:  PDF, RTF, or Microsoft Word document. Send email submissions to:    wail at linguistics.ucsb.edu DEADLINE FOR RECEIPT OF ABSTRACTS:  January 15, 2004 Notification of acceptance will be by email by February 15, 2004. General Information:  Santa Barbara is situated on the Pacific Ocean near the Santa Ynez mountains.  The UCSB campus is located near the Santa Barbara airport.  Participants may also choose to fly into LAX airport in Los Angeles which is approximately 90 miles south of the campus.  Shuttle buses run between LAX and Santa Barbara.   Information about hotel accommodations will be posted on the web. For further information contact the conference coordinator at wail at linguistics.ucsb.edu or (805) 893-3776 or check out our website at http://orgs.sa.ucsb.edu/nailsg/ From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 4 17:50:22 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2003 10:50:22 -0700 Subject: CULTURE: Group to Develop Internet Tools With Indigenous Worldview (fwd) Message-ID: CULTURE: Group to Develop Internet Tools With Indigenous Worldview Marty Logan http://ipsnews.net/interna.asp?idnews=21404 MONTREAL, Dec 4 (IPS) - Type ”sacred circle” into the Internet's 'Google' search engine and you will uncover hundreds of thousands of references. Now, one group wants the World Wide Web itself to function much more like the circle, whose concept of balance is integral to many of the world's indigenous peoples. Led by Frits Pannekoek, director of information resources at the University of Calgary, the team is developing tools that would search the Web and organise its information using an ”indigenous way of knowing”. ''The real question is,” says Pannekoek in a telephone interview, ”can the Internet or the World Wide Web be culturally neutral, or at least sufficiently neutral that an alternate world perspective can use it to move in the directions that those world knowledge systems want to move?” ”Because if it isn't and it can't become so, then I think we've got ourselves a bit of a problem.” While Pannekoek argues that simply working to connect indigenous peoples to the Internet is a shortsighted approach that could harm their cultures, aboriginal peoples are split on how to approach the technology. In the run-up to next week's World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva, Switzerland, it has become clear that some indigenous groups want to have a greater online presence; others stress that they must have the power to control their information, and then they will decide themselves the best way to communicate their knowledge. Pannekoek, whose team includes representatives of Cree and Blood indigenous groups in the western Canadian Province of Alberta, compares the Internet to radio, television and other major new technologies. ”They all had transformative impact,” he says. ”Transformation isn't always positive.” ”In particular the hope is that the (new) software will appeal to youth and will reconnect or strengthen their connections to the worldview of their communities,” he wrote in an August research proposal. ”If such software is not developed, the lament of the Blood elders will be realised in the next generation. The young people will truly be 'new people' without real roots.” Next week hundreds of indigenous people and their supporters from around the world will gather for the four-day Global Forum of Indigenous Peoples and the Information Society, being held alongside the WSIS. The meeting's agenda includes an ”independent expert paper” by Marcos Matias Alonso, a member of the U.N. Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. He writes that indigenous peoples, ”do not yet equitably participate in building the future information society. Consequently, indigenous visions and philosophies do not contribute to its developing concept and structure”. Matias Alonso calls for recognising that, ”indigenous traditional knowledge does not automatically belong to the so-called public domain”. ”Regulations on the use of indigenous knowledge by third parties have to be developed, in cooperation with indigenous peoples, fully recognising indigenous customary laws and protocols for sharing, disseminating and communicating indigenous knowledge and its applications,” he adds. One Maori researcher says the focus in New Zealand should be putting the Maori language on the Internet, rather than trying to ”force” the technology in a certain direction. ”If we have sites in our own language, everything else will follow. Culture follows language,” said Te Taka Keegan from the University of Waikato in Hamilton, in a telephone interview. He said he is beginning to see many websites, both indigenous and non-indigenous, employing Maori symbols and other images. ”That's something that's happened without anybody saying, 'look, we're Maori, we should be doing it like this'. It's just something that's kind of happened naturally,” said Keegan. ”It means that there are some inherent influences in our culture that are coming through on the Web . it's quite good to see that it's not all total suppression; it's not total obliteration.” The increasingly multimedia nature of the technology might also shape the Internet into a better fit with indigenous cultures, he suggests. ”An important thing in the Maori culture is the face to face contact ('kanohi ki te kanohi') and the Internet definitely takes that away from you, but . in the future when we're using video links maybe it will return”. ”Maybe the technology will catch up to our culture.” Another group suggests that putting culture first could even lead to indigenous peoples rejecting the technology as it is now organised. ”To think that indigenous peoples' problems with communication will be solved by just connecting them to the Internet and the digital era is another form of colonialism,” said Nilo Cayuqueo, a Mapuche activist and writer from Argentina and co-director of the Abya Yala Nexus, a native development network. ”What we are proposing is to have the rights to information and produce our own indigenous community media. Free software could help us in designing and customising our message according to our values and aspirations as peoples,” he added in an e-mail interview. Pannekoek says if his group receives funding, it could develop a prototype of the Internet tools by 2007. Their major features would include a new way of ”tagging” or digitally labelling information on the Web that would reflect Indigenous ways of seeing the world. Those ways, he adds -- quoting other researchers -- include: (1) knowledge of and belief in unseen powers in the ecosystem: and (2) knowledge that all things in the ecosystem are dependent on each other, and that sacred traditions and persons who know these traditions are responsible for teaching ''morals'' and ''ethics'' to practitioners, who are then given responsibility for this specialised knowledge and its dissemination. An innovative search tool or engine would display its ''finds'' in a form -- such as circles -- that would be innate to indigenous cultures, unlike the text-based tools that now dominate the Web. For example, not only would the outcome of a search be displayed differently, the parameters of the search would also be unique. ”One of the attributes of indigenous knowledge is a responsibility of the individual in the community to transmit, hold, nurture and release knowledge, so one (would have) to establish a tiered system of authorities that are controlled by communities,” according to Pannekoek. That could mean limiting control of indigenous knowledge to certain individuals, he adds, much like the way copyright is used to protect some information now. He says the indigenous people he is working with are ready to share their knowledge, if they can control how it is presented on the Internet. ”There's also a legend around in North America that says, 'the time will eventually come when the white man will need our knowledge. And he'll need it to understand his relationship to the environment, to the greater universe and to each other',” Pannekoek says. ”That still persists, and I've heard more than one (indigenous) person say 'maybe this is a way that our knowledge will assist mankind as a whole'.” (END/2003) From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 4 17:54:50 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2003 10:54:50 -0700 Subject: UB linguist searches for new meaning of Inca informational device (fwd) Message-ID: UB linguist searches for new meaning of Inca informational device University at Buffalo By DONNA LONGENECKER Reporter Assistant Editor http://www.buffalo.edu/reporter/vol35/vol35n14/articles/Brokaw.html Although the ancient Inca are renowned for their highly organized society and extraordinary skill in working with gold, stone and pottery, few are familiar with the khipu—an elaborate system of colored, knotted strings that many researchers believe to be primarily mnemonic in nature—like a rosary—and was used by the ancient conquerors to record census, tribute, genealogies and calendrical information. Because the Inca didn't employ a recognizable system of writing, researchers like Galen Brokaw, assistant professor in the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures in the College of Arts and Sciences, have focused on the khipu as a way of further illuminating Inca history and culture. Brokaw doesn't adhere to the strict view held by some researchers that the khipu is solely mnemonic in nature, instead maintaining the possibility that these intricate specimens are historiographic in nature. Deciphering the mysteries of the khipu, which consists of a primary cord from which hang pendants of cords, depends upon researchers discovering a Rosetta Stone of sorts that would allow them to decode the meaning of the cords and knots. Cord color and the direction of twist and ply of yarn appear to denote specific meanings, but whether or not the devices recorded more than statistical or mathematical information, such as poetry or language, remains elusive to researchers, says Brokaw. He does believe, however, that some of the specimens—about 600 khipu survive in museums or private collections—do appear to be non-numerical. The khipu didn't originate with the Inca, explains Brokaw, and even today Andean shepherds can be seen using a form of khipu to record information about their flocks. "There's a certain kind of mystery about it that's intriguing," Brokaw says of the khipu, noting that while there is a tendency among some researchers to overly romanticize the devices as some kind of writing system, he believes—after reading the indigenous texts comprised, in part, of biographies of Inca kings—that it's easy to see how the khipu might have represented more complex, discursive structures than simply being records of tribute. In fact, Brokaw says the first step in understanding the khipu is "to recognize that it was linked to genres of Andean discourse, powerful discursive paradigms" that were retained by the indigenous chroniclers in the organizational structure they employed in writing down the lineage of the Inca kings. While these chroniclers wrote in the language of their Spanish conquerors, the discursive paradigms Brokaw refers to "do not simply dissolve and disappear when translated into Spanish," he says. One chronicler in particular, he points out, attributes the principal source of all his information to the khipu. "One of the questions that colonial chroniclers attempted to answer about the khipu was whether or not it constituted writing, and much of the debate today centers around the same issue. Based on a selective and literal interpretation of colonial sources and a limited understanding of archaeological specimens, many scholars have argued that the khipu was not writing, but rather a mnemonic device similar to a rosary," says Brokaw in his paper "The Poetics of Khipu Historiography: Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala and the Khipukamayuqs from Pacariqtambo," published recently in Latin American Research Review. Guaman Poma, writing around the beginning of the 17th century, is one of the Andean chroniclers who relied on khipu as his primary source of information. The numerical aspect of many of the khipu differs from Western numbering systems in that Andean societies used and viewed numeration as a way to define and organize themselves, as well as a way to achieve balance in all aspects of life—from the aesthetic to emotional and material concerns, explains Brokaw in "Khipu Numeracy and Alphabetic Literacy in the Andes," published in Colonial Latin American Review. Brokaw writes that the "complete decimal unit of 10, for example, is also a metaphor for the basic social groups called ayllus. "Furthermore, many colonial chronicles describe a decimal-based system used in the organization, administration and record keeping of the Inca empire, and the model of fives is also evident in the historical and geographical paradigms of Andean sociopolitics," he explains. Brokaw argues that Guaman Poma's work is shaped not only by European conventions of text, but also by an Andean conception of historical discourse. It is that Andean-influenced discourse, or poetics, that is shaping the Spanish chronicle of Inca kings that Brokaw believes establishes "an implicit link" between it and the khipu as its physical representation—indeed, as some type of text in and of itself. Brokaw's research is funded by a fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies. He is working on a book about the subject, titled "Reading, Writing and Arithmetic: The Andean Khipu and its Transcriptions." From coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU Thu Dec 4 20:17:19 2003 From: coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU (David Lewis) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2003 12:17:19 -0800 Subject: Fwd: Query: Native North American Internet Presence Message-ID: >Delivered-To: H-AmIndian at h-net.msu.edu >X-Sender: amindian at mail.h-net.msu.edu >X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 5.1.1 >Approved-By: "H-AmIndian (Joyce Ann Kievit)" >Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2003 07:50:17 -0700 >Reply-To: H-Net List for American Indian Studies >Sender: H-Net List for American Indian Studies >From: "H-AmIndian (Joyce Ann Kievit)" >Subject: Query: Native North American Internet Presence >To: H-AMINDIAN at H-NET.MSU.EDU > >Delivered-To: h-amindian at h-net.msu.edu >Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2003 01:39:15 -0500 >From: kristopher.meen at utoronto.ca >Subject: Native North American Internet Presence > >Greetings, > >My name is Kris Meen, a graduate student at the University of Toronto. I'm >doing a research paper on Native North Americans online. I'm currently >looking for Native presence (sites, message boards, blogs, etc) on the web, to >see what's out there. I've found a few sites, but also a lot of dead ends - a >long list from a couple years ago that I found turned up a lot of no longer >functioning addresses. Anyhow, my supervisor told me that the folks at the >American Indian Net service might have some leads. > >Thanks for any help you can provide, sincerely, > >Kris Meen From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 4 22:13:35 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2003 15:13:35 -0700 Subject: Under threat: an ancient tribe emerging from the forests (fwd) Message-ID: Under threat: an ancient tribe emerging from the forests By Paul Vallely 04 December 2003 http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/story.jsp?story=469848 The woman came out from the forest at the side of the road. She was stark naked, apart from a thong of braided red around her loins. She waved to stop the bus. As it slowed the passengers could see that delicately drawn patterns in white clay adorned her face and body. Those in the bus were fascinated, and wary. For tens of thousands of years the Jarawa people have lived in isolation in the rainforest of the Andaman Islands, remote in the Indian Ocean. Their reputation is of a hostile tribe ready to keep strangers at bay with bows and arrows. But now, for the first time, they have started to emerge from their forests. Nobody was quite sure what the woman wanted. No one among the Indian community speaks her language. And only one or two Jarawa speak Hindi. But she held out her hands as if requesting something. The Jarawa are ethnically distinct from the Indians who run their island. Anthropologists suggest they are descended from the first humans to come out of Africa - DNA tests suggest their closest relatives may be the bushmen of the Kalahari. It is possible they have lived in the Andamans for as long as 60,000 years. Throughout that time these nomadic hunter-gatherers have survived in bands of 40 to 50, hunting pig and monitor lizard, fishing with arrows, and gathering seeds, berries and honey. They use the plants of the islands to make bows, spears, ropes, huts, ornaments and even bee-repellent. It is only in the past 150 years that the islands have been settled, first by the British, who set up a penal colony, and then by the Indians. Slowly the settlers have cleared the forest. The Indian government set aside an area of rainforest for the Jarawa but it saw them as "primitive". Its officials took gifts of food and cloth to the edge of the forest: the Jarawa accepted them, but mocked the officials by urinating on their feet and squirting breast milk at them. More recently the authorities built a trunk road through the reserve. The tribal people fled deeper into the forest, and their numbers have dwindled from 8,000 before colonisation to fewer than 800. But five years ago, they began to emerge. Perhaps because settlers were poaching too much of the reserve's game. Perhaps because loggers were clearing trees in quantities which altered the environment on which they depend. Perhaps because in 1996 one Jarawa youth, named Enmei, was found immobilised with a broken leg and taken to hospital where, during five months treatment, he learnt Hindi and returned with the news that the settlers were friendly. Either way the Jarawa began to surface, some in parties with Enmei, others just appearing by the trunk road or in villages. Local people assumed they were starving and organised food. When the settlers did not offer food or clothes the Jarawa would arrive, with their bows and arrows, and take things. Police advised locals not to protest. And despite the "Beware of Jarawa" signs, and the posters announcing "Do not allow the Jarawa to get into any vehicles" and "Do not give any eatable items to the Jarawa", the interaction with the island's original inhabitants has become a source of entertainment. The negative consequences of this are becoming clear. New diseases are sweeping through the native people. In 1999 a measles and pneumonia epidemic affected up to half of the native population and killed 10 per cent. Young Jarawa have begun bartering for alien goods, such as chewing tobacco and the narcotic betel leaf. And an Indian lawyer filed a case demanding that the Jarawa be settled, stating that it was "high time to make them acquainted with modern civilisation". Survival International, one of the three charities in this year's Independent Christmas Appeal, has been instrumental in helping the Jarawa put their case to the Indian authorities. Evidence it presented - showing that forced resettlement was fatal for other tribes in the Andaman Islands, introducing diseases, destroying self-sufficiency, undermining self-esteem and leaving them vulnerable to alcoholism, suicide and despair - was decisive in two ways. The Indian government, after receiving some 200 letters a day from Survival supporters, two years ago dropped its plans to resettle the Jarawa. Survival then presented evidence to the Indian Supreme Court, citing the example of the Great Andamanese tribe, of whom only 28 people now remain in government "breeding centres". Today three of the Andaman tribes are virtually extinct. Only the Jarawa and the Sentinelese, who live on an island uninvaded by settlers, from which they fire arrows at approaching boats, remain. Last year the Supreme Court ruled in favour of the Jarawa. It ordered that the trunk road be closed, that logging and poaching in the area be banned, and that some settlements be removed. It was one of the biggest successes in Survival's history. "Now the challenge is to see that the order is implemented," said Survival's director, Stephen Corry. "The Jarawa are a people whose lives are synchronised with their environment. More they do not need. Only recognition of their right to own their land and to make their own choices about how they live." As for Enmei, he is back in the rainforest, coming out only when he needs medical treatment, as he did last month. "Even if I have to stay outside for a few days, I like to return," he said. "The jungle is better." From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri Dec 5 17:11:00 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2003 10:11:00 -0700 Subject: Indian education officials discuss virtual tribal college (fwd) Message-ID: Indian education officials discuss virtual tribal college Published: December 5, 2003 By Julia Lyon The Bulletin http://www.bendbulletin.com/news/story.cfm?story_no=11718 Education officials from Indian tribes throughout Oregon are discussing the creation of a virtual tribal college. Proponents say the program would the first of its kind in the nation. The proposed institution would allow reservation residents to access pre-existing college courses at other schools through fiber optics and other technology. Instead of a main campus, education centers could be built or improved with increased technology at reservations across the state. Paid for with federal dollars, the program could allow reservation residents to access degree and training programs with video or Web-based courses, among other methods. Education officials say the next step is gaining approval from the nine tribal councils in Oregon. One of the main goals of the tribal college would be to train and educate residents for reservation industries, said Wendell Jim, the general manager of the education branch of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. Curriculum might be created to meet the needs of the reservations, said Clint Jacks the Oregon State University extension agent for Jefferson County and Warm Springs. Tribal college faculty could teach the curriculum, which could include topics such as natural resources or casino management. Another focus would likely be expanding the remedial education program to help prepare students for degree programs. "One of our experiences is that folks need to increase their math and writing skills to be successful in a bachelor's or associate of arts program," Jacks said. Tribal experts could also teach courses in native languages, forestry and other fields that could be distributed to other campuses. Although many reservations, including Warm Springs, already have some local higher education programs, the concept of the college would be to bring in new education options in addition to expanding what's already there. Rather than just increasing what Central Oregon Community College already offers at Warm Springs, for example, Jim would like to see other schools' offerings added to the education options. Many reservation residents can't leave the reservation for school because they are already working locally, Jim said. And Warm Springs, like some other reservations, is far away from many college campuses. "We're trying to bring opportunity here," he said. Warm Springs has been one of the tribes actively involved in the the virtual school discussions. The program would probably start as a two-year college and be linked with four-year institutions like Oregon State University, said Bill McCaughan, the dean of OSU Extended Campus, in a phone interview from Corvallis. Students could do some college work at home and then move on to a four-year degree at a main campus. If the tribal councils approve the concept, the tribal college could still be perhaps five years away from becoming a reality. "That would be five years of a lot of hard work," McCaughan said. How much it would cost to develop the college remains unknown. The governing body of the college could be made up of tribal representatives, he said. If the program succeeds, the virtual tribal college could become a national model, Jim said. "If this works, it's a method for tribes in the state of Oregon, in the Northwest and in the U.S. to train, to provide these opportunities through technology," he said. "That's the wave of the future." Julia Lyon can be reached at 541-617-7831 or atjlyon at bendbulletin.com. From fnkrs at UAF.EDU Fri Dec 5 21:37:25 2003 From: fnkrs at UAF.EDU (Hishinlai') Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2003 12:37:25 -0900 Subject: Query: Native North American Internet Presence Message-ID: Don't know if you've checked out the University of Alaska Fairbanks' Alaska Native Language Center's website, but here it is (after my signature), if it helps. Hishinlai' >>Greetings, >> >>My name is Kris Meen, a graduate student at the University of Toronto. I'm >>doing a research paper on Native North Americans online. I'm currently >>looking for Native presence (sites, message boards, blogs, etc) on the web, to >>see what's out there. I've found a few sites, but also a lot of dead ends - a >>long list from a couple years ago that I found turned up a lot of no longer >>functioning addresses. Anyhow, my supervisor told me that the folks at the >>American Indian Net service might have some leads. >> >>Thanks for any help you can provide, sincerely, >> >>Kris Meen <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> Hishinlai' "Kathy R. Sikorski", Gwich'in Instructor University of Alaska Fairbanks Alaska Native Language Center P. O. Box 757680 Fairbanks, AK 99775-7680 P (907) 474-7875 F (907) 474-7876 E fnkrs at uaf.edu ANLC-L at www.uaf.edu/anlc/ Laraa t'ahch'yaa kwaa k'it tr'agwah'in. Nigwiinjik kwaa k'it juu veet'indhan veet'indhan ts'a' nak'arahtii kwaa k'it ch'andzaa. or "Work like you don't need the money. Love like you've never been hurt, and Dance like you do when nobody's watching." From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Sat Dec 6 09:26:35 2003 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Don Osborn) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 03:26:35 -0600 Subject: Anishinaabemowin on the Web! Message-ID: Martha O'Kennon's online computer translators for English to Ojibwe, Ojibwe to English, and English to Odawa at http://mokennon2.albion.edu/ojibwe.htm may be of interest to those not already aware of it. These are works in progress (she's doing revisions to the earlier versions) and feedback is sought. Personally I think that computer translation has a lot of potential (aside from being good for an occasional laugh) for less widely spoken languages and Prof. O'Kennon at the forefront of exploring this. She has also been working on Xhosa and Pulaar/Fulfulde translators (see http://mokennon2.albion.edu/language.htm ). Don Osborn Bisharat.net From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Sat Dec 6 17:30:08 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 10:30:08 -0700 Subject: The threatened forest people who are learning the language of survival (fwd) Message-ID: The threatened forest people who are learning the language of survival By Louise Rimmer in Rio de Janeiro 06 December 2003 http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=470595 When Davi Yanomami jets in and out of international conferences, he wears his traditional feathers rather than a suit, although few hotels can offer him his preferred hammock. Yet this is a minor discomfort. For, through his engagement with the modern world, the charismatic spokesman for the Yanomami, South America's most numerous forest-dwelling tribal people, has helped secure their rights over ancestral land and preserve a lifestyle that has nature at its core. Davi represents an estimated 27,000 Yanomami, the continent's last substantial group of isolated indigenous people. Their home is the northern Amazon, deep in the hills that lie between Brazil and Venezuela. After their land is secured from the interests of gold-prospectors and cattle-ranchers, the Yanomami are able to thrive as their ancestors did for thousands of years. Life for the Yanomami is communal; tribal groups of up to 400 can share the same house, although there are hearths for individual families around a central area cleared for rituals and dancing. The communities live by hunting and gathering, cultivating crops and growing medicines in large gardens. Hunting is reciprocal, with meat being shared with family and friends. "There is always enough food in the forest," Davi says. The Yanomami are also deeply spiritual people, who summon shamanic spirits using an hallucinogenic snuff called yakoana. These spirits are said to preside in the mountains, wind, thunder and darkness and help cure forest diseases, control the weather and generally keep an eye on the world, which can be a perilous place for the Yanomami. During the 1970s and 1980s, they suffered hugely from Brazilian gold-miners invading their land. Villages were destroyed, the people were shot at, and swept by diseases to which the Yanomami had no immunity. Twenty per cent of the population were wiped out in seven years. Finally, after a 20-year international campaign led by Survival International, one of the three charities in this year's Independent Christmas Appeal, the miners were expelled and the land was demarcated as the Yanomami Park by the Brazilian government in 1992. But the Yanomami do not have ownership rights over their land. Cattle-ranchers and miners continue to threaten them, and the Indians (to use the term they prefer) wish to own the land, rather than simply feel they are renting it from the government. "By law it is forbidden to invade Yanomami land, but nobody is making sure that the law is being implemented," Davi says. "The miners are still coming in, and bringing disease with them. The farmers are chopping down the trees and destroying the forest. The land gives us life, and if we keep the land, we give life back to it, because no one can destroy it when it remains in our hands." The vulnerability of the Yanomami was brutally exposed in 1993, when 16 of them were killed by gold-miners in what became known as the Haximu massacre. And there are threats of a more insidious kind. The increased militarisation of the area has brought barracks full of soldiers who bring sexually transmitted diseases with them, infecting Indian women who sell sex for food and coffee. But not all experience with the non-indigenous "white man", or the nape, as Yanomami call them, is negative. In recent years, the Yanomami have accepted funding from international organisations, including Survival, to set up their own school, with the aim of writing down their language and history for the first time. "It is important for us to become educated, to be able to write about our culture to pass onto future generations," Davi says. He learnt Portuguese to translate the advice of white doctors after an epidemic of malaria in his community. "I also want white people to be able to read our language, just as it is important for us to speak theirs." The Yanomami are also learning to read a microscope slide to study the impact of malaria. "The meeting of white and Yanomami healing gives us the strength to get rid of disease," he says. "Our shamanic spirits can cure only the diseases they know, the diseases of the forest. The white doctor cures tuberculosis, malaria, pneumonia and worms." These diseases were brought in by the white man. The Yanomami are reluctant to encourage further integration, preferring to fight for the right to be different. "We don't know about commerce," Davi says. "We use our forest without paying. The whites come and take our earth to make things to put in shops, where they wait for the price to go up so they can gain more at our expense. We indigenous people use the earth to plant and then we divide food up between our relatives and our friends." Misconceptions about Indians and non-indigenous abound. It is hard to tell if Davi is joking when he speaks solemnly on the worst type of white man, the yoasi, "men with white skin, who are bald with glasses and go around in cars and swim in swimming pools. What I really mean is men who look to the forest, and all they see is money". Davi's stereotypes are much less damaging than those of a leading American anthropologist, Napoleon Chagnon, who once pronounced the Yanomami as "sly, aggressive and intimidating" people who lived in a state of "chronic warfare". The anthropologist's views, which have been denounced as racist and sensationalist, are still current in some universities. But Davi is dismissive. "We get violent only when the white man messes with us," he says. "It is the rest of the world which is violent. You see it in the big cities, in Iraq, in the United States. We don't have bombs or guns. When we have conflict, we just fight among ourselves. That's normal." But the Yanomami's real battle, he knows, is a different one. It is against the corrosive homogenisation of Western culture. "We will keep on fighting," he says. "We Indian people from different tribes are getting together and getting stronger. We have learnt a lot; we are learning to speak Portuguese so that we can complain and demand. Don't you worry, we will keep on fighting. Fighting for our rights." -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 6442 bytes Desc: not available URL: From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sat Dec 6 17:50:04 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 10:50:04 -0700 Subject: Anishinaabemowin on the Web! In-Reply-To: <1070702795.3fd1a0cbe4c1c@webmail.bisharat.net> Message-ID: cool! thanks Don, Phil UofA, ILAT > ----- Message from dzo at BISHARAT.NET --------- > Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 03:26:35 -0600 > From: Don Osborn > Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology > Subject: Anishinaabemowin on the Web! > To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU > > Martha O'Kennon's online computer translators for English to Ojibwe, > Ojibwe to > English, and English to Odawa at > http://mokennon2.albion.edu/ojibwe.htm may be > of interest to those not already aware of it. These are works in > progress > (she's doing revisions to the earlier versions) and feedback is > sought. > > Personally I think that computer translation has a lot of potential > (aside from > being good for an occasional laugh) for less widely spoken languages > and Prof. > O'Kennon at the forefront of exploring this. She has also been > working on Xhosa > and Pulaar/Fulfulde translators (see > http://mokennon2.albion.edu/language.htm ). > > Don Osborn > Bisharat.net > > > ----- End message from dzo at BISHARAT.NET ----- From mikinakn at SHAW.CA Sat Dec 6 18:02:39 2003 From: mikinakn at SHAW.CA (Rolland Nadjiwon) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 13:02:39 -0500 Subject: Anishinaabemowin on the Web! Message-ID: Yep...definitely cool.... ---- wahjeh rolland nadjiwon ----- Original Message ----- From: "Phil CashCash" To: Sent: Saturday, December 06, 2003 12:50 PM Subject: Re: Anishinaabemowin on the Web! > cool! thanks Don, > > Phil > UofA, ILAT From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Sun Dec 7 02:34:19 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 19:34:19 -0700 Subject: 'Lost' sacred language of the Maya is rediscovered (fwd) Message-ID: 'Lost' sacred language of the Maya is rediscovered By David Keys Archaeology Correspondent 07 December 2003 http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=470833 Linguists have discovered a still-surviving version of the sacred religious language of the ancient Maya - the great pyramid-building civilisation that once dominated Central America. For years some Maya hieroglyphic texts have defied interpretation - but now archaeologists and linguists have identified a little-known native Indian language as the descendant of the elite tongue spoken by rulers and religious leaders of the ancient Maya. The language, Ch'orti - spoken today by just a few thousand Guatemalan Indians - will become a living "Rosetta Stone", a key to unravelling those aspects of Maya hieroglyphic writings which have so far not been properly understood. Over the next few years dozens of linguists and anthropologists are expected to start "mining" Ch'orti language and culture for words and expressions relating to everything from blood-letting to fasting. The Maya were one of the great civilisations of the ancient world - a civilisation that lasted for 2,000 years, roughly from 550BC to AD1450. Theyconstructed huge cities - some covering 100 square miles with populations of up to 170,000. Their art, architecture and culture were extremely sophisticated - and their elites studied astronomy and mathematics. Their writing system was a complex script - systemically similar to Chinese. And yet they remained technically a "stone age" society with no metal tools, no draught animals and no wheeled transport. Up till now, scholars had thought that, in spoken form, the ancient Maya elite sacred language was extinct. But research by a team led by archaeologist Professor Steven Houston and linguist Professor John Robertson of Brigham Young University, Utah, has now shown that Ch'orti evolved directly out of that sacred language. The language that Ch'orti is descended from seems to have originally been spoken through an area of what are now Guatemala, Belize, Honduras and southern Mexico. Archaeological research has shown that as the civilisation progressed and spread, other Central American Maya languages came to be spoken. But because of its association with the first Maya civilisation, successive generations of Maya elites preserved proto-Ch'orti as a sacred language. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 2681 bytes Desc: not available URL: From miakalish at REDPONY.US Wed Dec 10 20:10:00 2003 From: miakalish at REDPONY.US (MiaKalish@RedPony) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2003 13:10:00 -0700 Subject: Informal servey Message-ID: Dear Indigenous Scholars: I would like to ask a question that is only slightly off-topic, less so for languages that have a "women's language" and a "men's language" than for those who do not. I have a belief that for Indigenous women, there is not the contention that is so often studied in Women's Studies programs. I am working in the Women's Studies Program Office at New Mexico State, and would like to see our curriculum expand to include women in Science, for who men are co-workers and friends, and Women of Color, for whom issues, especially in those groups where land, culture, language, and often livelihood, have been ripped away, are very, very different than for the white women who have traditionally involved themselves in Women's Studies programs and who have written much of the Women's Studies rhetoric. I was hoping some number of you would have the time and willingness to reply to me, at MiaKalish at RedPony.US, and let me know what is true for you. I will take your replies, without your names unless you specifically request that I attribute your responses to you, and use them to make a case for an expanded curriculum here at NMSU. If we are successful, and those who participated are interested, I will return the favor for your time and consideration by sending you the copies of the prepared documents that I develop to support this case. I am not only asking Indigenous Women to reply, but Indigenous Men, also. My underlying idea is that "Women's Studies" has to be about a lot, lot more than "Look at what those big mean ole men did to us", which has been the traditional refrain for 30 years. I want something that reflects who The People actually are, all the people, the men, the women, and Everyone, not just the white women who seem to dominate this field of study. Thanking you in advance, Mia Kalish "Heritage Languages: Don't leave home without one." Mia Kalish, M.A. Director, Red Pony Heritage Language Team PhD Student, Computer Science Tularosa, New Mexico USA 88352 www.redpony.us -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Ivy.gif Type: image/gif Size: 5665 bytes Desc: not available URL: From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Thu Dec 11 17:53:06 2003 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 09:53:06 -0800 Subject: Karuk Xmas Message-ID: 12 Days of Karuk Christmas (also applicable to Hupa¹s, Tolowa's and Yurok¹s) On the Twelfth day of Christmas, my true love gave to meŠ Twelve Gamblers Drumming, Eleven Salmon Swimming, Ten Pounds of Acorns, Nine Brush Dancers, Eight Girls Singing, Seven Baby Baskets, Six Strings of Dentalia, Five Redwood Canoes, Four Boys Jumping Center, Three Elk Horn Purses, Two Bundles of Bear Grass, and a Woodpecker in a Huckleberry Bush. (Idea Borrowed from Ivy and Yolanda Fulmer of Kirkland, Washington and Hoonah, Alaska) From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Thu Dec 11 18:10:48 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 11:10:48 -0700 Subject: Ethnic art facing life or death (fwd) Message-ID: Ethnic art facing life or death ( 2003-12-10 23:39) (China Daily) http://www1.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2003-12/10/content_289139.htm China is working hard to salvage and preserve some of its diversified ethnic cultures threatened with extinction as a result of modernization. Zhao Weisui, vice-minister of culture, said the folk culture of the country's 56 nationalities -- including art, literature and custom -- are suffering unprecedented challenges and destruction with the rapid speed of globalization and modernization. Zhao said his ministry had launched a massive project to save folk cultural heritage in print, photos and on video. "Saving and preserving the folk culture of ethnic minorities is very urgent and the project needs more field research at grass-roots levels,'' said Zhao when he addressed at a three-day international symposium on ethnic culture protection which was closed yesterday in Beijing. Around 200 artists, scholars and officials from home and abroad participated in the workshop, exchanging views and experiences on the protection of endangered cultural heritage, such as ethnic and folk dances, music and their instruments, folk fine arts and traditional handicrafts like cloth weaving and dying, embroidery and paper cutting. Liu Xiaochun, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, expressed her concern on the survival of the culture of the Oroqen ethnic group who have been living in the deep forest in Northeast China since ancient times. As a member of the Oroqen minority with a small population of around 8,000 people, Liu said her ethnic group is good at singing and dancing. However, when she was on a survey trip to a Oroqen dominated village in Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, she founded that few people under 50-year-old can sing their folk songs. Moreover, the lip harp is a traditional musical instrument of the Oroqen people, but only one of these instruments was found in the village, and few people can play it. "The Oroqen ethnic group has its own particular language but without written words. Therefore, its preservation and inheritance is very difficult. If nothing is done to it, the Oroqen language and its talking and singing art will become extinct,'' said Liu. She suggested that the central or local government establish a training organization in the area to train folk artists and set up special funds to save important aspects of folk culture. Zhou Xing, an professor with the Aichi University in Japan, called for the preservation of culture and art heritage in local communities. "With support from the community, ancient art forms can have a better chance of surviving and being passed on to future generations. Heritage can only be passed on from generation to generation when the whole community realizes the value of this heritage,'' said Zhou. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 3199 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Thu Dec 11 18:26:21 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 11:26:21 -0700 Subject: Aboriginal community college urged (fwd) Message-ID: Aboriginal community college urged Learning to be made possible through virtual indigenous school system 2003-12-10 / Taiwan News, Contributing Writer / By Jason Pan -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 611 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 67850 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- Women try on aboriginal handicraft on display during a two-day conference on life-long learning and cultural development for aboriginal communities in Taiwan. (PETER MAH, TAIWAN NEWS) http://www.etaiwannews.com/Taiwan/2003/12/10/1071022187.htm Aboriginal activists and social service groups gathered yesterday to press for the establishment of an "Indigenous Peoples College" to promote lifelong learning and economic development at the community level. Founding a post-secondary school system that would also preserve aboriginal language and culture was the central focus of the two-day "2003 Conference on Managing Aboriginal Community Learning and Cultural Development" that began in Taipei yesterday. Chen Chien-nien (陳建年), the head of the Council of Indigenous Peoples attended the meeting and reviewed the presentation on adult education courses and distant-learning programs at remote villages. "We support the revitalization drive for aboriginal communities. It is part of the 'Challenge 2008: National Development Plans,' and our government is firmly behind the efforts to train indigenous teachers and social service workers at the grassroots levels," Chen said. "We can provide assistance and technical help in setting up education centers in the communities for lifelong learning and for cultivating local talent," he added. The CIP head stressed that new approaches were needed to strengthen indigenous cultures and create an environment that would encourage aborigines to speak their mother tongues. He also pointed to the need to improve aboriginal living standards with sustainable economic programs. Many of the more than 100 delegates taking part in the conference seminars agreed with the plan for an "Indigenous Peoples College" and expected to participate in the initiative through the networking of education centers and distant-learning programs in aboriginal communities. They said the rapid changes in telecommunications and broadband information technologies in recent years have made it possible to create and manage a virtual aboriginal school system through links with other communities and outside support networks. The two-day meeting was organized by the Association of Taiwan Indigenous People College, and sponsored by the CIP, national universities, and a number of aboriginal NGO groups. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 2852 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Thu Dec 11 18:28:08 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 11:28:08 -0700 Subject: Technology of the future preserving indigenous past (fwd) Message-ID: Technology of the future preserving indigenous past Cairns December 10, 2003 High-tech wizardry is replacing billy can and damper-style oral cultural transmission for a Cape York indigenous community. The Noel Pearson-driven Computer Culture project at Coen trains students to record their elders' stories and culture onto websites, CDs and digital video. Pearson said the pioneering project, one of many he is rolling out across the cape, aims to make children's education the town's number one priority. The project would also ensure the preservation of culture, both through its documentation and in the minds of the young people who document it. "Education is absolutely critical to cultural survival in the long term," Pearson said. "We're not going to survive as a culture without education in the long term. We have to make a decisive connection between education and cultural survival. "The people who will speak Aboriginal languages in 50 years time will be literate in English, they'll be literate in their own language, they'll be highly educated. "Our focus here in the Computer Culture project is education, it's using culture as a culture has got to involve literacy," he said. Also launching the Coen Education Strategy, which focuses on encouraging hook to bring the elders and families in to support their kids in education." Pearson said indigenous people needed to decisively move to literate transmission of culture because oral transmission was not enough in the modern world. "We're moving away from the billy can and damper cultural transmission of the bush tucker trips in the bush to one that stresses even your inquiring minds and high-quality schooling, Pearson warned of the danger of surrounding children with low expectations. "One of the real dangers I'm waking up to in terms of secondary school education is too many schools have got a kind of two-stream program," he said. "One for the kids they have expectations of and the other for the kids they have no expectations of. "My alarm is at the fact that schools are already pre-determining the two streams these kids enter into ... I don't like the fact it's all the black kids who are going down the B-grade stream." AAP This story was found at: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/10/1070732247518.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 2573 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 204 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 64 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Fri Dec 12 18:43:51 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 11:43:51 -0700 Subject: Study reaps knowledge from names (fwd) Message-ID: Study reaps knowledge from names "Richest detail came from people with most experience on the land" JANE GEORGE Anne Henshaw will meet Cape Dorset residents this month to discuss traditional place names. (PHOTO COURTESY OF ANNE HENSHAW) -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 759 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 95578 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- http://www.nunatsiaq.com/news/nunavut/31212_06.html Communities should record and locate traditional place names in Inuktitut because they hold a wealth of information about the environment, culture and history. An anthropologist from the United States is helping the hamlet of Cape Dorset document this place-name information, with funding from Nunavut's department of culture, language, elders and youth, the Inuit Heritage Foundation and the National Science Foundation. This month, Anne Henshaw of the Coastal Studies Centre at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, will meet residents, municipal officials and students in Cape Dorset to discuss place names she recorded in the community with the assistance of residents Aksatungua Ashoona, Pootoogook Eli and Akalayuk Qavavau. "The richest detail came from people with the most experience on the land," Henshaw said in a telephone interview before her expected arrival in Cape Dorset on Dec. 8. The Inuktitut language, she said, is the repository of generations of experience. The names reveal information about ice, animal migrations and snowfields. She said the place names helped Inuit deal with changes in climate and remain safe when travelling on the land. Place names around Cape Dorset that are connected to how people see the world include: • Amanguatuq: a place that resembles a women carrying a baby in an amautiq. • Aiviqqat: the islands resemble walruses swimming as a group. • Sinarnaq: a place that resembles a husky dog (the fur and the gray and white color). • Taliruat: a place that resembles a walrus flipper, lots of seals and walrus during sea ice break up. • Pitsik: a place where animals appear to be bouncing off the water. Among names showing environmental knowledge are: • Pattitaituk: a lake that doesn't freeze all the way to the bottom. • Arviturlik: a small bay for bowhead whale. • Naujaaraajuit: a seagull nesting area, for fledgling birds. • Qasigijjat: a place of harbor seals, nesting area for eider ducks. • Sarvaalu: an inlet that doesn't freeze in winter, where currents are very strong, with flowing water. And some names that show history are: • Ungujaqtalik: a place where lots of people lived in igloos. • Tunniqjuat: the original camp of the Tuniit. Recording place names doesn't require more than willing collectors and a map, Henshaw said. "It's not rocket science, but it does take some science," she said. The science comes in when traditional place names are matched, one by one, with Global Positioning System locations on a digitized map. Providing CDs showing an exact map location and photo of each place would be the next step in this project, so the names could be used in schools to pass on the knowledge to the next generation. Better knowledge of place names could also lead to more culturally informed climate change policies, Henshaw said, because there would be a richer official record of the land's role in peoples' lives. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 3269 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Fri Dec 12 18:46:31 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 11:46:31 -0700 Subject: Press Statement of the Indigenous Peoples Delegation to the UN WSIS Geneva 11 (fwd) Message-ID: Press Statement of the Indigenous Peoples Delegation to the UN WSIS Geneva 11 December 2003 STATES BETRAY THE WORLDS 400 MILLION INDIGENOUS PEOPLES http://www.indymedia.ch/fr/2003/12/16442.shtml Indigenous delegations from the four corners of the world arrived in Geneva to learn that States have once again betrayed their agreements to address the central concerns of Indigenous Peoples. Language in earlier drafts contained specific references to the right of Indigenous Peoples to fundamental freedoms and human rights protections had been deleted from the documents. In addition, references providing that Indigenous Peoples have the right to protection of their collective intellectual property and traditional knowledge had also disappeared from the current WSIS Plan of Action. States have also deleted the term "Indigenous Peoples" from section C8 of the Plan of Action covering cultural diversity, identity, linguistic diversity and local content. The current language in the WSIS Plan of Action allows the wholesale theft, commodification and commercialisation of indigenous knowledge and genetic and biological diversity without the free, prior and informed consent of the Indigenous Peoples who are the guardians of these cultural resources and the owners of traditional knowledge. The language in the WSIS Plan of Action will facilitate biopiracy and further marginalize the millions of Indigenous Peoples who live in extreme poverty without electricity or any infrastructure for ICT. We urge all States, human rights groups and civil society NGOs to help lobby for changes to the Plan of Action to reinsert the protective language that has been deleted. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 1783 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Fri Dec 12 18:47:35 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 11:47:35 -0700 Subject: UN-backed information summit called on to help progress of indigenous peoples (fwd) Message-ID: UN-backed information summit called on to help progress of indigenous peoples 11 December – Indigenous people today called on a United Nations-backed global information summit to put information and communications technologies (ICTs) into the service of economic and social development in their communities around the world. The call came in a declaration and action programme adopted at the conclusion of the Global Forum on Indigenous Peoples and the Information Society this week in Geneva, one of three official side events to the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). The text will be officially transmitted to the Summit tomorrow by Ole-Henrik Magga, Chairperson of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. “This Global Forum is a chance for indigenous people to become engaged with the World Summit on the Information Society. By discussing opportunities and challenges facing people around the world, we are creating solutions that will help indigenous peoples move forward in meaningful ways,” Mr. Magga said at a press briefing. The Global Forum, which began Monday, addressed topics ranging from e-health, e-learning, cultural preservation through digital media and citizen empowerment. It identified many challenges, including a lack of resources as well as a lack of control most indigenous peoples experience in terms of having to adapt to a new technology rather than being able to adjust the technology to suit their needs. The meeting also agreed that indigenous peoples should play a part in the preparatory process for the second phase of the Summit in 2005 in Tunis, and win concrete results at that conference, after having been given short notice to prepare for and participate in the Geneva phase. “The value of information technology becomes most apparent when we examine how it is benefiting indigenous communities, particularly those in remote locations,” Mr. Magga said. “Indigenous peoples are keen to preserve and pass on their diverse culture to future generation and are examining the new tools of the information society to see how they can assist.” Joining Mr. Magga was Mililani Trask, a member of the Permanent Forum, who lamented the decision by the Member States to delete references in the Summit's draft Declaration of Principles and Plan of Action to such issues as the protection of indigenous peoples' rights and the preservation of cultural diversity and language. The Secretariat for the UN Permanent Forum assists the 16-member panel in carrying out its mandate, which covers economic and social development, culture, the environment, education, health and human rights. It provides expert advice and recommendations on indigenous issues to the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and to UN programmes, funds and agencies, and helps to raise awareness of indigenous issues within the UN system. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 3350 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Fri Dec 12 18:51:53 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 11:51:53 -0700 Subject: UN-backed information summit called on to help progress of indigenous peoples (fwd) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: ...link http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp? NewsID=9180&Cr=indigenous&Cr1=people On Dec 12, 2003, at 11:47 AM, phil cash cash wrote: > UN-backed information summit called on to help progress of indigenous > peoples > > 11 December – Indigenous people today called on a United > Nations-backed global information summit to put information and > communications technologies (ICTs) into the service of economic and > social development in their communities around the world. > > The call came in a declaration and action programme adopted at the > conclusion of the Global Forum on Indigenous Peoples and the > Information Society this week in Geneva, one of three official side > events to the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). The text > will be officially transmitted to the Summit tomorrow by Ole-Henrik > Magga, Chairperson of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. > > “This Global Forum is a chance for indigenous people to become engaged > with the World Summit on the Information Society. By discussing > opportunities and challenges facing people around the world, we are > creating solutions that will help indigenous peoples move forward in > meaningful ways,” Mr. Magga said at a press briefing. > > The Global Forum, which began Monday, addressed topics ranging from > e-health, e-learning, cultural preservation through digital media and > citizen empowerment. It identified many challenges, including a lack > of resources as well as a lack of control most indigenous peoples > experience in terms of having to adapt to a new technology rather than > being able to adjust the technology to suit their needs. > > The meeting also agreed that indigenous peoples should play a part in > the preparatory process for the second phase of the Summit in 2005 in > Tunis, and win concrete results at that conference, after having been > given short notice to prepare for and participate in the Geneva phase. > > “The value of information technology becomes most apparent when we > examine how it is benefiting indigenous communities, particularly > those in remote locations,” Mr. Magga said. “Indigenous peoples are > keen to preserve and pass on their diverse culture to future > generation and are examining the new tools of the information society > to see how they can assist.” > > Joining Mr. Magga was Mililani Trask, a member of the Permanent Forum, > who lamented the decision by the Member States to delete references in > the Summit's draft Declaration of Principles and Plan of Action to > such issues as the protection of indigenous peoples' rights and the > preservation of cultural diversity and language. > > The Secretariat for the UN Permanent Forum assists the 16-member panel > in carrying out its mandate, which covers economic and social > development, culture, the environment, education, health and human > rights. It provides expert advice and recommendations on indigenous > issues to the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and to UN > programmes, funds and agencies, and helps to raise awareness of > indigenous issues within the UN system. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 3438 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Fri Dec 12 18:55:22 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 11:55:22 -0700 Subject: Harvard mulls challenges facing Native Americans (fwd) Message-ID: http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2003/12.11/17-natamer.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 64 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: pastedGraphic1.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 346526 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- Professor of Business Administration James Austin delivers opening remarks at the Native Issues Research Symposium, an event designed to promote research and scholarly work at Harvard relevant to Native Americans. (Staff photos Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard News Office) Harvard mulls challenges facing Native Americans First research symposium on Native American issues unites University researchers By Alvin Powell Harvard News Office Invoking the "Great Creator" to guide them, Native Americans and researchers examining Native American challenges convened their first-ever Harvard-wide symposium Thursday (Dec. 4), joining forces to improve Native American lives. Called the Native Issues Research Symposium, the event's purpose was to promote research and scholarly work at Harvard relevant to Native Americans. Topics covered a broad range, representing research in disciplines across the University. Among the issues examined during the symposium were leadership, archaeology, cancer education, gaming compacts, resolving disputes between tribes and other governments, family life, language preservation, and the legal and economic realities of tribal sovereignty. Joe Kalt, faculty chair of the Harvard University Native American Program and Ford Foundation Professor of International Political Economy at the Kennedy School of Government, said organizers plan to gather research presented at the symposium into a book that they hope will be the first in a series of research publications centered on Native Americans. "We will hopefully produce the first of a steady effort that goes on for years and years," Kalt said. The symposium, sponsored by the Ernst Fund for Native American Studies of the Harvard University Native American Program, drew about 40 researchers from a variety of schools across Harvard, including the Kennedy School of Government, the Medical School, and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 2397 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 204418 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- Carmen Lopez, interim executive director of the Native American Program, addresses the symposium. Leadership key One of the first presentations examined challenges facing Native American leaders. From questions of governance to education to cultural preservation and language loss, tribal leaders have an important role in determining the future course of different tribal groups. That leadership has to be adaptive and responsive, according to Tim Begaye, who presented a paper he co-authored with Lecturer in Public Policy at the Kennedy School Ronald Heifetz, "Adaptive Leadership: Challenges Native Leaders Face in a Contemporary Society." Native American leaders have been dealing with fundamental change for hundreds of years, Begaye said. Challenges they face today include guiding the pace and direction of that continuing change. Key to being a successful leader is understanding not just the changes, but the underlying community. The community can be extremely diverse, encompassing elders who speak only their tribal language, younger people who speak only English, as well as tribal members currently living outside the community. Language loss is a particularly difficult problem, Begaye said. More than half of young people under 25 don't speak their tribal language anymore, and some adults question the usefulness of even trying to teach it to their children. "I hear parents saying, 'I don't need the language, it's English-only out there,'" Begaye said. Other challenges include loss of tribal land, loss of identity, cultural mixing, integration of Christianity with traditional beliefs, functioning with government and educational systems imposed by the federal government, and the "brain drain" from reservations. Successful leaders, Begaye said, must have a vision based on the needs and desires of their community. Lessons from the Pequots Another researcher drew lessons from the financially successful Mashantucket Pequot casino in Connecticut. Gavin Clarkson, the Reginald F. Lewis Fellow at Harvard Law School, presented the paper "Gaming Compact Negotiations (Pequot Case Study)," co-authored with Jim Sebenius, the Gordon Donaldson Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. Clarkson outlined the circumstances surrounding the founding of the Mashantucket Pequot's casino, Foxwoods, 10 years ago. The tribe, which had run bingo games from their eastern Connecticut reservation, asked the state to enter into negotiations for a casino, but, contrary to federal law, the state refused. The state's refusal opened the door to a unilateral decision by the Bureau of Indian Affairs, which approved the casino, only without slot machines. The tribe and state then entered into negotiations over whether the slot machines would be allowed and the tribe offered to give the state a portion of the proceeds if it were allowed slot machines and if it were allowed to have a monopoly on casino gambling in Connecticut. The state, in the midst of a budget crisis, approved. The Pequots, in exchange, got a casino gaming monopoly and a financial windfall. "It was a brilliant move on the part of the tribe," Clarkson said. Though gaming compacts are the most familiar kinds of agreements between tribes and states, many other compacts exist governing law enforcement, resource use, hunting, fishing, and other areas where tribal and state authority overlap. The Mashantucket Pequot case, Clarkson said, has lessons beyond the arena of Indian gaming, offering an example of how a tribe can improve its own position in negotiations at the same time it worsens the state's bargaining position. "The framework isn't limited to gaming compacts," Clarkson said. "Any time you approach negotiations with the state with the mind to improve your alternative [positions] and worsen the state's you can reach a deal favorable to the tribe." alvin_powell at harvard.edu Related stories: Native American professorship endowed Future of Inuit explored KSG professors mediate dispute Questions over sovereignty spark clash between Idaho tribe, nearby towns -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 4776 bytes Desc: not available URL: From sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri Dec 12 21:43:44 2003 From: sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Sue Penfield) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 14:43:44 -0700 Subject: Fw: Endangered Language Fund announces 10 grants Message-ID: ----- Original Message ----- From: "C. Thomas Mason" Subject: Endangered Language Fund announces 10 grants > ELF announces 10 grants > ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > >From Doug Whalen (whalen at haskins.yale.edu) 5 Dec 2003: > > The Endangered Language Fund's seventh annual request for proposals > resulted in the submission of 68 projects on languages throughout the > world. As usual, the quality of the proposals was high, leading to many > difficult decisions. We funded ten of the projects, and could easily > have done twenty. We are hoping to expand our resources for future > grants. > > Of the ten proposals selected, five focused on indigenous American > languages: > > -- Cora McKenna & Brenda McKenna (Nambe Pueblo, NM): "Tewa Dictionary > and Curriculum, Nambe Dialect." [Nambe Pueblo is north of Santa Fe. > Current Nambe classes serve learners from age 4 to 60, so the curriculum > has to be specially designed. The ELF grant will help collect material > for the classroom and a better dictionary.] > > -- Lisa Conathan & Belle Anne Matheson (UC Berkeley): "Arapaho Description > and Revitalization." [The Northern Arapaho community feels a need for an > audio dictionary. Pitch accents are not necessary for fluent speakers to > write, but they are difficult for learners to remember. Conathan and > Mathesen will work on a dictionary along with a better description of the > rules of the sound system.] > > -- Arthur Schmidt, Rita Flamand & Grace Zoldy (Metis): "The Camperville > Michif Master-Apprentice Program." [Michif is a mixed language from Cree > and French. Schmidt, a native Michif, but not a speaker, will apprentice > himself to Flamand and Zoldy. The Endangered Language Fund grant will > allow Schmidt to spend time in Camperville in Manitoba, Canada.] > > -- Rosemary Beam de Azcona (UC Berkeley): "Southern Zapotec Language > Materials." [It appears that there are only two remaining speakers of > San Agustín Mixtepec Zapotec, a southern Zapotec language of Mexico. > Coatlán-Loxicha Zapotec is declining, though it has about 170 speakers. > Beam de Azcona will record as much language material as possible.] > > -- Rick Thoman & Gary Holton (U Alaska Fairbanks): "The Tanacross > Athabascan Sound System." [This project will produce a CD-ROM illustra- > ting the sound system of Tanacross. Speakers will pronounce selected > words and phrases with the rich array of ejectives, affricates and > fricatives as well as contrastive tone. This CD-ROM will be a useful > resource for Tanacross.] > > The five other projects funded include: > > -- Nadezhda Shalamova (Tomsk Polytechnic U), Andrei Filtchenko (Rice U) > & Olga Potanina (Tomsk State Pedagogical U): "Documentation of Vasyugan > Khanty." > > -- Dmitri Funk (Russian Academy of Sciences): "The Last Epic Singer in > Shors (Western Siberia)." > > -- Cheruiyot Kiplangat (Centre for Endangered Languages, Kenya): "Working > to Save Ogiek and Sengwer of Kenya." [Two languages of the Rift Valley.] > > -- Claire Bowern (Harvard U): "Bardi Language Documentation: The Laves > Material." [An Australian language of the Nyulnyulan family. Bowern will > re-check texts collected by Gerhardt Laves in 1929 with the remaining > fluent speakers.] > > -- Francis Egbokhare (U Ibadan, Nigeria): "Documenting Akuku Oral > Traditions." [An endangered language of the Edoid family spoken in > Edo state of Nigeria.] > > As always, we depend on the generosity of our members. Just a dozen new > members would sponsor a new grant. Please visit > > http://www.ling.yale.edu/~elf/join.html > > if you would like to join. > > --Doug Whalen > Haskins Laboratories > New Haven, Connecticut > (whalen at haskins.yale.edu) > From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Mon Dec 15 20:41:50 2003 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Don Osborn) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:41:50 +0100 Subject: Language impoverishment Message-ID: Thank you Matthew (very belatedly). I think you are right in disaggregating the two elements of what I called language impoverishment as you do. I wonder however if there are not more connections between them. IOW, if you raise a generation of people with deficiencies in both the mother tongue and the (generally external) language of instruction, what effect does it have on society-wide range of expressiveness and the vigor of the first language? In a large population, say Cantonese speakers or Hausa speakers or maybe even Dine speakers (just to take 3 examples), you will generally have a core of educated people and perhaps a cultural production which operate with a more sophisticated knowledge in the language. (Today, with the potentials of ICT, this level can be brought more effectively out to more users.) In a smaller population, even when actively using the language, is there the same reservoir or performance of the language's richness? When a few key elders pass away how much knowledge, including perhaps obscure but important vocabulary etc., goes with them? (Amadou Hampate Ba's famous metaphor was that when an elder dies a library burns.) The reason I ask is that I have encountered people who tell me there is no word for such-and-such in their language, but from earlier documentation I knew/found out there was. How many other expressions, turns of phrase etc. that mean something important but not necessarily encountered every day, or could be creatively applied to something new, are lost without being recorded (or recorded but not returned through education to the speakers through education)? ...with the result being a kind of Newspeak by default (without any Orwellian authority to plan it). I guess the matter would have to be settled by some detailed ground level research. If you look at satellite images of vegetation in the Sahel it seems like the desert is now retreating (as per a news item not too long ago), but down here on the ground the biodiversity is definitely less, larger trees are fewer, and the vegetation index shows a shift of species. The analogy may not hold for what is happening with language, but I'd be more comfortable knowing for sure... It may be that what happens is an impoverishment of expression and some loss of vocabulary that is not readily evident and this goes on slowly for a period, and that this is related to socioeconomic, demographic, political etc. changes. And that as that regression continues, at some point it reaches a "stalling point" or some such threshhold where we can say that the language is clearly losing structures / expressiveness as in your second category (corresponding perhaps with another categorization such as moribund). Relating all this to Mia's message a while back and my reply, it seems there are several angles from different disciplines to considering links among various combinations of language "health" & survival, speakers' skills & range of expression, and individual & social wellbeing, but no synthetic approach to seeking a more unified or at least connected understanding of what's going on. One particular topic already brought up - that of people growing up with what amounts to impaired bi/multilingualism (limited expression/skills in both/all languages spoken; we know of course that the reason for such impairment is not the multiplicity of languages but a reflection of the education approach or lack of same) - is something I hadn't given much thought to until recently. And now I don't seem to find much discussion of it, let alone its relations to other hotbutton topics like language survival. A lot of heavy thinking remains in all this but the more I get into it (slowly, being preoccupied with other concerns), the more important it seems. Don ----- Original Message ----- From: "Matthew Ward" To: Sent: Monday, November 10, 2003 7:25 PM Subject: Re: Language impoverishment > I'm sorry that I can't point you to any studies, but I wanted to comment > that I wonder if there are not two separate things going on here: > > First, there is the phenomenon of people who fail to learn the official > language used in school sufficiently well, yet the non-use of their own > mother tongues in education and other contexts means that they lack > vocabulary to use those languages for many contexts. (It is not, of > course, that the mother tongues cannot develop, or have not developed > the sufficient vocabulary, but if ones education is in another language, > one might not be able to use ones own mother tongue in certain contexts). > > At any rate, the result is people who, in some sense, do not speak any > language fluently. One context I've read about this phenomenon is in > Hong Kong, a decade or more ago--many high school students were not > particularly fluent in English, especially in terms of grammar, but, > while Cantonese remained the language they would use at a native level > of fluency for nearly all social functions, they were unable to discuss > many school subjects in it, since as it was not used in education past a > certain level in some schools. This was actually one of the arguments > used when the decision was made to make Cantonese the main medium of > instruction in HK--I think the argument was something to the effect that > it would be better to gain complete fluency in Cantonese and to learn > English more as a foreign language, rather than to have people who had > deficiencies in both languages. > > I've also seen this in Taiwan, where people who lacked anything near > native-like fluency in Mandarin Chinese also had a low level of advanced > vocabulary in the own mother tongues, and here in Northeastern New > Mexico, where many native speakers of Spanish express insecurity about > their ability in English, yet they clearly lack the vocabulary in > Spanish to discuss certain subjects. Immigrants everywhere may have the > some problem--they do not achieve native-like fluency in the language(s) > of the countries they have moved to, yet they may also lack sufficient > fluency in their own native languages, largely because their acquisition > of vocabulary largely stopped after they immigrated. > > Second, when you have languages in a totally different > situation--languages that are truly on the brink, often with only a > small number of older people who speak it natively, you see not only the > loss of vocabulary, but also the seeming loss and simplification of > grammatical structures. Of course, all languages are known to change in > this way, even the healthiest ones, but in these cases of dying > languages, it does not seem that you are dealing with a change in which > one structure is replacing another, but with a situation where the > structures are not being replaced, and the language may actually be > losing its expressiveness. This is something that, despite popular > perceptions of language being "in decline," does not normally happen to > any language. Indeed, this real loss of expressiveness seems to only > occur when a language is truly dying. > > To me, the first phenomenon is an excellent argument for mother-tongue > education, and the second is a subject of study for linguists, as well > as a warning sign of language death. It is certainly possible that > certain individuals might be affected by both at the same time, but I do > believe that they are separate issues. In many situations in Africa, > where people who speak large and otherwise fairly healthy indigenous > tongues, yet are educated in colonial languages such as French, English > or Portuguese, then probably the first issue is relevant, but for those > who speak dying languages (which are, as I understand, usually replaced > by larger African languages, not by the colonial languages) the second > might apply as well. > > Don Osborn wrote: > > >I came upon a phrase earlier this year that was used by the author John > >Marsden in a workshop: "Language impoverishment can lead to frustration, > >impotence and/or rage" (at the site > >http://www.pvet.vic.edu.au/boyswebsite/conference.html ). This was a new > >take on a phenomenon that I had been thinking a lot about in the African > >context (young people who learn neither their maternal languages well nor > >the official languages used in school). Further research found that another > >author, Walker Percy, wrote that one result of language's impoverishment is > >"a radical impoverishment of human relations." > > > >My thinking is that well before we get to the point of concern about a > >language's survival, it starts to lose vocabulary and range of expression > >and creativity: it becomes impoverished. But more than being a stage in what > >may ultimately end up as extinction, language impoverishment seems to have > >broader social and psychological implications beyond cultural survival and > >language policy. > > > >I wrote Mr. Marsden, who kindly replied that his statement was the result of > >many years of observation and not formal research (which should not > >depreciate the value of such observation I would hasten to add!). But I > >would be interested in learning more about research anyone is doing on > >language impoverishment in communities and its effects on individual and > >community life. > > > >Don Osborn, Ph.D. dzo at bisharat.net > >*Bisharat! A language, technology & development initiative > >*Bisharat! Initiative langues - technologie - développement > >http://www.bisharat.net > > > > > > From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Mon Dec 15 21:50:11 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:50:11 -0700 Subject: A will to close the digital divide (fwd) Message-ID: A will to close the digital divide Jennifer L. Schenker/IHT International Herald Tribune GENEVA To no one's surprise, the United Nations World Summit on the Information Society last week, which attracted mostly delegates from the deprived side of the digital divide, concluded that the World Wide Web is not as global as it is made out to be. for full story follow the link http://www.iht.com/articles/121469.html From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Tue Dec 16 16:44:51 2003 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2003 08:44:51 -0800 Subject: The Missing Message-ID: SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) - Word swept through the Mescalero reservation like an early winter wind that characters in the film ``The Missing'' spoke a dialect of Apache. Most adult Apaches in the audiences have said they could understand every word of the Chiricahua dialect - and the children suddenly wished they could, too. That's what Mescalero councilman Berle Kanseah and Chiricahua linguist Elbys Hugar intended as technical advisers for the Ron Howard film, a tough tale of 19th century frontier life starring Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett that has been in theaters for about three weeks. Television and popular culture are killing minority cultures, starting with language, Kanseah said. ``There's a generation gap that's growing,'' he said, suggesting Apaches aren't the only ones facing it. ``We need to enforce the home and not lose our way of life, which is our language.'' It was the first film that any of them could remember in which Apache was spoken well enough on screen to be understood. Usually, Westerns were dubbed in Navajo, a related language, said supporting actor Steve Reevis, a Montana Blackfoot who has worked several films but never spoke Apache before ``The Missing.'' The film is set in southwestern New Mexico in 1885, just as the last of the Apache conflict was ending. The Jones character's granddaughter, Blanchett's daughter, is abducted by a ragged band of American Indians and whites who sell women into slavery in Mexico. Jones and co-star Jay Tavere set out to keep the slavers from reaching Mexico. The slavers are led by a ``brujo,'' a medicine man gone bad, played by Eric Schweig. Apaches appreciate the film for showing them as they were - the good and the bad, family oriented, generous, faithful to their religion and good-humored. The brujo played by Schweig is not intended to be Apache, though he speaks Apache, the producers say. Many Apaches have gone back two and three times to see ``The Missing,'' Kanseah said. The producers gave a screening for 500 Mescalero students in Alamogordo last month, and the tribe has been busing students to theaters in nearby Ruidoso. Two more screenings were held here Sunday for hundreds more students from several tribes who attend Santa Fe Indian School and other tribal schools in the surrounding area. ``It made me feel proud,'' said Megan Crespin, 8, a third-grader from Santo Domingo School. Her tribal name is Moonlight. Kevin Aspaas, 8, a Navajo student said he liked the hawk that led Jones back to his family. He is learning Navajo and said a few words in his native tongue. There aren't that many Chiricahuas left. They were rounded up and sent to Florida in 1886, shunted back to Alabama, Oklahoma and finally to the Mescalero homeland in south-central New Mexico in 1913. ``There are only about 300 people who are fluent in Chiricahua today,'' Tavere told the audience Sunday. From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Tue Dec 16 17:15:23 2003 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2003 09:15:23 -0800 Subject: The Missing Message-ID: SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) - Word swept through the Mescalero reservation like an early winter wind that characters in the film ``The Missing'' spoke a dialect of Apache. Most adult Apaches in the audiences have said they could understand every word of the Chiricahua dialect - and the children suddenly wished they could, too. That's what Mescalero councilman Berle Kanseah and Chiricahua linguist Elbys Hugar intended as technical advisers for the Ron Howard film, a tough tale of 19th century frontier life starring Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett that has been in theaters for about three weeks. Television and popular culture are killing minority cultures, starting with language, Kanseah said. ``There's a generation gap that's growing,'' he said, suggesting Apaches aren't the only ones facing it. ``We need to enforce the home and not lose our way of life, which is our language.'' It was the first film that any of them could remember in which Apache was spoken well enough on screen to be understood. Usually, Westerns were dubbed in Navajo, a related language, said supporting actor Steve Reevis, a Montana Blackfoot who has worked several films but never spoke Apache before ``The Missing.'' The film is set in southwestern New Mexico in 1885, just as the last of the Apache conflict was ending. The Jones character's granddaughter, Blanchett's daughter, is abducted by a ragged band of American Indians and whites who sell women into slavery in Mexico. Jones and co-star Jay Tavere set out to keep the slavers from reaching Mexico. The slavers are led by a ``brujo,'' a medicine man gone bad, played by Eric Schweig. Apaches appreciate the film for showing them as they were - the good and the bad, family oriented, generous, faithful to their religion and good-humored. The brujo played by Schweig is not intended to be Apache, though he speaks Apache, the producers say. Many Apaches have gone back two and three times to see ``The Missing,'' Kanseah said. The producers gave a screening for 500 Mescalero students in Alamogordo last month, and the tribe has been busing students to theaters in nearby Ruidoso. Two more screenings were held here Sunday for hundreds more students from several tribes who attend Santa Fe Indian School and other tribal schools in the surrounding area. ``It made me feel proud,'' said Megan Crespin, 8, a third-grader from Santo Domingo School. Her tribal name is Moonlight. Kevin Aspaas, 8, a Navajo student said he liked the hawk that led Jones back to his family. He is learning Navajo and said a few words in his native tongue. There aren't that many Chiricahuas left. They were rounded up and sent to Florida in 1886, shunted back to Alabama, Oklahoma and finally to the Mescalero homeland in south-central New Mexico in 1913. ``There are only about 300 people who are fluent in Chiricahua today,'' Tavere told the audience Sunday. From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US Tue Dec 16 22:36:40 2003 From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2003 15:36:40 -0700 Subject: Language impoverishment Message-ID: Well, I think that one thing you are getting at is the value of having every language being used by its native speakers with the fullest possible range of uses. I've often thought of how lucky speakers of major, official languages are: languages as widely varying in size and "importance" as Icelandic and Mandarin Chinese, Mongolian and Spanish are all used by most of their native speakers for all or nearly all of the possible functions of language: formal and informal registers, social situations, primary, secondary, higher education, government, etc., etc., etc. It is not that these languages are any more expressive than are languages which are used for fewer functions, but their native speakers can, potentially, do anything with them. They are never forced to switch to another language because they never learned to use their own languages in that way. In contrast, when you have people who are only able to use their native languages for a limited number of purposes, due to limited use of those languages, and yet who do not have anything close to native-like fluency in the official or dominant languages of their society, than I can see how this puts those people at a disadvantage. I do think that the idea of linguistic impoverishment needs to be dealt with carefully, however, as it has been misused too many times. It is often, for example, used as a label for speakers of minority dialects who simply don't speak the favored variety of the language well, which doesn't mean that they aren't perfectly fluent in their own languages. It is also often used as an excuse not to develop minority languages: the whole "X language doesn't have a term for nuclear physics or ethnic cleansing, therefore it can't possibly be used in the modern world," which totally ignores the ability of all languages to adapt to changing culture and technology. But, at any rate, this kind of adaptation is done through using language, and it is when languages are not used that they fail to develop, or, as in some of the cases you mention, the native speakers may not know words that the language actually possesses, or, at least, formerly possessed. It all leads back to the same conclusion: people should be able to use their own native tongues for the widest range of possible functions. In the real world, of course, this is not always practical or possible, but it is still a worthy goal. Don Osborn wrote: >Thank you Matthew (very belatedly). I think you are right in disaggregating >the two elements of what I called language impoverishment as you do. I >wonder however if there are not more connections between them. IOW, if you >raise a generation of people with deficiencies in both the mother tongue and >the (generally external) language of instruction, what effect does it have >on society-wide range of expressiveness and the vigor of the first language? >In a large population, say Cantonese speakers or Hausa speakers or maybe >even Dine speakers (just to take 3 examples), you will generally have a core >of educated people and perhaps a cultural production which operate with a >more sophisticated knowledge in the language. (Today, with the potentials >of ICT, this level can be brought more effectively out to more users.) > >In a smaller population, even when actively using the language, is there the >same reservoir or performance of the language's richness? When a few key >elders pass away how much knowledge, including perhaps obscure but important >vocabulary etc., goes with them? (Amadou Hampate Ba's famous metaphor was >that when an elder dies a library burns.) The reason I ask is that I have >encountered people who tell me there is no word for such-and-such in their >language, but from earlier documentation I knew/found out there was. How >many other expressions, turns of phrase etc. that mean something important >but not necessarily encountered every day, or could be creatively applied to >something new, are lost without being recorded (or recorded but not returned >through education to the speakers through education)? ...with the result >being a kind of Newspeak by default (without any Orwellian authority to plan >it). > >I guess the matter would have to be settled by some detailed ground level >research. If you look at satellite images of vegetation in the Sahel it >seems like the desert is now retreating (as per a news item not too long >ago), but down here on the ground the biodiversity is definitely less, >larger trees are fewer, and the vegetation index shows a shift of species. >The analogy may not hold for what is happening with language, but I'd be >more comfortable knowing for sure... > >It may be that what happens is an impoverishment of expression and some loss >of vocabulary that is not readily evident and this goes on slowly for a >period, and that this is related to socioeconomic, demographic, political >etc. changes. And that as that regression continues, at some point it >reaches a "stalling point" or some such threshhold where we can say that the >language is clearly losing structures / expressiveness as in your second >category (corresponding perhaps with another categorization such as >moribund). > >Relating all this to Mia's message a while back and my reply, it seems there >are several angles from different disciplines to considering links among >various combinations of language "health" & survival, speakers' skills & >range of expression, and individual & social wellbeing, but no synthetic >approach to seeking a more unified or at least connected understanding of >what's going on. One particular topic already brought up - that of people >growing up with what amounts to impaired bi/multilingualism (limited >expression/skills in both/all languages spoken; we know of course that the >reason for such impairment is not the multiplicity of languages but a >reflection of the education approach or lack of same) - is something I >hadn't given much thought to until recently. And now I don't seem to find >much discussion of it, let alone its relations to other hotbutton topics >like language survival. > >A lot of heavy thinking remains in all this but the more I get into it >(slowly, being preoccupied with other concerns), the more important it >seems. > >Don > >----- Original Message ----- >From: "Matthew Ward" >To: >Sent: Monday, November 10, 2003 7:25 PM >Subject: Re: Language impoverishment > > > > >>I'm sorry that I can't point you to any studies, but I wanted to comment >>that I wonder if there are not two separate things going on here: >> >>First, there is the phenomenon of people who fail to learn the official >>language used in school sufficiently well, yet the non-use of their own >>mother tongues in education and other contexts means that they lack >>vocabulary to use those languages for many contexts. (It is not, of >>course, that the mother tongues cannot develop, or have not developed >>the sufficient vocabulary, but if ones education is in another language, >>one might not be able to use ones own mother tongue in certain contexts). >> >>At any rate, the result is people who, in some sense, do not speak any >>language fluently. One context I've read about this phenomenon is in >>Hong Kong, a decade or more ago--many high school students were not >>particularly fluent in English, especially in terms of grammar, but, >>while Cantonese remained the language they would use at a native level >>of fluency for nearly all social functions, they were unable to discuss >>many school subjects in it, since as it was not used in education past a >>certain level in some schools. This was actually one of the arguments >>used when the decision was made to make Cantonese the main medium of >>instruction in HK--I think the argument was something to the effect that >>it would be better to gain complete fluency in Cantonese and to learn >>English more as a foreign language, rather than to have people who had >>deficiencies in both languages. >> >>I've also seen this in Taiwan, where people who lacked anything near >>native-like fluency in Mandarin Chinese also had a low level of advanced >>vocabulary in the own mother tongues, and here in Northeastern New >>Mexico, where many native speakers of Spanish express insecurity about >>their ability in English, yet they clearly lack the vocabulary in >>Spanish to discuss certain subjects. Immigrants everywhere may have the >>some problem--they do not achieve native-like fluency in the language(s) >>of the countries they have moved to, yet they may also lack sufficient >>fluency in their own native languages, largely because their acquisition >>of vocabulary largely stopped after they immigrated. >> >>Second, when you have languages in a totally different >>situation--languages that are truly on the brink, often with only a >>small number of older people who speak it natively, you see not only the >>loss of vocabulary, but also the seeming loss and simplification of >>grammatical structures. Of course, all languages are known to change in >>this way, even the healthiest ones, but in these cases of dying >>languages, it does not seem that you are dealing with a change in which >>one structure is replacing another, but with a situation where the >>structures are not being replaced, and the language may actually be >>losing its expressiveness. This is something that, despite popular >>perceptions of language being "in decline," does not normally happen to >>any language. Indeed, this real loss of expressiveness seems to only >>occur when a language is truly dying. >> >>To me, the first phenomenon is an excellent argument for mother-tongue >>education, and the second is a subject of study for linguists, as well >>as a warning sign of language death. It is certainly possible that >>certain individuals might be affected by both at the same time, but I do >>believe that they are separate issues. In many situations in Africa, >>where people who speak large and otherwise fairly healthy indigenous >>tongues, yet are educated in colonial languages such as French, English >>or Portuguese, then probably the first issue is relevant, but for those >>who speak dying languages (which are, as I understand, usually replaced >>by larger African languages, not by the colonial languages) the second >>might apply as well. >> >>Don Osborn wrote: >> >> >> >>>I came upon a phrase earlier this year that was used by the author John >>>Marsden in a workshop: "Language impoverishment can lead to frustration, >>>impotence and/or rage" (at the site >>>http://www.pvet.vic.edu.au/boyswebsite/conference.html ). This was a new >>>take on a phenomenon that I had been thinking a lot about in the African >>>context (young people who learn neither their maternal languages well nor >>>the official languages used in school). Further research found that >>> >>> >another > > >>>author, Walker Percy, wrote that one result of language's impoverishment >>> >>> >is > > >>>"a radical impoverishment of human relations." >>> >>>My thinking is that well before we get to the point of concern about a >>>language's survival, it starts to lose vocabulary and range of expression >>>and creativity: it becomes impoverished. But more than being a stage in >>> >>> >what > > >>>may ultimately end up as extinction, language impoverishment seems to >>> >>> >have > > >>>broader social and psychological implications beyond cultural survival >>> >>> >and > > >>>language policy. >>> >>>I wrote Mr. Marsden, who kindly replied that his statement was the result >>> >>> >of > > >>>many years of observation and not formal research (which should not >>>depreciate the value of such observation I would hasten to add!). But I >>>would be interested in learning more about research anyone is doing on >>>language impoverishment in communities and its effects on individual and >>>community life. >>> >>>Don Osborn, Ph.D. dzo at bisharat.net >>>*Bisharat! A language, technology & development initiative >>>*Bisharat! Initiative langues - technologie - développement >>>http://www.bisharat.net >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> > > > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed Dec 17 18:25:51 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 11:25:51 -0700 Subject: Grotto Foundation: indigenous language resources (link) Message-ID: fyi, Here are several items of interest. The Grotto Foundation has been working with Minnesota's indigenous languages for sometime and has releases several online publications. 1) Native Languages As World Languages A Vision for Assessing and Sharing Information About Native Languages Across Grantmaking Sectors and Native Country by Richard LaFortune (Yupik) 2) Encouragement, Guidance, Insights, and Lessons Learned for Native Language Activists Developing Their Own Tribal Language Programs by Darrell R. Kipp, Co-Founder of the Piegan Institute you download these documents from the following link: http://www.grottofoundation.org/download_fset.html take care, phil cash cash (cayuse/nez perce) UofA, ILAT From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 18 16:55:58 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2003 09:55:58 -0700 Subject: Apaches praise 'The Missing' for keeping their language alive (fwd) Message-ID: Apaches praise 'The Missing' for keeping their language alive By Richard Benke The Associated Press http://www.sltrib.com/2003/Dec/12182003/thursday/120921.asp     SANTA FE, N.M. -- Tommy Lee Jones speaking Apache? Word swept through the Mescalero reservation like an early winter wind.     Not only Jones but most characters in the Ron Howard film, "The Missing," speak the Chiricahua dialect of Apache, and most adult Apaches in the audiences have said they could understand every word.     The children, who couldn't, suddenly wished they could.     That's what Mescalero councilman Berle Kanseah and Chiricahua linguist Elbys Hugar intended as technical advisers for "The Missing," a tough tale of 19th century frontier life starring Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett.     The 21st century -- television, popular culture -- is killing minority cultures, starting with language, Kanseah said.     "There's a generation gap that's growing," he said, suggesting Apaches aren't the only ones facing it.     "We need to enforce the home and not lose our way of life, which is our language," he said.     Hugar, a great-granddaughter of Cochise, addressed the cast before shooting. Co-star Jay Tavere, a White Mountain Apache, recalled: "This is the first thing that Elbys said to us: 'This is more than a movie -- this is for the whole Apache nation.' "     It was the first film that any of them could remember in which Apache was spoken well enough on screen to be understood. Usually, Westerns were dubbed in Navajo, said supporting actor Steve Reevis, a Montana Blackfoot who has worked several films but never spoke Apache before "The Missing."     The film is set in southwestern New Mexico in 1885, just as the last of the Apache conflict was ending. Jones' granddaughter -- Blanchett's daughter -- is abducted by a ragged band of Indians and whites who sell women into slavery in Mexico.     New Mexico college student and rodeo competitor Yolanda Nez, a Navajo, plays a captive who is Apache. Her father, Tavere, and Jones set out to keep the slavers from reaching Mexico.     The slavers are led by a "brujo," a medicine man gone bad, played by Eric Schweig. Combat between Jones and Tavere and Schweig is inevitable.     The border slave trade is historically factual, producer Daniel Ostroff said.     University of New Mexico historian Paul Hutton, who also consulted on the film, concurred.     "Indeed people were being kidnapped all the time," Hutton said.     Apaches appreciate the film for showing them as they were -- the good and the bad, family-oriented, generous, faithful to their religion and good-humored. The brujo played by Schweig is not intended to be Apache, though he speaks Apache, the producers say.     Many Apaches have gone back two and three times to see "The Missing," Kanseah said. The producers gave a screening for 500 Mescalero students in Alamogordo last month, and the tribe has been busing students to theaters in nearby Ruidoso. Two more screenings were held here recently for hundreds more students from several tribes who attend Santa Fe Indian School and other tribal schools in the surrounding area.     "It made me feel proud," said Megan Crespin, 8, a 3rd grader from Santo Domingo School. Her tribal name is Moonlight.     Desiree Aguilar, 14, is fluent in Keres, the native tongue of Santo Domingo Pueblo. She watched the film with an analytical eye.     "It was very intense," the 9th grader said. "It kept you wanting to watch it."     Kevin Aspaas, 8, a Navajo student said he liked the hawk that led Tommy Lee Jones back to his family. "I really enjoyed it -- it was a scary and cool movie," he said.     While the last screening played to the students, Kanseah, Nez and Tavere made some comparisons among Navajo and Apache dialects, all of which stem from the Athabaskan root language common to a number of North American tribes.     During the film, even Tommy Lee Jones' grasp of the language was understandable to Apaches and many Navajos.     "He spoke Apache well enough for every Chiricahua in the audience to understand," said New Mexico State University anthropologist Scott Rushforth, who also consulted on the film and attended several screenings.     But there aren't that many Chiricahuas left. They were rounded up and sent to Florida in 1886, shunted back to Alabama, Oklahoma and finally to the Mescalero homeland in south-central New Mexico in 1913.     "There are only about 300 people who are fluent in Chiricahua today," Tavere said. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 18 16:59:21 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2003 09:59:21 -0700 Subject: Tuba City District adopts Hopi Lavayi Project (fwd) Message-ID: Tuba City District adopts Hopi Lavayi Project By Rosanda Suetopka Thayer TC District Media http://www.navajohopiobserver.com/NAVAJOHOPIOBSERVER/sites/NAVAJOHOPIOBSERVER/0189edition/myarticles864443.asp?P=864443&S=392&PubID=11713 Wednesday, Dec. 10 was a landmark meeting for Tuba City Unified School District #15 on several levels. It was the first time that any Hopi Tribal Chairman formally made a presentation before a TCUSD Governing Board. It was also the first time that the Hopi Tribe has formally partnered with a school board outside of the Hopi reservation to bring the Hopi language into school curriculum— a move that is targeted to address the extremely critical Hopi language loss for Hopi people, which includes Hopi students. It was the first time that both Upper and Lower Mungapi Villages have agreed to support a TC District school language program by formal village resolution with Upper Mungapi considering a pilot project within their Hopi community for their own village member use. Finally, in a first time effort, a petition was presented containing, not only Hopi student signatures who attend Tuba City High School requesting the Hopi language program for themselves, but the signatures of fellow TC High Navajo students who recognize and support this Hopi language effort. In fact, the petition is an important part of this now 10 entity effort that include the following groups: TCUSD, Tuba City Junior High and High School Language Committee; the Hopi Lavayi Project/the Hopi Tribe; Dr. Emory Sekaquaptewa, Orthography Specialist at the University of Arizona; Sheila Nicolas, Immersion Specialist at U of A; Dr. Noreen Sakiestewa, Director of Education of the Hopi Tribe; the Villages of Upper and Lower Mungapi; the Hopi Cultural Preservation Office; and the Office of the Hopi Tribal Chairman, the Hopi Footprints Project. The student petition stated that Tuba City High School students of both Hopi and Navajo tribes recognized, not only the importance of their individual Hopi and Navajo languages and cultures, but that these students supported each other as members of Native American tribes living alongside and working with each other at the TC School District in an effort to revitalize an extremely important part of their heritage through their individual tribal cultures and tongues. “Although we recognize that the Hopi language should be taught in the home and in the village, we also recognize that this is not a real or practical approach,” Chairman Taylor said in his opening statement. “It is through our language, and our culture that we learn about our values, our heritage and our responsibilities in this world. “Students are a large part of this world responsibility and they will need to be able to speak Hopi to understand and carry out those obligations.” Program benefits Some of the facts, presented by Chairman Taylor and the members of the Hopi Lavayi Project, Marvin Lalo-Director and Dawa Taylor, with support administrative work done by Chairman’s assistant, Reanna Albert, included statistics from a TC High School and TC Junior High School student survey taken in the spring of 2003 such as the following: • Eighty-four percent of students surveyed said that they saw a need for a Hopi language class at the TC High School level. • Ninety-six percent said they saw that speaking Hopi was very important. • Seventy-nine percent said they saw reading and writing Hopi as important. Many of the benefits presented by the survey with the support of the Hopi Tribe, after talking with staff members of TC District Hopi Language Committee and its Junior High and High School students who will be the prime beneficiaries of the new Hopi language classes included: • Students becoming proficient in the Hopi and English languages. • Improving and enhancing academic performance. • Increased community and parental involvement. • Meeting state foreign language requirements. • Reversing the trend in language loss. • Continue and resuming “Kyaptsi” (respect), “Nami’nangwa” (communal spirit), “Sumi’nangwa” (togetherness) and “Hita’nangwa” (unselfishness, generosity and cooperation). An additional benefit for students to study their own native primary language is continued development of a medium in which humans think and express their thoughts. Also based on studies, a second language increases intellectual growth and enhances mental development with positive effects on student performance academically. The infusion of language and culture will create natural links to other disciplines, fostering a better understanding of all people in the world. The new Hopi language classes also will build self-confidence in understanding and using Hopi language in everyday life as well as developing students’ positive self image by building self-esteem when speaking Hopi among their own age group. The initial course description in the Hopi Chairman’s and Hopi Lavayi Project proposal stated the focus will primarily be on conversational Hopi, hands-on learning, listening activities, community interaction and Hopi language guest presenters, including Hopi elders and local Hopi community resource members. Tuba City District Governing Board, which has stated it believes in, not just the highest and most well-rounded quality education for its students, has said it recognizes that “educational equity access” is also a must for its almost 3,000-plus student population. Board approval The TC District Governing Board formally voted to accept the new Hopi Language program for its student population. The positive yes vote was met with much approval from the packed meeting room, which included community members, teachers, other administrators and students there to hear the presentation from Chairman Taylor and the Hopi Lavayi Project Team. Implementation of the Hopi language classes are proposed for this coming spring semester in both the Tuba City High School and Junior High School levels. Chairman Taylor and the Hopi Lavayi Team also presented members of the TCUSD Governing Board with copies of the Hopi Dictionary, which currently contains 33,000 Hopi words and is not yet complete. The Hopi Dictionary is in the Third Mesa Hopi dialect and was a project directed by Emory Sekaquaptewa, a member of the Hopi Tribe and a linguistics professor at U of A. For more information on the new Hopi Language classes at Tuba City District, call Marvin Lalo or Dawa Taylor at the Hopi Tribe at 928-734-3000 or Principal Adelbert Goldtooth, Tuba City High School at 928-283-1047. (Rosanda Suetopka Thayer is Public Relations Director for Tuba City Unified School District.) From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Sun Dec 21 22:52:57 2003 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Don Osborn) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2003 23:52:57 +0100 Subject: WSIS mentions of languages & linguistic diversity Message-ID: FYI... Below are excerpts from the Declaration and Plan of Action of the World Summit on the Information Society that specifically mention languages or linguistic diversity (in the context of ICT and the "information society"). The entire documents can be read at http://www.itu.int/wsis/documents/doc_multi-en-1161|1160.asp Don Osborn Bisharat.net ======================== Document WSIS-03/GENEVA/DOC/4-E12 December 2003 Original: English Declaration of Principles Building the Information Society: a global challenge in the new Millennium ... 7) ICT applications: benefits in all aspects of life 51. ... Applications should be user-friendly, accessible to all, affordable, adapted to local needs in languages and cultures, and support sustainable development. To this effect, local authorities should play a major role in the provision of ICT services for the benefit of their populations. 8) Cultural diversity and identity, linguistic diversity and local content 52. Cultural diversity is the common heritage of humankind. The Information Society should be founded on and stimulate respect for cultural identity, cultural and linguistic diversity, traditions and religions, and foster dialogue among cultures and civilizations. The promotion, affirmation and preservation of diverse cultural identities and languages as reflected in relevant agreed United Nations documents including UNESCO's Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity, will further enrich the Information Society. 53. The creation, dissemination and preservation of content in diverse languages and formats must be accorded high priority in building an inclusive Information Society, paying particular attention to the diversity of supply of creative work and due recognition of the rights of authors and artists. It is essential to promote the production of and accessibility to all content - educational, scientific, cultural or recreational - in diverse languages and formats. The development of local content suited to domestic or regional needs will encourage social and economic development and will stimulate participation of all stakeholders, including people living in rural, remote and marginal areas. ... ======================== Document WSIS-03/GENEVA/DOC/5-E 12 December 2003 Original: English Plan of Action ... B. Objectives, goals and targets ... 6. Based on internationally agreed development goals, including those in the Millennium Declaration, which are premised on international cooperation, indicative targets may serve as global references for improving connectivity and access in the use of ICTs in promoting the objectives of the Plan of Action, to be achieved by 2015. These targets may be taken into account in the establishment of the national targets, considering the different national circumstances: ... i) to encourage the development of content and to put in place technical conditions in order to facilitate the presence and use of all world languages on the Internet; ... C. Action Lines ... C8. Cultural diversity and identity, linguistic diversity and local content 23. Cultural and linguistic diversity, while stimulating respect for cultural identity, traditions and religions, is essential to the development of an Information Society based on the dialogue among cultures and regional and international cooperation. It is an important factor for sustainable development. a) Create policies that support the respect, preservation, promotion and enhancement of cultural and linguistic diversity and cultural heritage within the Information Society, as reflected in relevant agreed United Nations documents, including UNESCO's Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity. This includes encouraging governments to design cultural policies to promote the production of cultural, educational and scientific content and the development of local cultural industries suited to the linguistic and cultural context of the users. ... f) Provide content that is relevant to the cultures and languages of individuals in the Information Society, through access to traditional and digital media services. g) Through public/private partnerships, foster the creation of varied local and national content, including that available in the language of users, and give recognition and support to ICT-based work in all artistic fields. ... i) Nurture the local capacity for the creation and distribution of software in local languages, as well as content that is relevant to different segments of population, including non-literate, persons with disabilities, disadvantaged and vulnerable groups especially in developing countries and countries with economies in transition. j) Give support to media based in local communities and support projects combining the use of traditional media and new technologies for their role in facilitating the use of local languages, for documenting and preserving local heritage, including landscape and biological diversity, and as a means to reach rural and isolated and nomadic communities. k) Enhance the capacity of indigenous peoples to develop content in their own languages. ... m) Exchange knowledge, experiences and best practices on policies and tools designed to promote cultural and linguistic diversity at regional and sub-regional levels. This can be achieved by establishing regional, and sub-regional working groups on specific issues of this Plan of Action to foster integration efforts. ... o) Governments, through public/private partnerships, should promote technologies and R&D programmes in such areas as translation, iconographies, voice-assisted services and the development of necessary hardware and a variety of software models, including proprietary, open source software and free software, such as standard character sets, language codes, electronic dictionaries, terminology and thesauri, multilingual search engines, machine translation tools, internationalized domain names, content referencing as well as general and application software. ... ======================== -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Sun Dec 21 22:57:27 2003 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Don Osborn) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2003 23:57:27 +0100 Subject: A Kenyan perspective on languages Message-ID: A posting by Mukoma Ngugi, author of "Conversing With Africa: Politics of Change" in response to a question I had re language may be of interest. See http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AfricanLanguages/message/157 . DZO From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Mon Dec 22 19:38:28 2003 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2003 11:38:28 -0800 Subject: Document Message-ID: C A L L F O R P A P E R S 4th International SALTMIL (ISCA SIG) LREC workshop on First Steps for Language Documentation of Minority Languages: Computational Linguistic Tools for Morphology, Lexicon and Corpus Compilation 24 May 2004, Lisbon, Portugal http://193.2.100.60/SALTMIL/ Motivation and Aims The minority or ~Slesser used~T languages of the world are under increasing pressure from the major languages (especially English), and many of them lack full political recognition. Some minority languages have been well researched linguistically, but most have not, and the vast majority do not yet possess basic speech and language resources (such as text and speech corpora) which are sufficient to permit research or commercial development of products. If this situation were to continue, the minority languages would fall a long way behind the major languages, as regards the availability of commercial speech and language products. This in turn will accelerate the decline of those languages that are already struggling to survive. To break this vicious circle, it is important to encourage the development of basic language resources as a first step. The workshop is intended to continue the series of SALTMIL (ISCA SIG) LREC workshops: 1) "Language Resources for European Minority Languages" (LREC1998) Granada, Spain. 2) "Developing Language Resources for Minority Languages: Re-usability and Strategic Priorities" (LREC2000) Athens, Greece. 3) "Portability Issues in Human Language Technologies " (LREC2002) Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain. The proposed workshop aims to share information on tools and best practice, so that isolated researchers will not need to start from scratch. An important aspect will be the forming of personal contacts, which can minimise duplication of effort. Information on sources of funding for minority languages will also be presented, and there will be discussion on the strategic priorities that need to be addressed in this area. There will be a balance between presentations of existing language resources, and more general presentations designed to give background information needed by all researchers present. One potential means of ameliorating this imbalance in technology resources is through encouraging research in the portability of human language technology for multilingual application. Topics of Interest The workshop will focus on the following topics and languages: * Existing projects in the field, with the opportunity to share useful information * Presentations of existing speech and text databases for minority languages, with particular emphasis on software tools that have been found useful in their development. * Linguistic corpora * Automatic Speech Recognition * Acoustic modelling * Dictionary development * Language modelling . * Natural Language Processing: * Computational lexicography * Morphology * Syntax * Machine Translation. * Information retrieval Agenda The first session of the workshop will consist of invited talks focusing on current methodologies for language documentation and computational linguistic tools which are available for minority languages. Each invited speaker will be asked to comment on the following: * how current research relates to minority languages, perhaps indicating how they would approach their work within this context * which methodologies and tools they find most useful * which of those methodologies are defined as portable for different languages. * how these tools could extend the use of the language * how these basis could be used in further work on HLT The second session will be an oral session focusing on programmes and initiatives for supporting minority language documentation. The main aim of this session is to provide a forum for fostering new contacts among researchers working in this area. Invited speakers * Dafydd Gibbon, Univ. Bielefeld. "First steps in corpus compilation" * Xabier Artola, Ixa group, Univ. of the Basque Country. "First steps in lexicon resources" * Bojan Petek, University of Ljubljana. Slovenia. ~SExperiences defining a Network of Excellence on Portability of Human Language Technologies~T * Kenneth R. Beesley, Xerox (to be confirmed) "First steps in morphology" Workshop Organizing and Program Committee Bojan Petek, University of Ljubljana. Slovenia Julie Berndsen, University College Dublin, Ireland Oliver Streiter, EURAC; European Academy, Bolzano/Bozen, Italy Atelach Alemu, Addis Ababa University. Ethiopia Kepa Sarasola,University of the Basque Country, Donostia Submission Papers are invited that describe research and development in the area of Human Language Technology portability. All contributed papers will be presented in poster format. Each submission should include: title; author(s); affiliation(s); and contact author's e-mail address, postal address, telephone and fax numbers. Abstracts (maximum 500 words, plain-text format) should be sent via email to: Julie Berndsen Julie.Berndsen at ucd.ie All contributions (including invited papers) will be printed in the workshop proceedings (CD). They also will be published on the SALTMIL website. Submissions of papers for poster presentations should follow the same style as the ones for regular LREC paper and not be longer than 6000 words. The final details will be published as soon as they become available. We allow simultaneous paper submission to the workshop and the LREC main conference. If a paper is accepted by both the conference and the workshop, the paper will be presented at the conference, rather than at the workshop. The author(s) should notify the workshop chair. Important Dates: Deadline for workshop abstract submission 11th February 2004 Notification of acceptance 25th February 2004 Final version of the paper for the workshop proceedings 1st April 2004 Workshop 24 May 2004, morning Workshop Registration Fees The registration fees for the workshop are: ·If you are not attending LREC: 85 EURO ·If you are attending LREC: 50 Euro These fees will include a coffee break and the Proceedings of the Workshop. Registration will be handled by the LREC Secretariat. From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Wed Dec 24 21:40:45 2003 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2003 13:40:45 -0800 Subject: Links (information) Message-ID: pictures and audio galleries can be found @: http://www.ncidc.org/gallery.htm From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri Dec 26 21:47:43 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2003 14:47:43 -0700 Subject: Voice of survival rings in reclaimed names (fwd) Message-ID: Voice of survival rings in reclaimed names By Debra Jopson December 27, 2003 http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/26/1072308682054.html Twenty Sydney harbour landmarks could have their original Aboriginal placenames officially added to the current English versions as early as Easter after preliminary approval was granted by a group of indigenous representatives. In keeping with the NSW Government's dual-naming policy, Darling Harbour would also be known as Dumbalong, Elizabeth Bay as Gurrajin and Mosman Bay's second name would be Goram Bullagong. Sydney Cove would also once again be called Warrane, Farm Cove Wahganmuggalee and Lavender Bay Gooweebahree. But no one knows what the names mean. The meanings were not recorded in First Fleeters' journals and other historical sources from the first 20 years of settlement which archaeologist Val Attenbrow and linguists Jaky Troy and Michael Walsh used to glean the place names. "What the first colonisers said is: 'What do you call this?' and they just got a name," said Dr Troy, head of the NSW Aboriginal Languages Research and Resources Centre who has reconstructed hundreds of words from the original Sydney language. The 20 names got the go-ahead from a workshop at which descendants of Sydney's original Dharug, Tharawal and Guringai people and other NSW Aborigines who live in the city approved spellings and rejected place names they thought culturally sensitive. One name was omitted because workshop members "were fairly certain it was a men's ceremonial place", Dr Troy said. Local councils and NSW government bodies with jurisdiction over the parts of the harbour will now officially consider the proposed names. Then the Geographical Names Board will advertise them to the public. If there are no objections, the new names could become official as early as Easter, said Flavia Hodges, research fellow with the Australian Placenames Survey. Under the board's policy, only features such as rivers, islands and points can be given dual names but not streets, suburbs or towns. "You don't want emergency services sent to somewhere they've never heard of, but if it is a feature like a point, no worries," said Dr Walsh, a Sydney University linguist. Since the Government announced its dual-naming policy 2 years ago, only two Sydney places have officially had their traditional names added to the map. Dawes Point, under the Harbour Bridge, is also known by its Cadigal name, Tar-ra. South Creek, in Sydney's west, is also known as Wianamatta. Eventually, dual names could cover NSW. But there are possible pitfalls, said Dr Troy. "Goona", for instance, meant faeces in several NSW Aboriginal languages. But names can also be uplifting. One workshop participant, Christopher Kirkbright Wagan Yullubirrgn, said: "When people once again utter the words that have been the names of our places for eons upon eons the sweet voice of our land will once again speak with meaning to her children." This story was found at: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/26/1072308682054.html From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Mon Dec 1 07:25:52 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2003 00:25:52 -0700 Subject: Latin Capital Letter Turned T/K? In-Reply-To: <00d901c3b62f$d7b3aa60$5ce4fbc1@gktg001> Message-ID: i did not see any such character referenced in the Languages vol 17 of the HBNAI. this seems surprising since they are one and the same entity from which the BAE originated. there a few turned letters but not the ones you are looking for...Boas shows /L/. phil UofA, ILAT On Nov 28, 2003, at 7:42 PM, Don Osborn wrote: > Here are two follow-ups to the questions re particular letters used in > some > transcriptions of some native American languages. There were other > postings > but not a whole lot more info so I'll leave the issue with this. DZO > > 1. > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Peter Constable" > To: > Sent: Friday, November 28, 2003 6:02 PM > Subject: RE: Latin Capital Letter Turned T/K? > > >> -----Original Message----- >> From: unicode-bounce at unicode.org [mailto:unicode-bounce at unicode.org] > On Behalf >> Of D. Starner > >> Has anyone else seen these characters, and >> could provide material for a submission? > > I looked through a lot of materials back in the spring for phonetic > symbols, and didn't record any instances of these. > >> How about the Latin Letters Tresillo and Cuatrillo? Any movement >> on that front? > > I've had them on my list of things to propose. I was trying to find > more > samples of tresillo to get a better idea of range of typographic > variation, and had just started on that when that work got interrupted > by other life events such as moving. I still need to follow up on that. > >> Oh, yes, pictures of the characters... > > Some samples of cuatrillo and tresillo can be found at > http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php? > site_id=nrsi&item_id=RecentCuatrilloUse > > > Peter > > Peter Constable > Globalization Infrastructure and Font Technologies > Microsoft Windows Division > > > 2. > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Peter Constable" > To: > Sent: Friday, November 28, 2003 8:27 PM > Subject: RE: Latin Capital Letter Turned T/K? > >> -----Original Message----- >> From: unicode-bounce at unicode.org [mailto:unicode-bounce at unicode.org] > On Behalf >> Of jameskass at att.net > >> Aren't these turned letters (and several others) used in the Fraser >> script? > > They sure are. > > > Peter > > Peter Constable > Globalization Infrastructure and Font Technologies > Microsoft Windows Division > From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Mon Dec 1 19:13:32 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2003 12:13:32 -0700 Subject: A healthy sign for Yakama language (fwd) Message-ID: A healthy sign for Yakama language Middle-school classes help students keep their culture alive Monday, December 1, 2003 SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/150533_signlanguage01.html By PHILIP FEROLITO YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC TOPPENISH -- Students gaze attentively at Loretta Selam-White as she motions her hand away from her body in a gesture that translates "Go my son" in the Yakama language. Surrounding Selam-White in a large circle, the students follow her lead, listening to the instructions on how to sign. "Go my son," she says, beginning the first verse of the song again. "It should be an inside hand -- the back of your hand should be facing you. "Go my son and earn your feather," Selam-White says, as the 26 students follow her every move further into the first verse. "You don't want your feather here because you don't wear your feather here," she reminds them while pointing to the side of her head. "You want your feather to stand tall back here," she says, holding up two fingers at the crown of her head. Selam-White takes the students through it again before going to the next verse. "Make your people proud of you," she says, turning her body to the right with arm extended as if she was pointing to a group of people. Students replicate every move as the song plays on a tape recorder. Selam-White's special visit adds another cultural piece to Rosemary Miller's class at Toppenish Middle School, where students in grades four through eight are learning the Yakama language. "It's a healing; it's a soothing that they can drift into," says Selam-White, who has taught Yakama sign language for more than 15 years. "They'll be so proud when they're performing it." Eighth-grader Cassandra Wesley, whose signing lessons began at home when she was 10, says the class is a place where she feels comfortable. "Actually, I feel pretty strong about this," she says. "I'm going to try and encourage my little nephews and cousins" to get involved in the class. Signing is integral to the Yakama language, she says, noting that it's still used by some in ceremonies where talking is forbidden. Today, signing has become more of a cultural performance. "And the smiles on those old people's faces; it just touches the elders' hearts," says Selam-White. The language class, which incorporates other aspects of Yakama culture, is open to middle school students and meets every Tuesday and Thursday. Its aim is to keep the Yakama language and culture alive. "There is a lot of interest," Miller says. "It's neat to open it (to non-Indians), because they are excited about our culture." There are many dialects of the Yakama language, because the Yakamas are a confederation of 14 tribes, and Miller says she tries to make it all available to students. "We just encourage them to learn as much as they can and I think that's how our language is going to be saved," says Miller, who has taught with the Toppenish School District for 16 years and recently began teaching the Yakama language. "We're trying to pull in as many elders as we can to come in and teach our culture." ? 1998-2003 Seattle Post-Intelligencer From coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU Mon Dec 1 19:35:12 2003 From: coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU (David Lewis) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2003 11:35:12 -0800 Subject: Fwd: [sovernspeakout] FW: White man's language from Turkey Message-ID: > > >First farmers planted the seeds of language > >By Tim Radford in London >November 29, 2003 > >http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/11/28/1069825991027.html > >At last the answer in black and white, or beltz and zuri if you happen to be >Basque, or noir and blanc, if you are French: you owe the words to >Hittite-speaking farmers from Anatolia, who invented agriculture and spread >their words as they sowed their seed 9500 years ago. > >Languages, like people, are related. Russell Gray, of Auckland University, >reports in the magazine Nature that he and a colleague decided to treat >language as if it was DNA and compared selected words from 87 languages to >build an evolutionary tree of the Indo-European languages. This could help >solve an old argument: who picked up the original language and began to >spread gradually evolving versions of it across Europe and Asia? > >For decades the focus has been on a tribe of nomad herders called the >Kurgans from central Asia, who domesticated the horse 6000 years ago and >invaded Europe. > >"It [language] spread not by the sword of conquest, but by the plough," Dr >Gray said. > >Others have argued that the Indo-European family of languages must have >spread with barley and lentils - the first agriculturalists in the Fertile >Crescent would have exported not just their techniques, but also the words >that went with them. > >Dr Gray chose 2449 words from 87 languages, including English, Lithuanian, >Gujarati, Romany, Walloon, Breton, Hindi and Pennsylvania Dutch, and began a >series of comparisons to build up a pattern of descent. > >The choice of words was critical. "For example, English is a veritable fruit >salad of a language, with chunks of vocabulary from the Celts, Romans, >Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Vikings, Normans, and slices of Latin, French, Greek, >and Italian tossed with some more recent garnishes from Arabic, Persian, >Turkish and Hindi. There is even the odd Polynesian borrowing, like tattoo," >he said. > >"Ninety nine per cent of words in the Oxford English Dictionary are in fact >borrowings from other languages." > >But English has a basic vocabulary of 200 words - star, dog, earth, blood, >woman, year and so on - that can be linked to an original shared language. > >The answer is that words were on the move long before horses. Dr Gray's >language tree ended with its roots in Anatolia in modern Turkey about >7500BC, when villagers speaking a form of Hittite kindled pahhur, or fire, >to boil watar, or water, before setting out on pad, or foot, to spread the >good word. > >Dr Gray was trained as a biologist, not a linguist, which some scientists >said could explain the generally cautious reception this week's announcement >in Nature received from linguists. > >"Partly, I think they are irritated," said Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, an >expert on historic population migrations and a professor emeritus at >Stanford Medical School. > >"It is a very good paper." > >The Guardian, The Boston Globe > > From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 4 17:35:42 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2003 10:35:42 -0700 Subject: CALL FOR PAPERS: Workshop on American Indigenous Languages (fwd) Message-ID: CALL FOR PAPERS Workshop on American Indigenous Languages Santa Barbara, CA April 30 - May 2, 2004 The Linguistics department at the University of California, Santa Barbara announces its seventh annual Workshop on American Indigenous Languages (WAIL), which provides a forum for the discussion of theoretical and descriptive linguistic studies of indigenous languages of the Americas. Anonymous abstracts are invited for talks on any topic in linguistics. Talks will be 20 minutes, followed by 10 minutes for discussion. ?Individuals may submit abstracts for one single and one co-authored paper. ?Abstracts should be 500 words or less and can be submitted by hard copy or email. For hard copy submissions, please send five copies of your abstract and a 3x5 card with the following information: (1) name; (2) affiliation; (3) mailing address; (4) phone number; (5) email address; (6) title of your paper. Send hard copy submissions to: ?? Workshop on American Indigenous Languages ?? Department of Linguistics ?? University of California, Santa Barbara ?? Santa Barbara, CA 93106 Email submissions are encouraged. ?Include the information from the 3x5 card (above) in the body of the email message with the abstract as an attachment. Please limit your abstracts to the following formats: ?PDF, RTF, or Microsoft Word document. Send email submissions to: ?? wail at linguistics.ucsb.edu DEADLINE FOR RECEIPT OF ABSTRACTS: ?January 15, 2004 Notification of acceptance will be by email by February 15, 2004. General Information: ?Santa Barbara is situated on the Pacific Ocean near the Santa Ynez mountains. ?The UCSB campus is located near the Santa Barbara airport. ?Participants may also choose to fly into LAX airport in Los Angeles which is approximately 90 miles south of the campus. ?Shuttle buses run between LAX and Santa Barbara. ? Information about hotel accommodations will be posted on the web. For further information contact the conference coordinator at wail at linguistics.ucsb.edu or (805) 893-3776 or check out our website at http://orgs.sa.ucsb.edu/nailsg/ From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 4 17:50:22 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2003 10:50:22 -0700 Subject: CULTURE: Group to Develop Internet Tools With Indigenous Worldview (fwd) Message-ID: CULTURE: Group to Develop Internet Tools With Indigenous Worldview Marty Logan http://ipsnews.net/interna.asp?idnews=21404 MONTREAL, Dec 4 (IPS) - Type ?sacred circle? into the Internet's 'Google' search engine and you will uncover hundreds of thousands of references. Now, one group wants the World Wide Web itself to function much more like the circle, whose concept of balance is integral to many of the world's indigenous peoples. Led by Frits Pannekoek, director of information resources at the University of Calgary, the team is developing tools that would search the Web and organise its information using an ?indigenous way of knowing?. ''The real question is,? says Pannekoek in a telephone interview, ?can the Internet or the World Wide Web be culturally neutral, or at least sufficiently neutral that an alternate world perspective can use it to move in the directions that those world knowledge systems want to move?? ?Because if it isn't and it can't become so, then I think we've got ourselves a bit of a problem.? While Pannekoek argues that simply working to connect indigenous peoples to the Internet is a shortsighted approach that could harm their cultures, aboriginal peoples are split on how to approach the technology. In the run-up to next week's World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva, Switzerland, it has become clear that some indigenous groups want to have a greater online presence; others stress that they must have the power to control their information, and then they will decide themselves the best way to communicate their knowledge. Pannekoek, whose team includes representatives of Cree and Blood indigenous groups in the western Canadian Province of Alberta, compares the Internet to radio, television and other major new technologies. ?They all had transformative impact,? he says. ?Transformation isn't always positive.? ?In particular the hope is that the (new) software will appeal to youth and will reconnect or strengthen their connections to the worldview of their communities,? he wrote in an August research proposal. ?If such software is not developed, the lament of the Blood elders will be realised in the next generation. The young people will truly be 'new people' without real roots.? Next week hundreds of indigenous people and their supporters from around the world will gather for the four-day Global Forum of Indigenous Peoples and the Information Society, being held alongside the WSIS. The meeting's agenda includes an ?independent expert paper? by Marcos Matias Alonso, a member of the U.N. Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. He writes that indigenous peoples, ?do not yet equitably participate in building the future information society. Consequently, indigenous visions and philosophies do not contribute to its developing concept and structure?. Matias Alonso calls for recognising that, ?indigenous traditional knowledge does not automatically belong to the so-called public domain?. ?Regulations on the use of indigenous knowledge by third parties have to be developed, in cooperation with indigenous peoples, fully recognising indigenous customary laws and protocols for sharing, disseminating and communicating indigenous knowledge and its applications,? he adds. One Maori researcher says the focus in New Zealand should be putting the Maori language on the Internet, rather than trying to ?force? the technology in a certain direction. ?If we have sites in our own language, everything else will follow. Culture follows language,? said Te Taka Keegan from the University of Waikato in Hamilton, in a telephone interview. He said he is beginning to see many websites, both indigenous and non-indigenous, employing Maori symbols and other images. ?That's something that's happened without anybody saying, 'look, we're Maori, we should be doing it like this'. It's just something that's kind of happened naturally,? said Keegan. ?It means that there are some inherent influences in our culture that are coming through on the Web . it's quite good to see that it's not all total suppression; it's not total obliteration.? The increasingly multimedia nature of the technology might also shape the Internet into a better fit with indigenous cultures, he suggests. ?An important thing in the Maori culture is the face to face contact ('kanohi ki te kanohi') and the Internet definitely takes that away from you, but . in the future when we're using video links maybe it will return?. ?Maybe the technology will catch up to our culture.? Another group suggests that putting culture first could even lead to indigenous peoples rejecting the technology as it is now organised. ?To think that indigenous peoples' problems with communication will be solved by just connecting them to the Internet and the digital era is another form of colonialism,? said Nilo Cayuqueo, a Mapuche activist and writer from Argentina and co-director of the Abya Yala Nexus, a native development network. ?What we are proposing is to have the rights to information and produce our own indigenous community media. Free software could help us in designing and customising our message according to our values and aspirations as peoples,? he added in an e-mail interview. Pannekoek says if his group receives funding, it could develop a prototype of the Internet tools by 2007. Their major features would include a new way of ?tagging? or digitally labelling information on the Web that would reflect Indigenous ways of seeing the world. Those ways, he adds -- quoting other researchers -- include: (1) knowledge of and belief in unseen powers in the ecosystem: and (2) knowledge that all things in the ecosystem are dependent on each other, and that sacred traditions and persons who know these traditions are responsible for teaching ''morals'' and ''ethics'' to practitioners, who are then given responsibility for this specialised knowledge and its dissemination. An innovative search tool or engine would display its ''finds'' in a form -- such as circles -- that would be innate to indigenous cultures, unlike the text-based tools that now dominate the Web. For example, not only would the outcome of a search be displayed differently, the parameters of the search would also be unique. ?One of the attributes of indigenous knowledge is a responsibility of the individual in the community to transmit, hold, nurture and release knowledge, so one (would have) to establish a tiered system of authorities that are controlled by communities,? according to Pannekoek. That could mean limiting control of indigenous knowledge to certain individuals, he adds, much like the way copyright is used to protect some information now. He says the indigenous people he is working with are ready to share their knowledge, if they can control how it is presented on the Internet. ?There's also a legend around in North America that says, 'the time will eventually come when the white man will need our knowledge. And he'll need it to understand his relationship to the environment, to the greater universe and to each other',? Pannekoek says. ?That still persists, and I've heard more than one (indigenous) person say 'maybe this is a way that our knowledge will assist mankind as a whole'.? (END/2003) From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 4 17:54:50 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2003 10:54:50 -0700 Subject: UB linguist searches for new meaning of Inca informational device (fwd) Message-ID: UB linguist searches for new meaning of Inca informational device University at Buffalo By DONNA LONGENECKER Reporter Assistant Editor http://www.buffalo.edu/reporter/vol35/vol35n14/articles/Brokaw.html Although the ancient Inca are renowned for their highly organized society and extraordinary skill in working with gold, stone and pottery, few are familiar with the khipu?an elaborate system of colored, knotted strings that many researchers believe to be primarily mnemonic in nature?like a rosary?and was used by the ancient conquerors to record census, tribute, genealogies and calendrical information. Because the Inca didn't employ a recognizable system of writing, researchers like Galen Brokaw, assistant professor in the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures in the College of Arts and Sciences, have focused on the khipu as a way of further illuminating Inca history and culture. Brokaw doesn't adhere to the strict view held by some researchers that the khipu is solely mnemonic in nature, instead maintaining the possibility that these intricate specimens are historiographic in nature. Deciphering the mysteries of the khipu, which consists of a primary cord from which hang pendants of cords, depends upon researchers discovering a Rosetta Stone of sorts that would allow them to decode the meaning of the cords and knots. Cord color and the direction of twist and ply of yarn appear to denote specific meanings, but whether or not the devices recorded more than statistical or mathematical information, such as poetry or language, remains elusive to researchers, says Brokaw. He does believe, however, that some of the specimens?about 600 khipu survive in museums or private collections?do appear to be non-numerical. The khipu didn't originate with the Inca, explains Brokaw, and even today Andean shepherds can be seen using a form of khipu to record information about their flocks. "There's a certain kind of mystery about it that's intriguing," Brokaw says of the khipu, noting that while there is a tendency among some researchers to overly romanticize the devices as some kind of writing system, he believes?after reading the indigenous texts comprised, in part, of biographies of Inca kings?that it's easy to see how the khipu might have represented more complex, discursive structures than simply being records of tribute. In fact, Brokaw says the first step in understanding the khipu is "to recognize that it was linked to genres of Andean discourse, powerful discursive paradigms" that were retained by the indigenous chroniclers in the organizational structure they employed in writing down the lineage of the Inca kings. While these chroniclers wrote in the language of their Spanish conquerors, the discursive paradigms Brokaw refers to "do not simply dissolve and disappear when translated into Spanish," he says. One chronicler in particular, he points out, attributes the principal source of all his information to the khipu. "One of the questions that colonial chroniclers attempted to answer about the khipu was whether or not it constituted writing, and much of the debate today centers around the same issue. Based on a selective and literal interpretation of colonial sources and a limited understanding of archaeological specimens, many scholars have argued that the khipu was not writing, but rather a mnemonic device similar to a rosary," says Brokaw in his paper "The Poetics of Khipu Historiography: Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala and the Khipukamayuqs from Pacariqtambo," published recently in Latin American Research Review. Guaman Poma, writing around the beginning of the 17th century, is one of the Andean chroniclers who relied on khipu as his primary source of information. The numerical aspect of many of the khipu differs from Western numbering systems in that Andean societies used and viewed numeration as a way to define and organize themselves, as well as a way to achieve balance in all aspects of life?from the aesthetic to emotional and material concerns, explains Brokaw in "Khipu Numeracy and Alphabetic Literacy in the Andes," published in Colonial Latin American Review. Brokaw writes that the "complete decimal unit of 10, for example, is also a metaphor for the basic social groups called ayllus. "Furthermore, many colonial chronicles describe a decimal-based system used in the organization, administration and record keeping of the Inca empire, and the model of fives is also evident in the historical and geographical paradigms of Andean sociopolitics," he explains. Brokaw argues that Guaman Poma's work is shaped not only by European conventions of text, but also by an Andean conception of historical discourse. It is that Andean-influenced discourse, or poetics, that is shaping the Spanish chronicle of Inca kings that Brokaw believes establishes "an implicit link" between it and the khipu as its physical representation?indeed, as some type of text in and of itself. Brokaw's research is funded by a fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies. He is working on a book about the subject, titled "Reading, Writing and Arithmetic: The Andean Khipu and its Transcriptions." From coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU Thu Dec 4 20:17:19 2003 From: coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU (David Lewis) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2003 12:17:19 -0800 Subject: Fwd: Query: Native North American Internet Presence Message-ID: >Delivered-To: H-AmIndian at h-net.msu.edu >X-Sender: amindian at mail.h-net.msu.edu >X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 5.1.1 >Approved-By: "H-AmIndian (Joyce Ann Kievit)" >Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2003 07:50:17 -0700 >Reply-To: H-Net List for American Indian Studies >Sender: H-Net List for American Indian Studies >From: "H-AmIndian (Joyce Ann Kievit)" >Subject: Query: Native North American Internet Presence >To: H-AMINDIAN at H-NET.MSU.EDU > >Delivered-To: h-amindian at h-net.msu.edu >Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2003 01:39:15 -0500 >From: kristopher.meen at utoronto.ca >Subject: Native North American Internet Presence > >Greetings, > >My name is Kris Meen, a graduate student at the University of Toronto. I'm >doing a research paper on Native North Americans online. I'm currently >looking for Native presence (sites, message boards, blogs, etc) on the web, to >see what's out there. I've found a few sites, but also a lot of dead ends - a >long list from a couple years ago that I found turned up a lot of no longer >functioning addresses. Anyhow, my supervisor told me that the folks at the >American Indian Net service might have some leads. > >Thanks for any help you can provide, sincerely, > >Kris Meen From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 4 22:13:35 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 4 Dec 2003 15:13:35 -0700 Subject: Under threat: an ancient tribe emerging from the forests (fwd) Message-ID: Under threat: an ancient tribe emerging from the forests By Paul Vallely 04 December 2003 http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/story.jsp?story=469848 The woman came out from the forest at the side of the road. She was stark naked, apart from a thong of braided red around her loins. She waved to stop the bus. As it slowed the passengers could see that delicately drawn patterns in white clay adorned her face and body. Those in the bus were fascinated, and wary. For tens of thousands of years the Jarawa people have lived in isolation in the rainforest of the Andaman Islands, remote in the Indian Ocean. Their reputation is of a hostile tribe ready to keep strangers at bay with bows and arrows. But now, for the first time, they have started to emerge from their forests. Nobody was quite sure what the woman wanted. No one among the Indian community speaks her language. And only one or two Jarawa speak Hindi. But she held out her hands as if requesting something. The Jarawa are ethnically distinct from the Indians who run their island. Anthropologists suggest they are descended from the first humans to come out of Africa - DNA tests suggest their closest relatives may be the bushmen of the Kalahari. It is possible they have lived in the Andamans for as long as 60,000 years. Throughout that time these nomadic hunter-gatherers have survived in bands of 40 to 50, hunting pig and monitor lizard, fishing with arrows, and gathering seeds, berries and honey. They use the plants of the islands to make bows, spears, ropes, huts, ornaments and even bee-repellent. It is only in the past 150 years that the islands have been settled, first by the British, who set up a penal colony, and then by the Indians. Slowly the settlers have cleared the forest. The Indian government set aside an area of rainforest for the Jarawa but it saw them as "primitive". Its officials took gifts of food and cloth to the edge of the forest: the Jarawa accepted them, but mocked the officials by urinating on their feet and squirting breast milk at them. More recently the authorities built a trunk road through the reserve. The tribal people fled deeper into the forest, and their numbers have dwindled from 8,000 before colonisation to fewer than 800. But five years ago, they began to emerge. Perhaps because settlers were poaching too much of the reserve's game. Perhaps because loggers were clearing trees in quantities which altered the environment on which they depend. Perhaps because in 1996 one Jarawa youth, named Enmei, was found immobilised with a broken leg and taken to hospital where, during five months treatment, he learnt Hindi and returned with the news that the settlers were friendly. Either way the Jarawa began to surface, some in parties with Enmei, others just appearing by the trunk road or in villages. Local people assumed they were starving and organised food. When the settlers did not offer food or clothes the Jarawa would arrive, with their bows and arrows, and take things. Police advised locals not to protest. And despite the "Beware of Jarawa" signs, and the posters announcing "Do not allow the Jarawa to get into any vehicles" and "Do not give any eatable items to the Jarawa", the interaction with the island's original inhabitants has become a source of entertainment. The negative consequences of this are becoming clear. New diseases are sweeping through the native people. In 1999 a measles and pneumonia epidemic affected up to half of the native population and killed 10 per cent. Young Jarawa have begun bartering for alien goods, such as chewing tobacco and the narcotic betel leaf. And an Indian lawyer filed a case demanding that the Jarawa be settled, stating that it was "high time to make them acquainted with modern civilisation". Survival International, one of the three charities in this year's Independent Christmas Appeal, has been instrumental in helping the Jarawa put their case to the Indian authorities. Evidence it presented - showing that forced resettlement was fatal for other tribes in the Andaman Islands, introducing diseases, destroying self-sufficiency, undermining self-esteem and leaving them vulnerable to alcoholism, suicide and despair - was decisive in two ways. The Indian government, after receiving some 200 letters a day from Survival supporters, two years ago dropped its plans to resettle the Jarawa. Survival then presented evidence to the Indian Supreme Court, citing the example of the Great Andamanese tribe, of whom only 28 people now remain in government "breeding centres". Today three of the Andaman tribes are virtually extinct. Only the Jarawa and the Sentinelese, who live on an island uninvaded by settlers, from which they fire arrows at approaching boats, remain. Last year the Supreme Court ruled in favour of the Jarawa. It ordered that the trunk road be closed, that logging and poaching in the area be banned, and that some settlements be removed. It was one of the biggest successes in Survival's history. "Now the challenge is to see that the order is implemented," said Survival's director, Stephen Corry. "The Jarawa are a people whose lives are synchronised with their environment. More they do not need. Only recognition of their right to own their land and to make their own choices about how they live." As for Enmei, he is back in the rainforest, coming out only when he needs medical treatment, as he did last month. "Even if I have to stay outside for a few days, I like to return," he said. "The jungle is better." From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri Dec 5 17:11:00 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2003 10:11:00 -0700 Subject: Indian education officials discuss virtual tribal college (fwd) Message-ID: Indian education officials discuss virtual tribal college Published: December 5, 2003 By Julia Lyon The Bulletin http://www.bendbulletin.com/news/story.cfm?story_no=11718 Education officials from Indian tribes throughout Oregon are discussing the creation of a virtual tribal college. Proponents say the program would the first of its kind in the nation. The proposed institution would allow reservation residents to access pre-existing college courses at other schools through fiber optics and other technology. Instead of a main campus, education centers could be built or improved with increased technology at reservations across the state. Paid for with federal dollars, the program could allow reservation residents to access degree and training programs with video or Web-based courses, among other methods. Education officials say the next step is gaining approval from the nine tribal councils in Oregon. One of the main goals of the tribal college would be to train and educate residents for reservation industries, said Wendell Jim, the general manager of the education branch of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. Curriculum might be created to meet the needs of the reservations, said Clint Jacks the Oregon State University extension agent for Jefferson County and Warm Springs. Tribal college faculty could teach the curriculum, which could include topics such as natural resources or casino management. Another focus would likely be expanding the remedial education program to help prepare students for degree programs. "One of our experiences is that folks need to increase their math and writing skills to be successful in a bachelor's or associate of arts program," Jacks said. Tribal experts could also teach courses in native languages, forestry and other fields that could be distributed to other campuses. Although many reservations, including Warm Springs, already have some local higher education programs, the concept of the college would be to bring in new education options in addition to expanding what's already there. Rather than just increasing what Central Oregon Community College already offers at Warm Springs, for example, Jim would like to see other schools' offerings added to the education options. Many reservation residents can't leave the reservation for school because they are already working locally, Jim said. And Warm Springs, like some other reservations, is far away from many college campuses. "We're trying to bring opportunity here," he said. Warm Springs has been one of the tribes actively involved in the the virtual school discussions. The program would probably start as a two-year college and be linked with four-year institutions like Oregon State University, said Bill McCaughan, the dean of OSU Extended Campus, in a phone interview from Corvallis. Students could do some college work at home and then move on to a four-year degree at a main campus. If the tribal councils approve the concept, the tribal college could still be perhaps five years away from becoming a reality. "That would be five years of a lot of hard work," McCaughan said. How much it would cost to develop the college remains unknown. The governing body of the college could be made up of tribal representatives, he said. If the program succeeds, the virtual tribal college could become a national model, Jim said. "If this works, it's a method for tribes in the state of Oregon, in the Northwest and in the U.S. to train, to provide these opportunities through technology," he said. "That's the wave of the future." Julia Lyon can be reached at 541-617-7831 or atjlyon at bendbulletin.com. From fnkrs at UAF.EDU Fri Dec 5 21:37:25 2003 From: fnkrs at UAF.EDU (Hishinlai') Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2003 12:37:25 -0900 Subject: Query: Native North American Internet Presence Message-ID: Don't know if you've checked out the University of Alaska Fairbanks' Alaska Native Language Center's website, but here it is (after my signature), if it helps. Hishinlai' >>Greetings, >> >>My name is Kris Meen, a graduate student at the University of Toronto. I'm >>doing a research paper on Native North Americans online. I'm currently >>looking for Native presence (sites, message boards, blogs, etc) on the web, to >>see what's out there. I've found a few sites, but also a lot of dead ends - a >>long list from a couple years ago that I found turned up a lot of no longer >>functioning addresses. Anyhow, my supervisor told me that the folks at the >>American Indian Net service might have some leads. >> >>Thanks for any help you can provide, sincerely, >> >>Kris Meen <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> Hishinlai' "Kathy R. Sikorski", Gwich'in Instructor University of Alaska Fairbanks Alaska Native Language Center P. O. Box 757680 Fairbanks, AK 99775-7680 P (907) 474-7875 F (907) 474-7876 E fnkrs at uaf.edu ANLC-L at www.uaf.edu/anlc/ Laraa t'ahch'yaa kwaa k'it tr'agwah'in. Nigwiinjik kwaa k'it juu veet'indhan veet'indhan ts'a' nak'arahtii kwaa k'it ch'andzaa. or "Work like you don't need the money. Love like you've never been hurt, and Dance like you do when nobody's watching." From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Sat Dec 6 09:26:35 2003 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Don Osborn) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 03:26:35 -0600 Subject: Anishinaabemowin on the Web! Message-ID: Martha O'Kennon's online computer translators for English to Ojibwe, Ojibwe to English, and English to Odawa at http://mokennon2.albion.edu/ojibwe.htm may be of interest to those not already aware of it. These are works in progress (she's doing revisions to the earlier versions) and feedback is sought. Personally I think that computer translation has a lot of potential (aside from being good for an occasional laugh) for less widely spoken languages and Prof. O'Kennon at the forefront of exploring this. She has also been working on Xhosa and Pulaar/Fulfulde translators (see http://mokennon2.albion.edu/language.htm ). Don Osborn Bisharat.net From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Sat Dec 6 17:30:08 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 10:30:08 -0700 Subject: The threatened forest people who are learning the language of survival (fwd) Message-ID: The threatened forest people who are learning the language of survival By Louise Rimmer in Rio de Janeiro 06 December 2003 http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=470595 When Davi Yanomami jets in and out of international conferences, he wears his traditional feathers rather than a suit, although few hotels can offer him his preferred hammock. Yet this is a minor discomfort. For, through his engagement with the modern world, the charismatic spokesman for the Yanomami, South America's most numerous forest-dwelling tribal people, has helped secure their rights over ancestral land and preserve a lifestyle that has nature at its core. Davi represents an estimated 27,000 Yanomami, the continent's last substantial group of isolated indigenous people. Their home is the northern Amazon, deep in the hills that lie between Brazil and Venezuela. After their land is secured from the interests of gold-prospectors and cattle-ranchers, the Yanomami are able to thrive as their ancestors did for thousands of years. Life for the Yanomami is communal; tribal groups of up to 400 can share the same house, although there are hearths for individual families around a central area cleared for rituals and dancing. The communities live by hunting and gathering, cultivating crops and growing medicines in large gardens. Hunting is reciprocal, with meat being shared with family and friends. "There is always enough food in the forest," Davi says. The Yanomami are also deeply spiritual people, who summon shamanic spirits using an hallucinogenic snuff called yakoana. These spirits are said to preside in the mountains, wind, thunder and darkness and help cure forest diseases, control the weather and generally keep an eye on the world, which can be a perilous place for the Yanomami. During the 1970s and 1980s, they suffered hugely from Brazilian gold-miners invading their land. Villages were destroyed, the people were shot at, and swept by diseases to which the Yanomami had no immunity. Twenty per cent of the population were wiped out in seven years. Finally, after a 20-year international campaign led by Survival International, one of the three charities in this year's Independent Christmas Appeal, the miners were expelled and the land was demarcated as the Yanomami Park by the Brazilian government in 1992. But the Yanomami do not have ownership rights over their land. Cattle-ranchers and miners continue to threaten them, and the Indians (to use the term they prefer) wish to own the land, rather than simply feel they are renting it from the government. "By law it is forbidden to invade Yanomami land, but nobody is making sure that the law is being implemented," Davi says. "The miners are still coming in, and bringing disease with them. The farmers are chopping down the trees and destroying the forest. The land gives us life, and if we keep the land, we give life back to it, because no one can destroy it when it remains in our hands." The vulnerability of the Yanomami was brutally exposed in 1993, when 16 of them were killed by gold-miners in what became known as the Haximu massacre. And there are threats of a more insidious kind. The increased militarisation of the area has brought barracks full of soldiers who bring sexually transmitted diseases with them, infecting Indian women who sell sex for food and coffee. But not all experience with the non-indigenous "white man", or the nape, as Yanomami call them, is negative. In recent years, the Yanomami have accepted funding from international organisations, including Survival, to set up their own school, with the aim of writing down their language and history for the first time. "It is important for us to become educated, to be able to write about our culture to pass onto future generations," Davi says. He learnt Portuguese to translate the advice of white doctors after an epidemic of malaria in his community. "I also want white people to be able to read our language, just as it is important for us to speak theirs." The Yanomami are also learning to read a microscope slide to study the impact of malaria. "The meeting of white and Yanomami healing gives us the strength to get rid of disease," he says. "Our shamanic spirits can cure only the diseases they know, the diseases of the forest. The white doctor cures tuberculosis, malaria, pneumonia and worms." These diseases were brought in by the white man. The Yanomami are reluctant to encourage further integration, preferring to fight for the right to be different. "We don't know about commerce," Davi says. "We use our forest without paying. The whites come and take our earth to make things to put in shops, where they wait for the price to go up so they can gain more at our expense. We indigenous people use the earth to plant and then we divide food up between our relatives and our friends." Misconceptions about Indians and non-indigenous abound. It is hard to tell if Davi is joking when he speaks solemnly on the worst type of white man, the yoasi, "men with white skin, who are bald with glasses and go around in cars and swim in swimming pools. What I really mean is men who look to the forest, and all they see is money". Davi's stereotypes are much less damaging than those of a leading American anthropologist, Napoleon Chagnon, who once pronounced the Yanomami as "sly, aggressive and intimidating" people who lived in a state of "chronic warfare". The anthropologist's views, which have been denounced as racist and sensationalist, are still current in some universities. But Davi is dismissive. "We get violent only when the white man messes with us," he says. "It is the rest of the world which is violent. You see it in the big cities, in Iraq, in the United States. We don't have bombs or guns. When we have conflict, we just fight among ourselves. That's normal." But the Yanomami's real battle, he knows, is a different one. It is against the corrosive homogenisation of Western culture. "We will keep on fighting," he says. "We Indian people from different tribes are getting together and getting stronger. We have learnt a lot; we are learning to speak Portuguese so that we can complain and demand. Don't you worry, we will keep on fighting. Fighting for our rights." -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 6442 bytes Desc: not available URL: From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sat Dec 6 17:50:04 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 10:50:04 -0700 Subject: Anishinaabemowin on the Web! In-Reply-To: <1070702795.3fd1a0cbe4c1c@webmail.bisharat.net> Message-ID: cool! thanks Don, Phil UofA, ILAT > ----- Message from dzo at BISHARAT.NET --------- > Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 03:26:35 -0600 > From: Don Osborn > Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology > Subject: Anishinaabemowin on the Web! > To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU > > Martha O'Kennon's online computer translators for English to Ojibwe, > Ojibwe to > English, and English to Odawa at > http://mokennon2.albion.edu/ojibwe.htm may be > of interest to those not already aware of it. These are works in > progress > (she's doing revisions to the earlier versions) and feedback is > sought. > > Personally I think that computer translation has a lot of potential > (aside from > being good for an occasional laugh) for less widely spoken languages > and Prof. > O'Kennon at the forefront of exploring this. She has also been > working on Xhosa > and Pulaar/Fulfulde translators (see > http://mokennon2.albion.edu/language.htm ). > > Don Osborn > Bisharat.net > > > ----- End message from dzo at BISHARAT.NET ----- From mikinakn at SHAW.CA Sat Dec 6 18:02:39 2003 From: mikinakn at SHAW.CA (Rolland Nadjiwon) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 13:02:39 -0500 Subject: Anishinaabemowin on the Web! Message-ID: Yep...definitely cool.... ---- wahjeh rolland nadjiwon ----- Original Message ----- From: "Phil CashCash" To: Sent: Saturday, December 06, 2003 12:50 PM Subject: Re: Anishinaabemowin on the Web! > cool! thanks Don, > > Phil > UofA, ILAT From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Sun Dec 7 02:34:19 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2003 19:34:19 -0700 Subject: 'Lost' sacred language of the Maya is rediscovered (fwd) Message-ID: 'Lost' sacred language of the Maya is rediscovered By David Keys Archaeology Correspondent 07 December 2003 http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=470833 Linguists have discovered a still-surviving version of the sacred religious language of the ancient Maya - the great pyramid-building civilisation that once dominated Central America. For years some Maya hieroglyphic texts have defied interpretation - but now archaeologists and linguists have identified a little-known native Indian language as the descendant of the elite tongue spoken by rulers and religious leaders of the ancient Maya. The language, Ch'orti - spoken today by just a few thousand Guatemalan Indians - will become a living "Rosetta Stone", a key to unravelling those aspects of Maya hieroglyphic writings which have so far not been properly understood. Over the next few years dozens of linguists and anthropologists are expected to start "mining" Ch'orti language and culture for words and expressions relating to everything from blood-letting to fasting. The Maya were one of the great civilisations of the ancient world - a civilisation that lasted for 2,000 years, roughly from 550BC to AD1450. Theyconstructed huge cities - some covering 100 square miles with populations of up to 170,000. Their art, architecture and culture were extremely sophisticated - and their elites studied astronomy and mathematics. Their writing system was a complex script - systemically similar to Chinese. And yet they remained technically a "stone age" society with no metal tools, no draught animals and no wheeled transport. Up till now, scholars had thought that, in spoken form, the ancient Maya elite sacred language was extinct. But research by a team led by archaeologist Professor Steven Houston and linguist Professor John Robertson of Brigham Young University, Utah, has now shown that Ch'orti evolved directly out of that sacred language. The language that Ch'orti is descended from seems to have originally been spoken through an area of what are now Guatemala, Belize, Honduras and southern Mexico. Archaeological research has shown that as the civilisation progressed and spread, other Central American Maya languages came to be spoken. But because of its association with the first Maya civilisation, successive generations of Maya elites preserved proto-Ch'orti as a sacred language. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 2681 bytes Desc: not available URL: From miakalish at REDPONY.US Wed Dec 10 20:10:00 2003 From: miakalish at REDPONY.US (MiaKalish@RedPony) Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2003 13:10:00 -0700 Subject: Informal servey Message-ID: Dear Indigenous Scholars: I would like to ask a question that is only slightly off-topic, less so for languages that have a "women's language" and a "men's language" than for those who do not. I have a belief that for Indigenous women, there is not the contention that is so often studied in Women's Studies programs. I am working in the Women's Studies Program Office at New Mexico State, and would like to see our curriculum expand to include women in Science, for who men are co-workers and friends, and Women of Color, for whom issues, especially in those groups where land, culture, language, and often livelihood, have been ripped away, are very, very different than for the white women who have traditionally involved themselves in Women's Studies programs and who have written much of the Women's Studies rhetoric. I was hoping some number of you would have the time and willingness to reply to me, at MiaKalish at RedPony.US, and let me know what is true for you. I will take your replies, without your names unless you specifically request that I attribute your responses to you, and use them to make a case for an expanded curriculum here at NMSU. If we are successful, and those who participated are interested, I will return the favor for your time and consideration by sending you the copies of the prepared documents that I develop to support this case. I am not only asking Indigenous Women to reply, but Indigenous Men, also. My underlying idea is that "Women's Studies" has to be about a lot, lot more than "Look at what those big mean ole men did to us", which has been the traditional refrain for 30 years. I want something that reflects who The People actually are, all the people, the men, the women, and Everyone, not just the white women who seem to dominate this field of study. Thanking you in advance, Mia Kalish "Heritage Languages: Don't leave home without one." Mia Kalish, M.A. Director, Red Pony Heritage Language Team PhD Student, Computer Science Tularosa, New Mexico USA 88352 www.redpony.us -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Ivy.gif Type: image/gif Size: 5665 bytes Desc: not available URL: From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Thu Dec 11 17:53:06 2003 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 09:53:06 -0800 Subject: Karuk Xmas Message-ID: 12 Days of Karuk Christmas (also applicable to Hupa?s, Tolowa's and Yurok?s) On the Twelfth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me? Twelve Gamblers Drumming, Eleven Salmon Swimming, Ten Pounds of Acorns, Nine Brush Dancers, Eight Girls Singing, Seven Baby Baskets, Six Strings of Dentalia, Five Redwood Canoes, Four Boys Jumping Center, Three Elk Horn Purses, Two Bundles of Bear Grass, and a Woodpecker in a Huckleberry Bush. (Idea Borrowed from Ivy and Yolanda Fulmer of Kirkland, Washington and Hoonah, Alaska) From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Thu Dec 11 18:10:48 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 11:10:48 -0700 Subject: Ethnic art facing life or death (fwd) Message-ID: Ethnic art facing life or death ( 2003-12-10 23:39) (China Daily) http://www1.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2003-12/10/content_289139.htm China is working hard to salvage and preserve some of its diversified ethnic cultures threatened with extinction as a result of modernization. Zhao Weisui, vice-minister of culture, said the folk culture of the country's 56 nationalities -- including art, literature and custom -- are suffering unprecedented challenges and destruction with the rapid speed of globalization and modernization. Zhao said his ministry had launched a massive project to save folk cultural heritage in print, photos and on video. "Saving and preserving the folk culture of ethnic minorities is very urgent and the project needs more field research at grass-roots levels,'' said Zhao when he addressed at a three-day international symposium on ethnic culture protection which was closed yesterday in Beijing. Around 200 artists, scholars and officials from home and abroad participated in the workshop, exchanging views and experiences on the protection of endangered cultural heritage, such as ethnic and folk dances, music and their instruments, folk fine arts and traditional handicrafts like cloth weaving and dying, embroidery and paper cutting. Liu Xiaochun, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, expressed her concern on the survival of the culture of the Oroqen ethnic group who have been living in the deep forest in Northeast China since ancient times. As a member of the Oroqen minority with a small population of around 8,000 people, Liu said her ethnic group is good at singing and dancing. However, when she was on a survey trip to a Oroqen dominated village in Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, she founded that few people under 50-year-old can sing their folk songs. Moreover, the lip harp is a traditional musical instrument of the Oroqen people, but only one of these instruments was found in the village, and few people can play it. "The Oroqen ethnic group has its own particular language but without written words. Therefore, its preservation and inheritance is very difficult. If nothing is done to it, the Oroqen language and its talking and singing art will become extinct,'' said Liu. She suggested that the central or local government establish a training organization in the area to train folk artists and set up special funds to save important aspects of folk culture. Zhou Xing, an professor with the Aichi University in Japan, called for the preservation of culture and art heritage in local communities. "With support from the community, ancient art forms can have a better chance of surviving and being passed on to future generations. Heritage can only be passed on from generation to generation when the whole community realizes the value of this heritage,'' said Zhou. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 3199 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Thu Dec 11 18:26:21 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 11:26:21 -0700 Subject: Aboriginal community college urged (fwd) Message-ID: Aboriginal community college urged Learning to be made possible through virtual indigenous school system 2003-12-10 / Taiwan News, Contributing Writer / By Jason Pan -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 611 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 67850 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- Women try on aboriginal handicraft on display during a two-day conference on life-long learning and cultural development for aboriginal communities in Taiwan. (PETER MAH, TAIWAN NEWS) http://www.etaiwannews.com/Taiwan/2003/12/10/1071022187.htm Aboriginal activists and social service groups gathered yesterday to press for the establishment of an "Indigenous Peoples College" to promote lifelong learning and economic development at the community level. Founding a post-secondary school system that would also preserve aboriginal language and culture was the central focus of the two-day "2003 Conference on Managing Aboriginal Community Learning and Cultural Development" that began in Taipei yesterday. Chen Chien-nien (???), the head of the Council of Indigenous Peoples attended the meeting and reviewed the presentation on adult education courses and distant-learning programs at remote villages. "We support the revitalization drive for aboriginal communities. It is part of the 'Challenge 2008: National Development Plans,' and our government is firmly behind the efforts to train indigenous teachers and social service workers at the grassroots levels," Chen said. "We can provide assistance and technical help in setting up education centers in the communities for lifelong learning and for cultivating local talent," he added. The CIP head stressed that new approaches were needed to strengthen indigenous cultures and create an environment that would encourage aborigines to speak their mother tongues. He also pointed to the need to improve aboriginal living standards with sustainable economic programs. Many of the more than 100 delegates taking part in the conference seminars agreed with the plan for an "Indigenous Peoples College" and expected to participate in the initiative through the networking of education centers and distant-learning programs in aboriginal communities. They said the rapid changes in telecommunications and broadband information technologies in recent years have made it possible to create and manage a virtual aboriginal school system through links with other communities and outside support networks. The two-day meeting was organized by the Association of Taiwan Indigenous People College, and sponsored by the CIP, national universities, and a number of aboriginal NGO groups. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 2852 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Thu Dec 11 18:28:08 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 11:28:08 -0700 Subject: Technology of the future preserving indigenous past (fwd) Message-ID: Technology of the future preserving indigenous past Cairns December 10, 2003 High-tech wizardry is replacing billy can and damper-style oral cultural transmission for a Cape York indigenous community. The Noel Pearson-driven Computer Culture project at Coen trains students to record their elders' stories and culture onto websites, CDs and digital video. Pearson said the pioneering project, one of many he is rolling out across the cape, aims to make children's education the town's number one priority. The project would also ensure the preservation of culture, both through its documentation and in the minds of the young people who document it. "Education is absolutely critical to cultural survival in the long term," Pearson said. "We're not going to survive as a culture without education in the long term. We have to make a decisive connection between education and cultural survival. "The people who will speak Aboriginal languages in 50 years time will be literate in English, they'll be literate in their own language, they'll be highly educated. "Our focus here in the Computer Culture project is education, it's using culture as a culture has got to involve literacy," he said. Also launching the Coen Education Strategy, which focuses on encouraging hook to bring the elders and families in to support their kids in education." Pearson said indigenous people needed to decisively move to literate transmission of culture because oral transmission was not enough in the modern world. "We're moving away from the billy can and damper cultural transmission of the bush tucker trips in the bush to one that stresses even your inquiring minds and high-quality schooling, Pearson warned of the danger of surrounding children with low expectations. "One of the real dangers I'm waking up to in terms of secondary school education is too many schools have got a kind of two-stream program," he said. "One for the kids they have expectations of and the other for the kids they have no expectations of. "My alarm is at the fact that schools are already pre-determining the two streams these kids enter into ... I don't like the fact it's all the black kids who are going down the B-grade stream." AAP This story was found at: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/10/1070732247518.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 2573 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 204 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 64 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Fri Dec 12 18:43:51 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 11:43:51 -0700 Subject: Study reaps knowledge from names (fwd) Message-ID: Study reaps knowledge from names "Richest detail came from people with most experience on the land" JANE GEORGE Anne Henshaw will meet Cape Dorset residents this month to discuss traditional place names. (PHOTO COURTESY OF ANNE HENSHAW) -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 759 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 95578 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- http://www.nunatsiaq.com/news/nunavut/31212_06.html Communities should record and locate traditional place names in Inuktitut because they hold a wealth of information about the environment, culture and history. An anthropologist from the United States is helping the hamlet of Cape Dorset document this place-name information, with funding from Nunavut's department of culture, language, elders and youth, the Inuit Heritage Foundation and the National Science Foundation. This month, Anne Henshaw of the Coastal Studies Centre at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, will meet residents, municipal officials and students in Cape Dorset to discuss place names she recorded in the community with the assistance of residents Aksatungua Ashoona, Pootoogook Eli and Akalayuk Qavavau. "The richest detail came from people with the most experience on the land," Henshaw said in a telephone interview before her expected arrival in Cape Dorset on Dec. 8. The Inuktitut language, she said, is the repository of generations of experience. The names reveal information about ice, animal migrations and snowfields. She said the place names helped Inuit deal with changes in climate and remain safe when travelling on the land. Place names around Cape Dorset that are connected to how people see the world include: ? Amanguatuq: a place that resembles a women carrying a baby in an amautiq. ? Aiviqqat: the islands resemble walruses swimming as a group. ? Sinarnaq: a place that resembles a husky dog (the fur and the gray and white color). ? Taliruat: a place that resembles a walrus flipper, lots of seals and walrus during sea ice break up. ? Pitsik: a place where animals appear to be bouncing off the water. Among names showing environmental knowledge are: ? Pattitaituk: a lake that doesn't freeze all the way to the bottom. ? Arviturlik: a small bay for bowhead whale. ? Naujaaraajuit: a seagull nesting area, for fledgling birds. ? Qasigijjat: a place of harbor seals, nesting area for eider ducks. ? Sarvaalu: an inlet that doesn't freeze in winter, where currents are very strong, with flowing water. And some names that show history are: ? Ungujaqtalik: a place where lots of people lived in igloos. ? Tunniqjuat: the original camp of the Tuniit. Recording place names doesn't require more than willing collectors and a map, Henshaw said. "It's not rocket science, but it does take some science," she said. The science comes in when traditional place names are matched, one by one, with Global Positioning System locations on a digitized map. Providing CDs showing an exact map location and photo of each place would be the next step in this project, so the names could be used in schools to pass on the knowledge to the next generation. Better knowledge of place names could also lead to more culturally informed climate change policies, Henshaw said, because there would be a richer official record of the land's role in peoples' lives. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 3269 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Fri Dec 12 18:46:31 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 11:46:31 -0700 Subject: Press Statement of the Indigenous Peoples Delegation to the UN WSIS Geneva 11 (fwd) Message-ID: Press Statement of the Indigenous Peoples Delegation to the UN WSIS Geneva 11 December 2003 STATES BETRAY THE WORLDS 400 MILLION INDIGENOUS PEOPLES http://www.indymedia.ch/fr/2003/12/16442.shtml Indigenous delegations from the four corners of the world arrived in Geneva to learn that States have once again betrayed their agreements to address the central concerns of Indigenous Peoples. Language in earlier drafts contained specific references to the right of Indigenous Peoples to fundamental freedoms and human rights protections had been deleted from the documents. In addition, references providing that Indigenous Peoples have the right to protection of their collective intellectual property and traditional knowledge had also disappeared from the current WSIS Plan of Action. States have also deleted the term "Indigenous Peoples" from section C8 of the Plan of Action covering cultural diversity, identity, linguistic diversity and local content. The current language in the WSIS Plan of Action allows the wholesale theft, commodification and commercialisation of indigenous knowledge and genetic and biological diversity without the free, prior and informed consent of the Indigenous Peoples who are the guardians of these cultural resources and the owners of traditional knowledge. The language in the WSIS Plan of Action will facilitate biopiracy and further marginalize the millions of Indigenous Peoples who live in extreme poverty without electricity or any infrastructure for ICT. We urge all States, human rights groups and civil society NGOs to help lobby for changes to the Plan of Action to reinsert the protective language that has been deleted. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 1783 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Fri Dec 12 18:47:35 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 11:47:35 -0700 Subject: UN-backed information summit called on to help progress of indigenous peoples (fwd) Message-ID: UN-backed information summit called on to help progress of indigenous peoples 11 December ? Indigenous people today called on a United Nations-backed global information summit to put information and communications technologies (ICTs) into the service of economic and social development in their communities around the world. The call came in a declaration and action programme adopted at the conclusion of the Global Forum on Indigenous Peoples and the Information Society this week in Geneva, one of three official side events to the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). The text will be officially transmitted to the Summit tomorrow by Ole-Henrik Magga, Chairperson of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. ?This Global Forum is a chance for indigenous people to become engaged with the World Summit on the Information Society. By discussing opportunities and challenges facing people around the world, we are creating solutions that will help indigenous peoples move forward in meaningful ways,? Mr. Magga said at a press briefing. The Global Forum, which began Monday, addressed topics ranging from e-health, e-learning, cultural preservation through digital media and citizen empowerment. It identified many challenges, including a lack of resources as well as a lack of control most indigenous peoples experience in terms of having to adapt to a new technology rather than being able to adjust the technology to suit their needs. The meeting also agreed that indigenous peoples should play a part in the preparatory process for the second phase of the Summit in 2005 in Tunis, and win concrete results at that conference, after having been given short notice to prepare for and participate in the Geneva phase. ?The value of information technology becomes most apparent when we examine how it is benefiting indigenous communities, particularly those in remote locations,? Mr. Magga said. ?Indigenous peoples are keen to preserve and pass on their diverse culture to future generation and are examining the new tools of the information society to see how they can assist.? Joining Mr. Magga was Mililani Trask, a member of the Permanent Forum, who lamented the decision by the Member States to delete references in the Summit's draft Declaration of Principles and Plan of Action to such issues as the protection of indigenous peoples' rights and the preservation of cultural diversity and language. The Secretariat for the UN Permanent Forum assists the 16-member panel in carrying out its mandate, which covers economic and social development, culture, the environment, education, health and human rights. It provides expert advice and recommendations on indigenous issues to the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and to UN programmes, funds and agencies, and helps to raise awareness of indigenous issues within the UN system. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 3350 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Fri Dec 12 18:51:53 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 11:51:53 -0700 Subject: UN-backed information summit called on to help progress of indigenous peoples (fwd) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: ...link http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp? NewsID=9180&Cr=indigenous&Cr1=people On Dec 12, 2003, at 11:47 AM, phil cash cash wrote: > UN-backed information summit called on to help progress of indigenous > peoples > > 11 December ? Indigenous people today called on a United > Nations-backed global information summit to put information and > communications technologies (ICTs) into the service of economic and > social development in their communities around the world. > > The call came in a declaration and action programme adopted at the > conclusion of the Global Forum on Indigenous Peoples and the > Information Society this week in Geneva, one of three official side > events to the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). The text > will be officially transmitted to the Summit tomorrow by Ole-Henrik > Magga, Chairperson of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. > > ?This Global Forum is a chance for indigenous people to become engaged > with the World Summit on the Information Society. By discussing > opportunities and challenges facing people around the world, we are > creating solutions that will help indigenous peoples move forward in > meaningful ways,? Mr. Magga said at a press briefing. > > The Global Forum, which began Monday, addressed topics ranging from > e-health, e-learning, cultural preservation through digital media and > citizen empowerment. It identified many challenges, including a lack > of resources as well as a lack of control most indigenous peoples > experience in terms of having to adapt to a new technology rather than > being able to adjust the technology to suit their needs. > > The meeting also agreed that indigenous peoples should play a part in > the preparatory process for the second phase of the Summit in 2005 in > Tunis, and win concrete results at that conference, after having been > given short notice to prepare for and participate in the Geneva phase. > > ?The value of information technology becomes most apparent when we > examine how it is benefiting indigenous communities, particularly > those in remote locations,? Mr. Magga said. ?Indigenous peoples are > keen to preserve and pass on their diverse culture to future > generation and are examining the new tools of the information society > to see how they can assist.? > > Joining Mr. Magga was Mililani Trask, a member of the Permanent Forum, > who lamented the decision by the Member States to delete references in > the Summit's draft Declaration of Principles and Plan of Action to > such issues as the protection of indigenous peoples' rights and the > preservation of cultural diversity and language. > > The Secretariat for the UN Permanent Forum assists the 16-member panel > in carrying out its mandate, which covers economic and social > development, culture, the environment, education, health and human > rights. It provides expert advice and recommendations on indigenous > issues to the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and to UN > programmes, funds and agencies, and helps to raise awareness of > indigenous issues within the UN system. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 3438 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Fri Dec 12 18:55:22 2003 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 11:55:22 -0700 Subject: Harvard mulls challenges facing Native Americans (fwd) Message-ID: http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2003/12.11/17-natamer.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 64 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: pastedGraphic1.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 346526 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- Professor of Business Administration James Austin delivers opening remarks at the Native Issues Research Symposium, an event designed to promote research and scholarly work at Harvard relevant to Native Americans. (Staff photos Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard News Office) Harvard mulls challenges facing Native Americans First research symposium on Native American issues unites University researchers By Alvin Powell Harvard News Office Invoking the "Great Creator" to guide them, Native Americans and researchers examining Native American challenges convened their first-ever Harvard-wide symposium Thursday (Dec. 4), joining forces to improve Native American lives. Called the Native Issues Research Symposium, the event's purpose was to promote research and scholarly work at Harvard relevant to Native Americans. Topics covered a broad range, representing research in disciplines across the University. Among the issues examined during the symposium were leadership, archaeology, cancer education, gaming compacts, resolving disputes between tribes and other governments, family life, language preservation, and the legal and economic realities of tribal sovereignty. Joe Kalt, faculty chair of the Harvard University Native American Program and Ford Foundation Professor of International Political Economy at the Kennedy School of Government, said organizers plan to gather research presented at the symposium into a book that they hope will be the first in a series of research publications centered on Native Americans. "We will hopefully produce the first of a steady effort that goes on for years and years," Kalt said. The symposium, sponsored by the Ernst Fund for Native American Studies of the Harvard University Native American Program, drew about 40 researchers from a variety of schools across Harvard, including the Kennedy School of Government, the Medical School, and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 2397 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 204418 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- Carmen Lopez, interim executive director of the Native American Program, addresses the symposium. Leadership key One of the first presentations examined challenges facing Native American leaders. From questions of governance to education to cultural preservation and language loss, tribal leaders have an important role in determining the future course of different tribal groups. That leadership has to be adaptive and responsive, according to Tim Begaye, who presented a paper he co-authored with Lecturer in Public Policy at the Kennedy School Ronald Heifetz, "Adaptive Leadership: Challenges Native Leaders Face in a Contemporary Society." Native American leaders have been dealing with fundamental change for hundreds of years, Begaye said. Challenges they face today include guiding the pace and direction of that continuing change. Key to being a successful leader is understanding not just the changes, but the underlying community. The community can be extremely diverse, encompassing elders who speak only their tribal language, younger people who speak only English, as well as tribal members currently living outside the community. Language loss is a particularly difficult problem, Begaye said. More than half of young people under 25 don't speak their tribal language anymore, and some adults question the usefulness of even trying to teach it to their children. "I hear parents saying, 'I don't need the language, it's English-only out there,'" Begaye said. Other challenges include loss of tribal land, loss of identity, cultural mixing, integration of Christianity with traditional beliefs, functioning with government and educational systems imposed by the federal government, and the "brain drain" from reservations. Successful leaders, Begaye said, must have a vision based on the needs and desires of their community. Lessons from the Pequots Another researcher drew lessons from the financially successful Mashantucket Pequot casino in Connecticut. Gavin Clarkson, the Reginald F. Lewis Fellow at Harvard Law School, presented the paper "Gaming Compact Negotiations (Pequot Case Study)," co-authored with Jim Sebenius, the Gordon Donaldson Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. Clarkson outlined the circumstances surrounding the founding of the Mashantucket Pequot's casino, Foxwoods, 10 years ago. The tribe, which had run bingo games from their eastern Connecticut reservation, asked the state to enter into negotiations for a casino, but, contrary to federal law, the state refused. The state's refusal opened the door to a unilateral decision by the Bureau of Indian Affairs, which approved the casino, only without slot machines. The tribe and state then entered into negotiations over whether the slot machines would be allowed and the tribe offered to give the state a portion of the proceeds if it were allowed slot machines and if it were allowed to have a monopoly on casino gambling in Connecticut. The state, in the midst of a budget crisis, approved. The Pequots, in exchange, got a casino gaming monopoly and a financial windfall. "It was a brilliant move on the part of the tribe," Clarkson said. Though gaming compacts are the most familiar kinds of agreements between tribes and states, many other compacts exist governing law enforcement, resource use, hunting, fishing, and other areas where tribal and state authority overlap. The Mashantucket Pequot case, Clarkson said, has lessons beyond the arena of Indian gaming, offering an example of how a tribe can improve its own position in negotiations at the same time it worsens the state's bargaining position. "The framework isn't limited to gaming compacts," Clarkson said. "Any time you approach negotiations with the state with the mind to improve your alternative [positions] and worsen the state's you can reach a deal favorable to the tribe." alvin_powell at harvard.edu Related stories: Native American professorship endowed Future of Inuit explored KSG professors mediate dispute Questions over sovereignty spark clash between Idaho tribe, nearby towns -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 4776 bytes Desc: not available URL: From sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri Dec 12 21:43:44 2003 From: sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Sue Penfield) Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2003 14:43:44 -0700 Subject: Fw: Endangered Language Fund announces 10 grants Message-ID: ----- Original Message ----- From: "C. Thomas Mason" Subject: Endangered Language Fund announces 10 grants > ELF announces 10 grants > ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > >From Doug Whalen (whalen at haskins.yale.edu) 5 Dec 2003: > > The Endangered Language Fund's seventh annual request for proposals > resulted in the submission of 68 projects on languages throughout the > world. As usual, the quality of the proposals was high, leading to many > difficult decisions. We funded ten of the projects, and could easily > have done twenty. We are hoping to expand our resources for future > grants. > > Of the ten proposals selected, five focused on indigenous American > languages: > > -- Cora McKenna & Brenda McKenna (Nambe Pueblo, NM): "Tewa Dictionary > and Curriculum, Nambe Dialect." [Nambe Pueblo is north of Santa Fe. > Current Nambe classes serve learners from age 4 to 60, so the curriculum > has to be specially designed. The ELF grant will help collect material > for the classroom and a better dictionary.] > > -- Lisa Conathan & Belle Anne Matheson (UC Berkeley): "Arapaho Description > and Revitalization." [The Northern Arapaho community feels a need for an > audio dictionary. Pitch accents are not necessary for fluent speakers to > write, but they are difficult for learners to remember. Conathan and > Mathesen will work on a dictionary along with a better description of the > rules of the sound system.] > > -- Arthur Schmidt, Rita Flamand & Grace Zoldy (Metis): "The Camperville > Michif Master-Apprentice Program." [Michif is a mixed language from Cree > and French. Schmidt, a native Michif, but not a speaker, will apprentice > himself to Flamand and Zoldy. The Endangered Language Fund grant will > allow Schmidt to spend time in Camperville in Manitoba, Canada.] > > -- Rosemary Beam de Azcona (UC Berkeley): "Southern Zapotec Language > Materials." [It appears that there are only two remaining speakers of > San Agust?n Mixtepec Zapotec, a southern Zapotec language of Mexico. > Coatl?n-Loxicha Zapotec is declining, though it has about 170 speakers. > Beam de Azcona will record as much language material as possible.] > > -- Rick Thoman & Gary Holton (U Alaska Fairbanks): "The Tanacross > Athabascan Sound System." [This project will produce a CD-ROM illustra- > ting the sound system of Tanacross. Speakers will pronounce selected > words and phrases with the rich array of ejectives, affricates and > fricatives as well as contrastive tone. This CD-ROM will be a useful > resource for Tanacross.] > > The five other projects funded include: > > -- Nadezhda Shalamova (Tomsk Polytechnic U), Andrei Filtchenko (Rice U) > & Olga Potanina (Tomsk State Pedagogical U): "Documentation of Vasyugan > Khanty." > > -- Dmitri Funk (Russian Academy of Sciences): "The Last Epic Singer in > Shors (Western Siberia)." > > -- Cheruiyot Kiplangat (Centre for Endangered Languages, Kenya): "Working > to Save Ogiek and Sengwer of Kenya." [Two languages of the Rift Valley.] > > -- Claire Bowern (Harvard U): "Bardi Language Documentation: The Laves > Material." [An Australian language of the Nyulnyulan family. Bowern will > re-check texts collected by Gerhardt Laves in 1929 with the remaining > fluent speakers.] > > -- Francis Egbokhare (U Ibadan, Nigeria): "Documenting Akuku Oral > Traditions." [An endangered language of the Edoid family spoken in > Edo state of Nigeria.] > > As always, we depend on the generosity of our members. Just a dozen new > members would sponsor a new grant. Please visit > > http://www.ling.yale.edu/~elf/join.html > > if you would like to join. > > --Doug Whalen > Haskins Laboratories > New Haven, Connecticut > (whalen at haskins.yale.edu) > From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Mon Dec 15 20:41:50 2003 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Don Osborn) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:41:50 +0100 Subject: Language impoverishment Message-ID: Thank you Matthew (very belatedly). I think you are right in disaggregating the two elements of what I called language impoverishment as you do. I wonder however if there are not more connections between them. IOW, if you raise a generation of people with deficiencies in both the mother tongue and the (generally external) language of instruction, what effect does it have on society-wide range of expressiveness and the vigor of the first language? In a large population, say Cantonese speakers or Hausa speakers or maybe even Dine speakers (just to take 3 examples), you will generally have a core of educated people and perhaps a cultural production which operate with a more sophisticated knowledge in the language. (Today, with the potentials of ICT, this level can be brought more effectively out to more users.) In a smaller population, even when actively using the language, is there the same reservoir or performance of the language's richness? When a few key elders pass away how much knowledge, including perhaps obscure but important vocabulary etc., goes with them? (Amadou Hampate Ba's famous metaphor was that when an elder dies a library burns.) The reason I ask is that I have encountered people who tell me there is no word for such-and-such in their language, but from earlier documentation I knew/found out there was. How many other expressions, turns of phrase etc. that mean something important but not necessarily encountered every day, or could be creatively applied to something new, are lost without being recorded (or recorded but not returned through education to the speakers through education)? ...with the result being a kind of Newspeak by default (without any Orwellian authority to plan it). I guess the matter would have to be settled by some detailed ground level research. If you look at satellite images of vegetation in the Sahel it seems like the desert is now retreating (as per a news item not too long ago), but down here on the ground the biodiversity is definitely less, larger trees are fewer, and the vegetation index shows a shift of species. The analogy may not hold for what is happening with language, but I'd be more comfortable knowing for sure... It may be that what happens is an impoverishment of expression and some loss of vocabulary that is not readily evident and this goes on slowly for a period, and that this is related to socioeconomic, demographic, political etc. changes. And that as that regression continues, at some point it reaches a "stalling point" or some such threshhold where we can say that the language is clearly losing structures / expressiveness as in your second category (corresponding perhaps with another categorization such as moribund). Relating all this to Mia's message a while back and my reply, it seems there are several angles from different disciplines to considering links among various combinations of language "health" & survival, speakers' skills & range of expression, and individual & social wellbeing, but no synthetic approach to seeking a more unified or at least connected understanding of what's going on. One particular topic already brought up - that of people growing up with what amounts to impaired bi/multilingualism (limited expression/skills in both/all languages spoken; we know of course that the reason for such impairment is not the multiplicity of languages but a reflection of the education approach or lack of same) - is something I hadn't given much thought to until recently. And now I don't seem to find much discussion of it, let alone its relations to other hotbutton topics like language survival. A lot of heavy thinking remains in all this but the more I get into it (slowly, being preoccupied with other concerns), the more important it seems. Don ----- Original Message ----- From: "Matthew Ward" To: Sent: Monday, November 10, 2003 7:25 PM Subject: Re: Language impoverishment > I'm sorry that I can't point you to any studies, but I wanted to comment > that I wonder if there are not two separate things going on here: > > First, there is the phenomenon of people who fail to learn the official > language used in school sufficiently well, yet the non-use of their own > mother tongues in education and other contexts means that they lack > vocabulary to use those languages for many contexts. (It is not, of > course, that the mother tongues cannot develop, or have not developed > the sufficient vocabulary, but if ones education is in another language, > one might not be able to use ones own mother tongue in certain contexts). > > At any rate, the result is people who, in some sense, do not speak any > language fluently. One context I've read about this phenomenon is in > Hong Kong, a decade or more ago--many high school students were not > particularly fluent in English, especially in terms of grammar, but, > while Cantonese remained the language they would use at a native level > of fluency for nearly all social functions, they were unable to discuss > many school subjects in it, since as it was not used in education past a > certain level in some schools. This was actually one of the arguments > used when the decision was made to make Cantonese the main medium of > instruction in HK--I think the argument was something to the effect that > it would be better to gain complete fluency in Cantonese and to learn > English more as a foreign language, rather than to have people who had > deficiencies in both languages. > > I've also seen this in Taiwan, where people who lacked anything near > native-like fluency in Mandarin Chinese also had a low level of advanced > vocabulary in the own mother tongues, and here in Northeastern New > Mexico, where many native speakers of Spanish express insecurity about > their ability in English, yet they clearly lack the vocabulary in > Spanish to discuss certain subjects. Immigrants everywhere may have the > some problem--they do not achieve native-like fluency in the language(s) > of the countries they have moved to, yet they may also lack sufficient > fluency in their own native languages, largely because their acquisition > of vocabulary largely stopped after they immigrated. > > Second, when you have languages in a totally different > situation--languages that are truly on the brink, often with only a > small number of older people who speak it natively, you see not only the > loss of vocabulary, but also the seeming loss and simplification of > grammatical structures. Of course, all languages are known to change in > this way, even the healthiest ones, but in these cases of dying > languages, it does not seem that you are dealing with a change in which > one structure is replacing another, but with a situation where the > structures are not being replaced, and the language may actually be > losing its expressiveness. This is something that, despite popular > perceptions of language being "in decline," does not normally happen to > any language. Indeed, this real loss of expressiveness seems to only > occur when a language is truly dying. > > To me, the first phenomenon is an excellent argument for mother-tongue > education, and the second is a subject of study for linguists, as well > as a warning sign of language death. It is certainly possible that > certain individuals might be affected by both at the same time, but I do > believe that they are separate issues. In many situations in Africa, > where people who speak large and otherwise fairly healthy indigenous > tongues, yet are educated in colonial languages such as French, English > or Portuguese, then probably the first issue is relevant, but for those > who speak dying languages (which are, as I understand, usually replaced > by larger African languages, not by the colonial languages) the second > might apply as well. > > Don Osborn wrote: > > >I came upon a phrase earlier this year that was used by the author John > >Marsden in a workshop: "Language impoverishment can lead to frustration, > >impotence and/or rage" (at the site > >http://www.pvet.vic.edu.au/boyswebsite/conference.html ). This was a new > >take on a phenomenon that I had been thinking a lot about in the African > >context (young people who learn neither their maternal languages well nor > >the official languages used in school). Further research found that another > >author, Walker Percy, wrote that one result of language's impoverishment is > >"a radical impoverishment of human relations." > > > >My thinking is that well before we get to the point of concern about a > >language's survival, it starts to lose vocabulary and range of expression > >and creativity: it becomes impoverished. But more than being a stage in what > >may ultimately end up as extinction, language impoverishment seems to have > >broader social and psychological implications beyond cultural survival and > >language policy. > > > >I wrote Mr. Marsden, who kindly replied that his statement was the result of > >many years of observation and not formal research (which should not > >depreciate the value of such observation I would hasten to add!). But I > >would be interested in learning more about research anyone is doing on > >language impoverishment in communities and its effects on individual and > >community life. > > > >Don Osborn, Ph.D. dzo at bisharat.net > >*Bisharat! A language, technology & development initiative > >*Bisharat! Initiative langues - technologie - d?veloppement > >http://www.bisharat.net > > > > > > From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Mon Dec 15 21:50:11 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:50:11 -0700 Subject: A will to close the digital divide (fwd) Message-ID: A will to close the digital divide Jennifer L. Schenker/IHT International Herald Tribune GENEVA To no one's surprise, the United Nations World Summit on the Information Society last week, which attracted mostly delegates from the deprived side of the digital divide, concluded that the World Wide Web is not as global as it is made out to be. for full story follow the link http://www.iht.com/articles/121469.html From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Tue Dec 16 16:44:51 2003 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2003 08:44:51 -0800 Subject: The Missing Message-ID: SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) - Word swept through the Mescalero reservation like an early winter wind that characters in the film ``The Missing'' spoke a dialect of Apache. Most adult Apaches in the audiences have said they could understand every word of the Chiricahua dialect - and the children suddenly wished they could, too. That's what Mescalero councilman Berle Kanseah and Chiricahua linguist Elbys Hugar intended as technical advisers for the Ron Howard film, a tough tale of 19th century frontier life starring Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett that has been in theaters for about three weeks. Television and popular culture are killing minority cultures, starting with language, Kanseah said. ``There's a generation gap that's growing,'' he said, suggesting Apaches aren't the only ones facing it. ``We need to enforce the home and not lose our way of life, which is our language.'' It was the first film that any of them could remember in which Apache was spoken well enough on screen to be understood. Usually, Westerns were dubbed in Navajo, a related language, said supporting actor Steve Reevis, a Montana Blackfoot who has worked several films but never spoke Apache before ``The Missing.'' The film is set in southwestern New Mexico in 1885, just as the last of the Apache conflict was ending. The Jones character's granddaughter, Blanchett's daughter, is abducted by a ragged band of American Indians and whites who sell women into slavery in Mexico. Jones and co-star Jay Tavere set out to keep the slavers from reaching Mexico. The slavers are led by a ``brujo,'' a medicine man gone bad, played by Eric Schweig. Apaches appreciate the film for showing them as they were - the good and the bad, family oriented, generous, faithful to their religion and good-humored. The brujo played by Schweig is not intended to be Apache, though he speaks Apache, the producers say. Many Apaches have gone back two and three times to see ``The Missing,'' Kanseah said. The producers gave a screening for 500 Mescalero students in Alamogordo last month, and the tribe has been busing students to theaters in nearby Ruidoso. Two more screenings were held here Sunday for hundreds more students from several tribes who attend Santa Fe Indian School and other tribal schools in the surrounding area. ``It made me feel proud,'' said Megan Crespin, 8, a third-grader from Santo Domingo School. Her tribal name is Moonlight. Kevin Aspaas, 8, a Navajo student said he liked the hawk that led Jones back to his family. He is learning Navajo and said a few words in his native tongue. There aren't that many Chiricahuas left. They were rounded up and sent to Florida in 1886, shunted back to Alabama, Oklahoma and finally to the Mescalero homeland in south-central New Mexico in 1913. ``There are only about 300 people who are fluent in Chiricahua today,'' Tavere told the audience Sunday. From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Tue Dec 16 17:15:23 2003 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2003 09:15:23 -0800 Subject: The Missing Message-ID: SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) - Word swept through the Mescalero reservation like an early winter wind that characters in the film ``The Missing'' spoke a dialect of Apache. Most adult Apaches in the audiences have said they could understand every word of the Chiricahua dialect - and the children suddenly wished they could, too. That's what Mescalero councilman Berle Kanseah and Chiricahua linguist Elbys Hugar intended as technical advisers for the Ron Howard film, a tough tale of 19th century frontier life starring Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett that has been in theaters for about three weeks. Television and popular culture are killing minority cultures, starting with language, Kanseah said. ``There's a generation gap that's growing,'' he said, suggesting Apaches aren't the only ones facing it. ``We need to enforce the home and not lose our way of life, which is our language.'' It was the first film that any of them could remember in which Apache was spoken well enough on screen to be understood. Usually, Westerns were dubbed in Navajo, a related language, said supporting actor Steve Reevis, a Montana Blackfoot who has worked several films but never spoke Apache before ``The Missing.'' The film is set in southwestern New Mexico in 1885, just as the last of the Apache conflict was ending. The Jones character's granddaughter, Blanchett's daughter, is abducted by a ragged band of American Indians and whites who sell women into slavery in Mexico. Jones and co-star Jay Tavere set out to keep the slavers from reaching Mexico. The slavers are led by a ``brujo,'' a medicine man gone bad, played by Eric Schweig. Apaches appreciate the film for showing them as they were - the good and the bad, family oriented, generous, faithful to their religion and good-humored. The brujo played by Schweig is not intended to be Apache, though he speaks Apache, the producers say. Many Apaches have gone back two and three times to see ``The Missing,'' Kanseah said. The producers gave a screening for 500 Mescalero students in Alamogordo last month, and the tribe has been busing students to theaters in nearby Ruidoso. Two more screenings were held here Sunday for hundreds more students from several tribes who attend Santa Fe Indian School and other tribal schools in the surrounding area. ``It made me feel proud,'' said Megan Crespin, 8, a third-grader from Santo Domingo School. Her tribal name is Moonlight. Kevin Aspaas, 8, a Navajo student said he liked the hawk that led Jones back to his family. He is learning Navajo and said a few words in his native tongue. There aren't that many Chiricahuas left. They were rounded up and sent to Florida in 1886, shunted back to Alabama, Oklahoma and finally to the Mescalero homeland in south-central New Mexico in 1913. ``There are only about 300 people who are fluent in Chiricahua today,'' Tavere told the audience Sunday. From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US Tue Dec 16 22:36:40 2003 From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward) Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2003 15:36:40 -0700 Subject: Language impoverishment Message-ID: Well, I think that one thing you are getting at is the value of having every language being used by its native speakers with the fullest possible range of uses. I've often thought of how lucky speakers of major, official languages are: languages as widely varying in size and "importance" as Icelandic and Mandarin Chinese, Mongolian and Spanish are all used by most of their native speakers for all or nearly all of the possible functions of language: formal and informal registers, social situations, primary, secondary, higher education, government, etc., etc., etc. It is not that these languages are any more expressive than are languages which are used for fewer functions, but their native speakers can, potentially, do anything with them. They are never forced to switch to another language because they never learned to use their own languages in that way. In contrast, when you have people who are only able to use their native languages for a limited number of purposes, due to limited use of those languages, and yet who do not have anything close to native-like fluency in the official or dominant languages of their society, than I can see how this puts those people at a disadvantage. I do think that the idea of linguistic impoverishment needs to be dealt with carefully, however, as it has been misused too many times. It is often, for example, used as a label for speakers of minority dialects who simply don't speak the favored variety of the language well, which doesn't mean that they aren't perfectly fluent in their own languages. It is also often used as an excuse not to develop minority languages: the whole "X language doesn't have a term for nuclear physics or ethnic cleansing, therefore it can't possibly be used in the modern world," which totally ignores the ability of all languages to adapt to changing culture and technology. But, at any rate, this kind of adaptation is done through using language, and it is when languages are not used that they fail to develop, or, as in some of the cases you mention, the native speakers may not know words that the language actually possesses, or, at least, formerly possessed. It all leads back to the same conclusion: people should be able to use their own native tongues for the widest range of possible functions. In the real world, of course, this is not always practical or possible, but it is still a worthy goal. Don Osborn wrote: >Thank you Matthew (very belatedly). I think you are right in disaggregating >the two elements of what I called language impoverishment as you do. I >wonder however if there are not more connections between them. IOW, if you >raise a generation of people with deficiencies in both the mother tongue and >the (generally external) language of instruction, what effect does it have >on society-wide range of expressiveness and the vigor of the first language? >In a large population, say Cantonese speakers or Hausa speakers or maybe >even Dine speakers (just to take 3 examples), you will generally have a core >of educated people and perhaps a cultural production which operate with a >more sophisticated knowledge in the language. (Today, with the potentials >of ICT, this level can be brought more effectively out to more users.) > >In a smaller population, even when actively using the language, is there the >same reservoir or performance of the language's richness? When a few key >elders pass away how much knowledge, including perhaps obscure but important >vocabulary etc., goes with them? (Amadou Hampate Ba's famous metaphor was >that when an elder dies a library burns.) The reason I ask is that I have >encountered people who tell me there is no word for such-and-such in their >language, but from earlier documentation I knew/found out there was. How >many other expressions, turns of phrase etc. that mean something important >but not necessarily encountered every day, or could be creatively applied to >something new, are lost without being recorded (or recorded but not returned >through education to the speakers through education)? ...with the result >being a kind of Newspeak by default (without any Orwellian authority to plan >it). > >I guess the matter would have to be settled by some detailed ground level >research. If you look at satellite images of vegetation in the Sahel it >seems like the desert is now retreating (as per a news item not too long >ago), but down here on the ground the biodiversity is definitely less, >larger trees are fewer, and the vegetation index shows a shift of species. >The analogy may not hold for what is happening with language, but I'd be >more comfortable knowing for sure... > >It may be that what happens is an impoverishment of expression and some loss >of vocabulary that is not readily evident and this goes on slowly for a >period, and that this is related to socioeconomic, demographic, political >etc. changes. And that as that regression continues, at some point it >reaches a "stalling point" or some such threshhold where we can say that the >language is clearly losing structures / expressiveness as in your second >category (corresponding perhaps with another categorization such as >moribund). > >Relating all this to Mia's message a while back and my reply, it seems there >are several angles from different disciplines to considering links among >various combinations of language "health" & survival, speakers' skills & >range of expression, and individual & social wellbeing, but no synthetic >approach to seeking a more unified or at least connected understanding of >what's going on. One particular topic already brought up - that of people >growing up with what amounts to impaired bi/multilingualism (limited >expression/skills in both/all languages spoken; we know of course that the >reason for such impairment is not the multiplicity of languages but a >reflection of the education approach or lack of same) - is something I >hadn't given much thought to until recently. And now I don't seem to find >much discussion of it, let alone its relations to other hotbutton topics >like language survival. > >A lot of heavy thinking remains in all this but the more I get into it >(slowly, being preoccupied with other concerns), the more important it >seems. > >Don > >----- Original Message ----- >From: "Matthew Ward" >To: >Sent: Monday, November 10, 2003 7:25 PM >Subject: Re: Language impoverishment > > > > >>I'm sorry that I can't point you to any studies, but I wanted to comment >>that I wonder if there are not two separate things going on here: >> >>First, there is the phenomenon of people who fail to learn the official >>language used in school sufficiently well, yet the non-use of their own >>mother tongues in education and other contexts means that they lack >>vocabulary to use those languages for many contexts. (It is not, of >>course, that the mother tongues cannot develop, or have not developed >>the sufficient vocabulary, but if ones education is in another language, >>one might not be able to use ones own mother tongue in certain contexts). >> >>At any rate, the result is people who, in some sense, do not speak any >>language fluently. One context I've read about this phenomenon is in >>Hong Kong, a decade or more ago--many high school students were not >>particularly fluent in English, especially in terms of grammar, but, >>while Cantonese remained the language they would use at a native level >>of fluency for nearly all social functions, they were unable to discuss >>many school subjects in it, since as it was not used in education past a >>certain level in some schools. This was actually one of the arguments >>used when the decision was made to make Cantonese the main medium of >>instruction in HK--I think the argument was something to the effect that >>it would be better to gain complete fluency in Cantonese and to learn >>English more as a foreign language, rather than to have people who had >>deficiencies in both languages. >> >>I've also seen this in Taiwan, where people who lacked anything near >>native-like fluency in Mandarin Chinese also had a low level of advanced >>vocabulary in the own mother tongues, and here in Northeastern New >>Mexico, where many native speakers of Spanish express insecurity about >>their ability in English, yet they clearly lack the vocabulary in >>Spanish to discuss certain subjects. Immigrants everywhere may have the >>some problem--they do not achieve native-like fluency in the language(s) >>of the countries they have moved to, yet they may also lack sufficient >>fluency in their own native languages, largely because their acquisition >>of vocabulary largely stopped after they immigrated. >> >>Second, when you have languages in a totally different >>situation--languages that are truly on the brink, often with only a >>small number of older people who speak it natively, you see not only the >>loss of vocabulary, but also the seeming loss and simplification of >>grammatical structures. Of course, all languages are known to change in >>this way, even the healthiest ones, but in these cases of dying >>languages, it does not seem that you are dealing with a change in which >>one structure is replacing another, but with a situation where the >>structures are not being replaced, and the language may actually be >>losing its expressiveness. This is something that, despite popular >>perceptions of language being "in decline," does not normally happen to >>any language. Indeed, this real loss of expressiveness seems to only >>occur when a language is truly dying. >> >>To me, the first phenomenon is an excellent argument for mother-tongue >>education, and the second is a subject of study for linguists, as well >>as a warning sign of language death. It is certainly possible that >>certain individuals might be affected by both at the same time, but I do >>believe that they are separate issues. In many situations in Africa, >>where people who speak large and otherwise fairly healthy indigenous >>tongues, yet are educated in colonial languages such as French, English >>or Portuguese, then probably the first issue is relevant, but for those >>who speak dying languages (which are, as I understand, usually replaced >>by larger African languages, not by the colonial languages) the second >>might apply as well. >> >>Don Osborn wrote: >> >> >> >>>I came upon a phrase earlier this year that was used by the author John >>>Marsden in a workshop: "Language impoverishment can lead to frustration, >>>impotence and/or rage" (at the site >>>http://www.pvet.vic.edu.au/boyswebsite/conference.html ). This was a new >>>take on a phenomenon that I had been thinking a lot about in the African >>>context (young people who learn neither their maternal languages well nor >>>the official languages used in school). Further research found that >>> >>> >another > > >>>author, Walker Percy, wrote that one result of language's impoverishment >>> >>> >is > > >>>"a radical impoverishment of human relations." >>> >>>My thinking is that well before we get to the point of concern about a >>>language's survival, it starts to lose vocabulary and range of expression >>>and creativity: it becomes impoverished. But more than being a stage in >>> >>> >what > > >>>may ultimately end up as extinction, language impoverishment seems to >>> >>> >have > > >>>broader social and psychological implications beyond cultural survival >>> >>> >and > > >>>language policy. >>> >>>I wrote Mr. Marsden, who kindly replied that his statement was the result >>> >>> >of > > >>>many years of observation and not formal research (which should not >>>depreciate the value of such observation I would hasten to add!). But I >>>would be interested in learning more about research anyone is doing on >>>language impoverishment in communities and its effects on individual and >>>community life. >>> >>>Don Osborn, Ph.D. dzo at bisharat.net >>>*Bisharat! A language, technology & development initiative >>>*Bisharat! Initiative langues - technologie - d?veloppement >>>http://www.bisharat.net >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> > > > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed Dec 17 18:25:51 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 11:25:51 -0700 Subject: Grotto Foundation: indigenous language resources (link) Message-ID: fyi, Here are several items of interest. The Grotto Foundation has been working with Minnesota's indigenous languages for sometime and has releases several online publications. 1) Native Languages As World Languages A Vision for Assessing and Sharing Information About Native Languages Across Grantmaking Sectors and Native Country by Richard LaFortune (Yupik) 2) Encouragement, Guidance, Insights, and Lessons Learned for Native Language Activists Developing Their Own Tribal Language Programs by Darrell R. Kipp, Co-Founder of the Piegan Institute you download these documents from the following link: http://www.grottofoundation.org/download_fset.html take care, phil cash cash (cayuse/nez perce) UofA, ILAT From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 18 16:55:58 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2003 09:55:58 -0700 Subject: Apaches praise 'The Missing' for keeping their language alive (fwd) Message-ID: Apaches praise 'The Missing' for keeping their language alive By Richard Benke The Associated Press http://www.sltrib.com/2003/Dec/12182003/thursday/120921.asp ??? SANTA FE, N.M. -- Tommy Lee Jones speaking Apache? Word swept through the Mescalero reservation like an early winter wind. ??? Not only Jones but most characters in the Ron Howard film, "The Missing," speak the Chiricahua dialect of Apache, and most adult Apaches in the audiences have said they could understand every word. ??? The children, who couldn't, suddenly wished they could. ??? That's what Mescalero councilman Berle Kanseah and Chiricahua linguist Elbys Hugar intended as technical advisers for "The Missing," a tough tale of 19th century frontier life starring Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett. ??? The 21st century -- television, popular culture -- is killing minority cultures, starting with language, Kanseah said. ??? "There's a generation gap that's growing," he said, suggesting Apaches aren't the only ones facing it. ??? "We need to enforce the home and not lose our way of life, which is our language," he said. ??? Hugar, a great-granddaughter of Cochise, addressed the cast before shooting. Co-star Jay Tavere, a White Mountain Apache, recalled: "This is the first thing that Elbys said to us: 'This is more than a movie -- this is for the whole Apache nation.' " ??? It was the first film that any of them could remember in which Apache was spoken well enough on screen to be understood. Usually, Westerns were dubbed in Navajo, said supporting actor Steve Reevis, a Montana Blackfoot who has worked several films but never spoke Apache before "The Missing." ??? The film is set in southwestern New Mexico in 1885, just as the last of the Apache conflict was ending. Jones' granddaughter -- Blanchett's daughter -- is abducted by a ragged band of Indians and whites who sell women into slavery in Mexico. ??? New Mexico college student and rodeo competitor Yolanda Nez, a Navajo, plays a captive who is Apache. Her father, Tavere, and Jones set out to keep the slavers from reaching Mexico. ??? The slavers are led by a "brujo," a medicine man gone bad, played by Eric Schweig. Combat between Jones and Tavere and Schweig is inevitable. ??? The border slave trade is historically factual, producer Daniel Ostroff said. ??? University of New Mexico historian Paul Hutton, who also consulted on the film, concurred. ??? "Indeed people were being kidnapped all the time," Hutton said. ??? Apaches appreciate the film for showing them as they were -- the good and the bad, family-oriented, generous, faithful to their religion and good-humored. The brujo played by Schweig is not intended to be Apache, though he speaks Apache, the producers say. ??? Many Apaches have gone back two and three times to see "The Missing," Kanseah said. The producers gave a screening for 500 Mescalero students in Alamogordo last month, and the tribe has been busing students to theaters in nearby Ruidoso. Two more screenings were held here recently for hundreds more students from several tribes who attend Santa Fe Indian School and other tribal schools in the surrounding area. ??? "It made me feel proud," said Megan Crespin, 8, a 3rd grader from Santo Domingo School. Her tribal name is Moonlight. ??? Desiree Aguilar, 14, is fluent in Keres, the native tongue of Santo Domingo Pueblo. She watched the film with an analytical eye. ??? "It was very intense," the 9th grader said. "It kept you wanting to watch it." ??? Kevin Aspaas, 8, a Navajo student said he liked the hawk that led Tommy Lee Jones back to his family. "I really enjoyed it -- it was a scary and cool movie," he said. ??? While the last screening played to the students, Kanseah, Nez and Tavere made some comparisons among Navajo and Apache dialects, all of which stem from the Athabaskan root language common to a number of North American tribes. ??? During the film, even Tommy Lee Jones' grasp of the language was understandable to Apaches and many Navajos. ??? "He spoke Apache well enough for every Chiricahua in the audience to understand," said New Mexico State University anthropologist Scott Rushforth, who also consulted on the film and attended several screenings. ??? But there aren't that many Chiricahuas left. They were rounded up and sent to Florida in 1886, shunted back to Alabama, Oklahoma and finally to the Mescalero homeland in south-central New Mexico in 1913. ??? "There are only about 300 people who are fluent in Chiricahua today," Tavere said. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu Dec 18 16:59:21 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Thu, 18 Dec 2003 09:59:21 -0700 Subject: Tuba City District adopts Hopi Lavayi Project (fwd) Message-ID: Tuba City District adopts Hopi Lavayi Project By Rosanda Suetopka Thayer TC District Media http://www.navajohopiobserver.com/NAVAJOHOPIOBSERVER/sites/NAVAJOHOPIOBSERVER/0189edition/myarticles864443.asp?P=864443&S=392&PubID=11713 Wednesday, Dec. 10 was a landmark meeting for Tuba City Unified School District #15 on several levels. It was the first time that any Hopi Tribal Chairman formally made a presentation before a TCUSD Governing Board. It was also the first time that the Hopi Tribe has formally partnered with a school board outside of the Hopi reservation to bring the Hopi language into school curriculum? a move that is targeted to address the extremely critical Hopi language loss for Hopi people, which includes Hopi students. It was the first time that both Upper and Lower Mungapi Villages have agreed to support a TC District school language program by formal village resolution with Upper Mungapi considering a pilot project within their Hopi community for their own village member use. Finally, in a first time effort, a petition was presented containing, not only Hopi student signatures who attend Tuba City High School requesting the Hopi language program for themselves, but the signatures of fellow TC High Navajo students who recognize and support this Hopi language effort. In fact, the petition is an important part of this now 10 entity effort that include the following groups: TCUSD, Tuba City Junior High and High School Language Committee; the Hopi Lavayi Project/the Hopi Tribe; Dr. Emory Sekaquaptewa, Orthography Specialist at the University of Arizona; Sheila Nicolas, Immersion Specialist at U of A; Dr. Noreen Sakiestewa, Director of Education of the Hopi Tribe; the Villages of Upper and Lower Mungapi; the Hopi Cultural Preservation Office; and the Office of the Hopi Tribal Chairman, the Hopi Footprints Project. The student petition stated that Tuba City High School students of both Hopi and Navajo tribes recognized, not only the importance of their individual Hopi and Navajo languages and cultures, but that these students supported each other as members of Native American tribes living alongside and working with each other at the TC School District in an effort to revitalize an extremely important part of their heritage through their individual tribal cultures and tongues. ?Although we recognize that the Hopi language should be taught in the home and in the village, we also recognize that this is not a real or practical approach,? Chairman Taylor said in his opening statement. ?It is through our language, and our culture that we learn about our values, our heritage and our responsibilities in this world. ?Students are a large part of this world responsibility and they will need to be able to speak Hopi to understand and carry out those obligations.? Program benefits Some of the facts, presented by Chairman Taylor and the members of the Hopi Lavayi Project, Marvin Lalo-Director and Dawa Taylor, with support administrative work done by Chairman?s assistant, Reanna Albert, included statistics from a TC High School and TC Junior High School student survey taken in the spring of 2003 such as the following: ? Eighty-four percent of students surveyed said that they saw a need for a Hopi language class at the TC High School level. ? Ninety-six percent said they saw that speaking Hopi was very important. ? Seventy-nine percent said they saw reading and writing Hopi as important. Many of the benefits presented by the survey with the support of the Hopi Tribe, after talking with staff members of TC District Hopi Language Committee and its Junior High and High School students who will be the prime beneficiaries of the new Hopi language classes included: ? Students becoming proficient in the Hopi and English languages. ? Improving and enhancing academic performance. ? Increased community and parental involvement. ? Meeting state foreign language requirements. ? Reversing the trend in language loss. ? Continue and resuming ?Kyaptsi? (respect), ?Nami?nangwa? (communal spirit), ?Sumi?nangwa? (togetherness) and ?Hita?nangwa? (unselfishness, generosity and cooperation). An additional benefit for students to study their own native primary language is continued development of a medium in which humans think and express their thoughts. Also based on studies, a second language increases intellectual growth and enhances mental development with positive effects on student performance academically. The infusion of language and culture will create natural links to other disciplines, fostering a better understanding of all people in the world. The new Hopi language classes also will build self-confidence in understanding and using Hopi language in everyday life as well as developing students? positive self image by building self-esteem when speaking Hopi among their own age group. The initial course description in the Hopi Chairman?s and Hopi Lavayi Project proposal stated the focus will primarily be on conversational Hopi, hands-on learning, listening activities, community interaction and Hopi language guest presenters, including Hopi elders and local Hopi community resource members. Tuba City District Governing Board, which has stated it believes in, not just the highest and most well-rounded quality education for its students, has said it recognizes that ?educational equity access? is also a must for its almost 3,000-plus student population. Board approval The TC District Governing Board formally voted to accept the new Hopi Language program for its student population. The positive yes vote was met with much approval from the packed meeting room, which included community members, teachers, other administrators and students there to hear the presentation from Chairman Taylor and the Hopi Lavayi Project Team. Implementation of the Hopi language classes are proposed for this coming spring semester in both the Tuba City High School and Junior High School levels. Chairman Taylor and the Hopi Lavayi Team also presented members of the TCUSD Governing Board with copies of the Hopi Dictionary, which currently contains 33,000 Hopi words and is not yet complete. The Hopi Dictionary is in the Third Mesa Hopi dialect and was a project directed by Emory Sekaquaptewa, a member of the Hopi Tribe and a linguistics professor at U of A. For more information on the new Hopi Language classes at Tuba City District, call Marvin Lalo or Dawa Taylor at the Hopi Tribe at 928-734-3000 or Principal Adelbert Goldtooth, Tuba City High School at 928-283-1047. (Rosanda Suetopka Thayer is Public Relations Director for Tuba City Unified School District.) From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Sun Dec 21 22:52:57 2003 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Don Osborn) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2003 23:52:57 +0100 Subject: WSIS mentions of languages & linguistic diversity Message-ID: FYI... Below are excerpts from the Declaration and Plan of Action of the World Summit on the Information Society that specifically mention languages or linguistic diversity (in the context of ICT and the "information society"). The entire documents can be read at http://www.itu.int/wsis/documents/doc_multi-en-1161|1160.asp Don Osborn Bisharat.net ======================== Document WSIS-03/GENEVA/DOC/4-E12 December 2003 Original: English Declaration of Principles Building the Information Society: a global challenge in the new Millennium ... 7) ICT applications: benefits in all aspects of life 51. ... Applications should be user-friendly, accessible to all, affordable, adapted to local needs in languages and cultures, and support sustainable development. To this effect, local authorities should play a major role in the provision of ICT services for the benefit of their populations. 8) Cultural diversity and identity, linguistic diversity and local content 52. Cultural diversity is the common heritage of humankind. The Information Society should be founded on and stimulate respect for cultural identity, cultural and linguistic diversity, traditions and religions, and foster dialogue among cultures and civilizations. The promotion, affirmation and preservation of diverse cultural identities and languages as reflected in relevant agreed United Nations documents including UNESCO's Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity, will further enrich the Information Society. 53. The creation, dissemination and preservation of content in diverse languages and formats must be accorded high priority in building an inclusive Information Society, paying particular attention to the diversity of supply of creative work and due recognition of the rights of authors and artists. It is essential to promote the production of and accessibility to all content - educational, scientific, cultural or recreational - in diverse languages and formats. The development of local content suited to domestic or regional needs will encourage social and economic development and will stimulate participation of all stakeholders, including people living in rural, remote and marginal areas. ... ======================== Document WSIS-03/GENEVA/DOC/5-E 12 December 2003 Original: English Plan of Action ... B. Objectives, goals and targets ... 6. Based on internationally agreed development goals, including those in the Millennium Declaration, which are premised on international cooperation, indicative targets may serve as global references for improving connectivity and access in the use of ICTs in promoting the objectives of the Plan of Action, to be achieved by 2015. These targets may be taken into account in the establishment of the national targets, considering the different national circumstances: ... i) to encourage the development of content and to put in place technical conditions in order to facilitate the presence and use of all world languages on the Internet; ... C. Action Lines ... C8. Cultural diversity and identity, linguistic diversity and local content 23. Cultural and linguistic diversity, while stimulating respect for cultural identity, traditions and religions, is essential to the development of an Information Society based on the dialogue among cultures and regional and international cooperation. It is an important factor for sustainable development. a) Create policies that support the respect, preservation, promotion and enhancement of cultural and linguistic diversity and cultural heritage within the Information Society, as reflected in relevant agreed United Nations documents, including UNESCO's Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity. This includes encouraging governments to design cultural policies to promote the production of cultural, educational and scientific content and the development of local cultural industries suited to the linguistic and cultural context of the users. ... f) Provide content that is relevant to the cultures and languages of individuals in the Information Society, through access to traditional and digital media services. g) Through public/private partnerships, foster the creation of varied local and national content, including that available in the language of users, and give recognition and support to ICT-based work in all artistic fields. ... i) Nurture the local capacity for the creation and distribution of software in local languages, as well as content that is relevant to different segments of population, including non-literate, persons with disabilities, disadvantaged and vulnerable groups especially in developing countries and countries with economies in transition. j) Give support to media based in local communities and support projects combining the use of traditional media and new technologies for their role in facilitating the use of local languages, for documenting and preserving local heritage, including landscape and biological diversity, and as a means to reach rural and isolated and nomadic communities. k) Enhance the capacity of indigenous peoples to develop content in their own languages. ... m) Exchange knowledge, experiences and best practices on policies and tools designed to promote cultural and linguistic diversity at regional and sub-regional levels. This can be achieved by establishing regional, and sub-regional working groups on specific issues of this Plan of Action to foster integration efforts. ... o) Governments, through public/private partnerships, should promote technologies and R&D programmes in such areas as translation, iconographies, voice-assisted services and the development of necessary hardware and a variety of software models, including proprietary, open source software and free software, such as standard character sets, language codes, electronic dictionaries, terminology and thesauri, multilingual search engines, machine translation tools, internationalized domain names, content referencing as well as general and application software. ... ======================== -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Sun Dec 21 22:57:27 2003 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Don Osborn) Date: Sun, 21 Dec 2003 23:57:27 +0100 Subject: A Kenyan perspective on languages Message-ID: A posting by Mukoma Ngugi, author of "Conversing With Africa: Politics of Change" in response to a question I had re language may be of interest. See http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AfricanLanguages/message/157 . DZO From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Mon Dec 22 19:38:28 2003 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2003 11:38:28 -0800 Subject: Document Message-ID: C A L L F O R P A P E R S 4th International SALTMIL (ISCA SIG) LREC workshop on First Steps for Language Documentation of Minority Languages: Computational Linguistic Tools for Morphology, Lexicon and Corpus Compilation 24 May 2004, Lisbon, Portugal http://193.2.100.60/SALTMIL/ Motivation and Aims The minority or ~Slesser used~T languages of the world are under increasing pressure from the major languages (especially English), and many of them lack full political recognition. Some minority languages have been well researched linguistically, but most have not, and the vast majority do not yet possess basic speech and language resources (such as text and speech corpora) which are sufficient to permit research or commercial development of products. If this situation were to continue, the minority languages would fall a long way behind the major languages, as regards the availability of commercial speech and language products. This in turn will accelerate the decline of those languages that are already struggling to survive. To break this vicious circle, it is important to encourage the development of basic language resources as a first step. The workshop is intended to continue the series of SALTMIL (ISCA SIG) LREC workshops: 1) "Language Resources for European Minority Languages" (LREC1998) Granada, Spain. 2) "Developing Language Resources for Minority Languages: Re-usability and Strategic Priorities" (LREC2000) Athens, Greece. 3) "Portability Issues in Human Language Technologies " (LREC2002) Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain. The proposed workshop aims to share information on tools and best practice, so that isolated researchers will not need to start from scratch. An important aspect will be the forming of personal contacts, which can minimise duplication of effort. Information on sources of funding for minority languages will also be presented, and there will be discussion on the strategic priorities that need to be addressed in this area. There will be a balance between presentations of existing language resources, and more general presentations designed to give background information needed by all researchers present. One potential means of ameliorating this imbalance in technology resources is through encouraging research in the portability of human language technology for multilingual application. Topics of Interest The workshop will focus on the following topics and languages: * Existing projects in the field, with the opportunity to share useful information * Presentations of existing speech and text databases for minority languages, with particular emphasis on software tools that have been found useful in their development. * Linguistic corpora * Automatic Speech Recognition * Acoustic modelling * Dictionary development * Language modelling . * Natural Language Processing: * Computational lexicography * Morphology * Syntax * Machine Translation. * Information retrieval Agenda The first session of the workshop will consist of invited talks focusing on current methodologies for language documentation and computational linguistic tools which are available for minority languages. Each invited speaker will be asked to comment on the following: * how current research relates to minority languages, perhaps indicating how they would approach their work within this context * which methodologies and tools they find most useful * which of those methodologies are defined as portable for different languages. * how these tools could extend the use of the language * how these basis could be used in further work on HLT The second session will be an oral session focusing on programmes and initiatives for supporting minority language documentation. The main aim of this session is to provide a forum for fostering new contacts among researchers working in this area. Invited speakers * Dafydd Gibbon, Univ. Bielefeld. "First steps in corpus compilation" * Xabier Artola, Ixa group, Univ. of the Basque Country. "First steps in lexicon resources" * Bojan Petek, University of Ljubljana. Slovenia. ~SExperiences defining a Network of Excellence on Portability of Human Language Technologies~T * Kenneth R. Beesley, Xerox (to be confirmed) "First steps in morphology" Workshop Organizing and Program Committee Bojan Petek, University of Ljubljana. Slovenia Julie Berndsen, University College Dublin, Ireland Oliver Streiter, EURAC; European Academy, Bolzano/Bozen, Italy Atelach Alemu, Addis Ababa University. Ethiopia Kepa Sarasola,University of the Basque Country, Donostia Submission Papers are invited that describe research and development in the area of Human Language Technology portability. All contributed papers will be presented in poster format. Each submission should include: title; author(s); affiliation(s); and contact author's e-mail address, postal address, telephone and fax numbers. Abstracts (maximum 500 words, plain-text format) should be sent via email to: Julie Berndsen Julie.Berndsen at ucd.ie All contributions (including invited papers) will be printed in the workshop proceedings (CD). They also will be published on the SALTMIL website. Submissions of papers for poster presentations should follow the same style as the ones for regular LREC paper and not be longer than 6000 words. The final details will be published as soon as they become available. We allow simultaneous paper submission to the workshop and the LREC main conference. If a paper is accepted by both the conference and the workshop, the paper will be presented at the conference, rather than at the workshop. The author(s) should notify the workshop chair. Important Dates: Deadline for workshop abstract submission 11th February 2004 Notification of acceptance 25th February 2004 Final version of the paper for the workshop proceedings 1st April 2004 Workshop 24 May 2004, morning Workshop Registration Fees The registration fees for the workshop are: ?If you are not attending LREC: 85 EURO ?If you are attending LREC: 50 Euro These fees will include a coffee break and the Proceedings of the Workshop. Registration will be handled by the LREC Secretariat. From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Wed Dec 24 21:40:45 2003 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2003 13:40:45 -0800 Subject: Links (information) Message-ID: pictures and audio galleries can be found @: http://www.ncidc.org/gallery.htm From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri Dec 26 21:47:43 2003 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Phil CashCash) Date: Fri, 26 Dec 2003 14:47:43 -0700 Subject: Voice of survival rings in reclaimed names (fwd) Message-ID: Voice of survival rings in reclaimed names By Debra Jopson December 27, 2003 http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/26/1072308682054.html Twenty Sydney harbour landmarks could have their original Aboriginal placenames officially added to the current English versions as early as Easter after preliminary approval was granted by a group of indigenous representatives. In keeping with the NSW Government's dual-naming policy, Darling Harbour would also be known as Dumbalong, Elizabeth Bay as Gurrajin and Mosman Bay's second name would be Goram Bullagong. Sydney Cove would also once again be called Warrane, Farm Cove Wahganmuggalee and Lavender Bay Gooweebahree. But no one knows what the names mean. The meanings were not recorded in First Fleeters' journals and other historical sources from the first 20 years of settlement which archaeologist Val Attenbrow and linguists Jaky Troy and Michael Walsh used to glean the place names. "What the first colonisers said is: 'What do you call this?' and they just got a name," said Dr Troy, head of the NSW Aboriginal Languages Research and Resources Centre who has reconstructed hundreds of words from the original Sydney language. The 20 names got the go-ahead from a workshop at which descendants of Sydney's original Dharug, Tharawal and Guringai people and other NSW Aborigines who live in the city approved spellings and rejected place names they thought culturally sensitive. One name was omitted because workshop members "were fairly certain it was a men's ceremonial place", Dr Troy said. Local councils and NSW government bodies with jurisdiction over the parts of the harbour will now officially consider the proposed names. Then the Geographical Names Board will advertise them to the public. If there are no objections, the new names could become official as early as Easter, said Flavia Hodges, research fellow with the Australian Placenames Survey. Under the board's policy, only features such as rivers, islands and points can be given dual names but not streets, suburbs or towns. "You don't want emergency services sent to somewhere they've never heard of, but if it is a feature like a point, no worries," said Dr Walsh, a Sydney University linguist. Since the Government announced its dual-naming policy 2 years ago, only two Sydney places have officially had their traditional names added to the map. Dawes Point, under the Harbour Bridge, is also known by its Cadigal name, Tar-ra. South Creek, in Sydney's west, is also known as Wianamatta. Eventually, dual names could cover NSW. But there are possible pitfalls, said Dr Troy. "Goona", for instance, meant faeces in several NSW Aboriginal languages. But names can also be uplifting. One workshop participant, Christopher Kirkbright Wagan Yullubirrgn, said: "When people once again utter the words that have been the names of our places for eons upon eons the sweet voice of our land will once again speak with meaning to her children." This story was found at: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/26/1072308682054.html