From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Sun Aug  1 20:51:16 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Sun, 1 Aug 2004 13:51:16 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
Message-ID: <SUN.1.AUG.2004.135116.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Dear ILAT,

i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
ilat-based informational website that is in progress.

please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.

thanks,
phil cash cash
UofA, ILAT

~~~

ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html

AZTLAN: Maya
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree

ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html

GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
Greenland
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/

Indigenous Languages and Technology
http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html

NAHUAT-L: The Náhuatl Language of the Aztecs
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html

SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html

WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html


From pmeyer at SDCOE.K12.CA.US  Sun Aug  1 21:46:57 2004
From: pmeyer at SDCOE.K12.CA.US (Paula Meyer)
Date: Sun, 1 Aug 2004 14:46:57 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
Message-ID: <SUN.1.AUG.2004.144657.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Phil, Kumeyaay is in San Diego County, CA and northern Baja California.
Here are some websites that deal with it.
Paula

KUMEYAAY:  www.kumeyaay.org, www.kumeyaay.com, www.americanindiansource.com.

----- Original Message -----
From: "phil cash cash" <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Sunday, August 01, 2004 1:51 PM
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs


Dear ILAT,

i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
ilat-based informational website that is in progress.

please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.

thanks,
phil cash cash
UofA, ILAT

~~~

ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html

AZTLAN: Maya
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree

ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html

GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
Greenland
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/

Indigenous Languages and Technology
http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html

NAHUAT-L: The Náhuatl Language of the Aztecs
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html

SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html

WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html


From phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET  Mon Aug  2 03:41:52 2004
From: phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET (jess tauber)
Date: Sun, 1 Aug 2004 23:41:52 -0400
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
Message-ID: <SUN.1.AUG.2004.234152.0400.PHONOSEMANTICS@EARTHLINK.NET>

Hi. The discussion list for the Yahgan language of Tierra del Fuego can be found at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/waata_chis


Jess Tauber


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Mon Aug  2 06:56:17 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 01:56:17 -0500
Subject: Ethnocomputing
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.015617.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

"Ethnocomputing" is one of those terms that sounds like I've heard it someplace,
but in fact it is relatively new (searchs on ILAT and GKD
yielded no hits and Google had only 60 some). That is not to say that the
thinking behind it would be unfamiliar to many people working on "ICT4D" and
"digital divide" issues. Still, it may be a useful concept to add to the
repertoire for discussions of ICT & development, ICT & language, knowledge
generation in non-Western or indigenous communities, etc.

Here are a few references I ran across on this:
* An article, "Ethnocomputing a Multicultural View on Computer Science" by Matti
Tedre, Piet Kommers, Erkki Sutinen at
http://www.cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/articles/ethnocomputing_ICALT2002.pdf
* A M.S. thesis (2002) by Matti Tedre entitled "Ethnocomputing: A Multicultural
View on Computer Science" at
http://www.cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/articles/tedre_matti_ethnocomputing.pdf
* There was even a webpage www.ethnocomputing.org, though that apparently exists
now only in the Web Archives at:
http://web.archive.org/web/20030711043220/cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/

Part of the abstract from the Tedre's thesis (similar to one in the article) is
reproduced below.

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net


"The prevailing westernness of Computer Science is a major problem with the
Computer Science education in developing countries. The students not only face
a new subject, but also a fundamentally different philosophy and problem
solving methods. In this thesis, I shall present a new member to the family of
ethnosciences: ethnocomputing. Ethnocomputing challenges the prevailing way of
thinking that in order to keep up with the West, other cultures have to adapt
to
the western ways of thinking. Relying on constructivist theories, I argue that
the universal theories of computing take different forms in different cultures,
and that the European view on abstract ideas of computing is culturally bound,
too. Studying ethnocomputing~W i.e. the computational ideas within a culture ~W
may lead to new findings that can be used in both developing the western view
of Computer Science, and improving Computer Science education in non-western
cultures."


From CRANEM at MAIL.ECU.EDU  Mon Aug  2 14:35:27 2004
From: CRANEM at MAIL.ECU.EDU (Bizzaro, Resa Crane)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 10:35:27 -0400
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.103527.0400.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Hi, everyone.  Phil--will you share the address for the web site as soon as it's ready?  It sounds like a great resource.
 
Resa

	-----Original Message----- 
	From: Indigenous Languages and Technology on behalf of phil cash cash 
	Sent: Sun 8/1/2004 4:51 PM 
	To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
	Cc: 
	Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
	
	

	Dear ILAT,
	
	i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
	indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
	ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
	
	please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
	you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.
	
	thanks,
	phil cash cash
	UofA, ILAT
	
	~~~
	
	ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
	
	AZTLAN: Maya
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
	
	CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
	
	CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
	http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
	
	ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
	
	GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
	Greenland
	http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
	
	Indigenous Languages and Technology
	http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
	
	NAHUAT-L: The Náhuatl Language of the Aztecs
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
	
	SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
	
	WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
	


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug  2 16:53:59 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 09:53:59 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language CD-ROMs
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.095359.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

ta'c 'alaxp (good day),

i am compiling a resource listing of indigenous language CD-ROMs.  the
resource listing will be made available on an ilat-based (indigenous
languages and technology) informational web site in progress.

if you know of any or have created a language CD=ROM please feel free to
send me information or post it to ILAT listserv.  what i will need is
the basic citation information, although that can be tricky in itself
because guidelines for citing a CD-ROM is not that precise.

here is an example of a recent language CD-ROM:

~~~
Author: GreyFox CE

Title: TSI' THUWATI'NIKUHLALÁKHWA KA'NIH^NÁ:SA
Where They Take Care of Them The Little Ones
An Interactive CD for Onieda Language Learning

Publication Medium: [CD-ROM]

Publisher: Onieda Nation Childcare, CCDF Pass Through Grant

Location & Date: 2003
~~~

feel free to forward this request to other listservs or informational
lists.

thanks,
phil cash cash (cayuse/nez perce)
UofA, ILAT
pasxapu at dakotacom.net
cashcash at u.arizona.edu


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug  2 17:08:33 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 10:08:33 -0700
Subject: Ethnocomputing
In-Reply-To: <1091429777.410de5918d25a@webmail.kabissa.org>
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.100833.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

nice Don!  i will add these references (as hyperlinks) to my resource
listing of research on indigenous languages and technology.

here are some interesting quotations from the article Ethnocomputing a
Multicultural View on Computer Science:

"ethnocomput-ing refers to a cultural perspective in the problem solving
methods, conceptual categories, structures, and models used to
represent data or other computational practices."

"Ethno represents particularity and computing universality, and a
combina-tion of particular and universal leads to computing activ-ity
that takes its place within a culture. The concepts of ethnocomputing
can manifest as direct applications in real-life situations, or objects
among cultural groups, and they reflect the traditional practices of a
culture – whether or not technically advanced."

later,

phil cash cash
UofA, ILAT


> ----- Message from dzo at BISHARAT.NET ---------
>     Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 01:56:17 -0500
>     From: "Donald Z. Osborn" <dzo at BISHARAT.NET>
> Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology
<ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>  Subject: Ethnocomputing
>       To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>
> "Ethnocomputing" is one of those terms that sounds like I've heard it
> someplace,
> but in fact it is relatively new (searchs on ILAT and GKD
> yielded no hits and Google had only 60 some). That is not to say that
> the
> thinking behind it would be unfamiliar to many people working on
> "ICT4D" and
> "digital divide" issues. Still, it may be a useful concept to add to
> the
> repertoire for discussions of ICT & development, ICT & language,
> knowledge
> generation in non-Western or indigenous communities, etc.
>
> Here are a few references I ran across on this:
> * An article, "Ethnocomputing a Multicultural View on Computer
> Science" by Matti
> Tedre, Piet Kommers, Erkki Sutinen at
> http://www.cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/articles/ethnocomputing_ICALT2002.pdf
> * A M.S. thesis (2002) by Matti Tedre entitled "Ethnocomputing: A
> Multicultural
> View on Computer Science" at
>
http://www.cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/articles/tedre_matti_ethnocomputing.pdf
> * There was even a webpage www.ethnocomputing.org, though that
> apparently exists
> now only in the Web Archives at:
> http://web.archive.org/web/20030711043220/cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/
>
> Part of the abstract from the Tedre's thesis (similar to one in the
> article) is
> reproduced below.
>
> Don Osborn
> Bisharat.net
>
>
> "The prevailing westernness of Computer Science is a major problem
> with the
> Computer Science education in developing countries. The students not
> only face
> a new subject, but also a fundamentally different philosophy and
> problem
> solving methods. In this thesis, I shall present a new member to the
> family of
> ethnosciences: ethnocomputing. Ethnocomputing challenges the
> prevailing way of
> thinking that in order to keep up with the West, other cultures have
> to adapt
> to
> the western ways of thinking. Relying on constructivist theories, I
> argue that
> the universal theories of computing take different forms in different
> cultures,
> and that the European view on abstract ideas of computing is
> culturally bound,
> too. Studying ethnocomputing— i.e. the computational ideas within a
> culture —
> may lead to new findings that can be used in both developing the
> western view
> of Computer Science, and improving Computer Science education in
> non-western
> cultures."
>
>
> ----- End message from dzo at BISHARAT.NET -----


From iackerman at ROSETTASTONE.COM  Mon Aug  2 17:13:28 2004
From: iackerman at ROSETTASTONE.COM (Ilse Ackerman)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 13:13:28 -0400
Subject: Indigenous Language CD-ROMs
In-Reply-To: <1091465639.13cfe9e68f5e2@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.131328.0400.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Dear Phil,

Thanks very much for compiling the resource listing.  I have two 
CD-ROMs for listing.  These should be released early next year.


Author:                 NANA Corporation

Title:                          Iñupiaq

Publication Medium:     [CD-ROM]

Publisher:                      Fairfield Language Technologies (makers of Rosetta Stone)

Location & Date:        expected release 2005



Author:                 Kanien'kehaka Onkwawenna Raotitiohkwa Cultural Center

Title:                          Kanien'kéha [Mohawk]

Publication Medium:[CD-ROM]

Publisher:                      Fairfield Language Technologies (makers of Rosetta Stone)

Location & Date:        expected release 2005



Best regards,

ilse

_____________________________

Ilse Ackerman
Program Manager
Endangered Language Program
Fairfield Language Technologies
Harrisonburg, VA  22802 USA

Tel  1.800.788.0822 Ext. 3318
Tel  1.540.432.6166 Ext. 3318
Fax 1.540.432.0953

www.rosettastone.com/languagerescue
_______________________________

From langendt at U.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug  2 17:28:38 2004
From: langendt at U.ARIZONA.EDU (Terry Langendoen)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 10:28:38 -0700
Subject: NSF Documenting Endangered Languages
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.102838.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Documenting Endangered Languages

This partnership between the National Science Foundation and the
National Endowment for the Humanities supports projects to develop and
advance knowledge concerning endangered human languages and aims also to
exploit advances in information technology. Funding will support
fieldwork and other activities relevant to recording, documenting, and
archiving endangered languages, including the preparation of lexicons,
grammars, text samples, and databases. Funding is available for 6-10
project grants ranging from $12,000 to $150,000 per year for 1-3 years
and about 12 fellowships of either $40,000 (9-12 months) or $24,000 (6-8
months). Fellowships are not intended to support graduate course work or
a master's degree, but may contribute to the completion of a doctoral
dissertation. At least half the available funding will be awarded to
projects involving fieldwork.

DEADLINE: November 1, 2004

http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2004/nsf04605/nsf04605.htm


From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET  Mon Aug  2 17:56:44 2004
From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 10:56:44 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <7F4FA3FB24EC7040825418FFCCA088FB43E296@ecufacstaf1.intra.ecu.edu>
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.105644.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Resa, yes certainly.  i hope to have a site up soon, right now i am 
organizing content, that is, anything interesting relating to 
indigenous languages and technology.  so at the moment it is mostly 
informational oriented.  phil

On Aug 2, 2004, at 7:35 AM, Bizzaro, Resa Crane wrote:

> Hi, everyone.  Phil--will you share the address for the web site as 
> soon as it's ready?  It sounds like a great resource.
>
> Resa
>
>       -----Original Message-----
>       From: Indigenous Languages and Technology on behalf of phil cash cash
>       Sent: Sun 8/1/2004 4:51 PM
>       To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>       Cc:
>       Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
> 	
> 	
>
>       Dear ILAT,
> 	
>       i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
>       indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
>       ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
> 	
>       please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
>       you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.
> 	
>       thanks,
>       phil cash cash
>       UofA, ILAT
> 	
>       ~~~
> 	
>       ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
> 	
>       AZTLAN: Maya
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
> 	
>       CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
> 	
>       CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
>       http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
> 	
>       ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
> 	
>       GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
>       Greenland
>       http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
> 	
>       Indigenous Languages and Technology
>       http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
> 	
>       NAHUAT-L: The Náhuatl Language of the Aztecs
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
> 	
>       SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
> 	
>       WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
> 	
>


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Wed Aug  4 19:07:58 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Wed, 4 Aug 2004 12:07:58 -0700
Subject: Omushkigo Oral History Project (link)
Message-ID: <WED.4.AUG.2004.120758.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Omushkigo Oral History Project

The Omushkego Oral History Project has been devoted to the
transcription, digitization, and preservation on CD-ROMs of a large
portion of Louis Bird’s extensive collection of audiotapes documenting
Swampy Cree legends and oral history.

http://www.ourvoices.ca/

[note: this is an impressive site of narratives.  the intro page has a
flash w/audio intro so wait for it to play.  phil]


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Wed Aug  4 19:38:21 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Wed, 4 Aug 2004 12:38:21 -0700
Subject: Aboriginal Sans unicode font
Message-ID: <WED.4.AUG.2004.123821.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

just a quick note,

for those who think the unicode Aboriginal Serif font that came out
recently was a major step forward to creating language texts, now there
is an Aboriginal Sans version available.

i downloaded onto my Mac, typed in some Nez Perce and it looks great.

http://www.languagegeek.com/font/fontdownload.html

later,
phil
UofA, ILAT


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Thu Aug  5 06:22:00 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Thu, 5 Aug 2004 01:22:00 -0500
Subject: Fwd: Re: [A12n-forum] Aboriginal Unicode fonts
Message-ID: <THU.5.AUG.2004.012200.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Andrew Cunningham, in a reply to my posting news on this font to the "A12n"
lists, noted a small but not insignificant discrepancy in glyphs used for one
character, the capital "eng," in the 2 fonts. In the lower case it is
invariably an "n" with a longer right leg that curves leftward. The two
variants on the upper case are one that looks like the lower case but larger
("n-form"), and one that looks like the upper case with an added line curving
left from the right leg ("N-form"). The former is used in parts of Africa; the
latter in some northern European and Australian aboriginal languages.

As he notes (below), one font used the n-form capital, the other the N-form.

Don Osborn, Ph.D.         dzo at bisharat.net
*Bisharat! A language, technology & development initiative
*Bisharat! Initiative langues - technologie - développement
http://www.bisharat.net






----- Forwarded message from Andrew Cunningham -----

Donald Z. Osborn wrote:

> The Aboriginal Unicode fonts (ttf; serifed and now sans-serif in beta) seem
to
> have all the Latin character ranges, though the site's character map was
still
> under construction when I checked. It's free and should be useful for most
> African languages. Even though Africa was not the primary audience for the
font
> the version history indicates some attention to African needs.
>
> See http://www.languagegeek.com/font/fontdownload.html . (Pointer from the
ILAT
> list.)
>

Of the two families Aboriginal Sans and Aboriginal Serif

Aboriginal Sans uses the N-form of capital eng, while Aboriginal Serif uses the
n-form.

Andrew


--
Andrew Cunningham
e-Diversity and Content Infrastructure Solutions
Public Libraries Unit, Vicnet
State Library of Victoria
328 Swanston Street
Melbourne  VIC  3000
Australia

andrewc+AEA-vicnet.net.au

Ph. 3-8664-7430
Fax: 3-9639-2175

http://www.openroad.net.au/
http://www.libraries.vic.gov.au/
http://www.vicnet.net.au/


----- End forwarded message -----


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Thu Aug  5 06:32:47 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Thu, 5 Aug 2004 01:32:47 -0500
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <1091393476.ffa2985ff3c21@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <THU.5.AUG.2004.013247.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Phil, It may be of interest to include a link to a very short list of lists with
some or all traffic in one or another African language at
http://www.bisharat.net/links2.htm#11b . This needs an updating (any pointers
would be welcome). TIA...

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net



Quoting phil cash cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU>:

> Dear ILAT,
>
> i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
> indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
> ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
>
> please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
> you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.
>
> thanks,
> phil cash cash
> UofA, ILAT
>
> ~~~
>
> ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
>
> AZTLAN: Maya
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
> CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
> CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
> http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
>
> ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
>
> GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
> Greenland
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
>
> Indigenous Languages and Technology
> http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
>
> NAHUAT-L: The Náhuatl Language of the Aztecs
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
>
> SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
>
> WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
>


From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG  Fri Aug  6 15:41:07 2004
From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 08:41:07 -0700
Subject: Finding Out About Natives
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.084107.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Need to find out something about Native California, or perhaps the rest
of Native America.  Find links @:
http://www.ncidc.org/links.htm

--


André Cramblit: andre.p.cramblit.86 at alum.dartmouth.org is the Operations
Director Northern California Indian Development Council NCIDC
(http://www.ncidc.org) is a non-profit that meets the development needs
of American Indians

To subscribe to a news letter of interest to Natives send an email to:
IndigenousNewsNetwork-subscribe at topica.com or go to:
http://www.topica.com/lists/IndigenousNewsNetwork/subscribe/?location=listinfo


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Fri Aug  6 18:33:41 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 11:33:41 -0700
Subject: 60% of languages may go (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.113341.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

60% of languages may go

06/08/2004 07:09  - (SA) 
http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1568950,00.html 

Leipzig - More than 60% of the world's 6 700 spoken languages and
dialects are threatened with eventual extinction due to the domination
of a few widely used languages, a linguist warned on Thursday.

Balthasar Bickel of Leipzig University said that in some cases there
were minority languages "spoken only by two or three old people."

He was speaking on the opening day of an international linguistic
congress here called Syntax of the World's Languages.

The meeting, ending on Sunday, is attended by about 200 specialists from
around the world who will consider the future of minority languages
such as Breton, the native Celtic language of Brittany in western
France, and Zulu, the Bantu tongue of South Africa.

Edited by Andrea Botha


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Fri Aug  6 18:36:06 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 11:36:06 -0700
Subject: SA languages boosted (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.113606.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

SA languages boosted

31/03/2004 08:49  - (SA)  
http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,6119,2-7-1442_1505745,00.html

Johannesburg - The South African government announced on Tuesday it is
about to embark on a project to bring indigenous languages into line
with current international norms.

This was the message from Minister of Minerals and Energy, Arts,
Culture, Science and Technology Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka when she
announced an innovative language scheme at the Durban Convention
Centre.

The minister said Africa as a whole had a woeful history as far as
honouring the languages of the people of the continent was concerned.

"African languages' biggest problem stems from the days of colonialism
and the ill-conceived idea that African languages were inferior to
colonial languages and unfit for any functional role in business or
politics," said the minister.

As part of a strategy to reverse this situation the minister announced
three initiatives - a bursary scheme, the establishment of language
research and development centres (LRDCs) and the launch of a human
language technologies (HLT) initiative.

"I would like to state that it is the government's goal to have all the
official languages of South Africa adequately developed in order to
serve the complex and diverse requirements of modern communication,"
she said.

"Developing a language requires the use of realistic strategies, and a
proper plan of action with clear goals and objectives. When one thinks
about developing languages one has to think about research, which
provides the backbone of all language development strategies.

Terminology, literature, research

"It is for this reason that we have decided to establish language
research and development centres and to link them with academic
institutions. The mandates of these centres are terminology
development, literature development and research, and language planning
research.

Mlambo-Ngcuka said the human language technologies unit would
co-ordinate the work that was done in terms of developing and managing
electronic language and speech resources in all the official languages
of South Africa.

Department spokesperson Xolile Mfaxa said the new technology could be
used in all sections of society such as universities, government and
the private sector in promoting the use of indigenous languages.

"We want to see capacity built along the lines of terminology so there
is no excuse for not using a particular language - for example not
using Zulu because it doesn't have certain technical terms."

Mfaxa said five bursaries worth R40 000 each, were awarded to
post-graduate students in the fields of translation and editing,
interpreting, terminology development, human language technologies and
language planning.

All of these initiatives follow the February 2003 adoption by government
of the National Language Policy Framework.

Edited by Tisha Steyn


From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG  Fri Aug  6 22:27:48 2004
From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 15:27:48 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <1091393476.ffa2985ff3c21@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.152748.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

    List Name   Karuk Language Restoration Issues (Karuk Language)
Purpose:        A place for those interested in the Karuk Language to discuse
items, events, learning strategies, ideas etc
Website URL:    http://www.ncidc.org
List Type:      Unmoderated discussion
Subscription:   Requires owner approval
Archive:        Readable by anyone
Created:        Mar 08, 2002
Owner:  andre cramblit
To Join:        Subscribe
<http://lists.topica.com/lists/KarukLanguage/subscribe/?location=listinfo>
here, or send an email to KarukLanguage-subscribe at topica.com
To Post:        Send mail to 'KarukLanguage at topica.com'
Stats:  39 subscribers / 2 messages per week
Categories:     Regional & Travel
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=182>  |  Countries
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=184>  |  United States
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=368>  |  Society & Culture
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=6897>  |  Cultures & Groups
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=7549>  |  Native American
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=2023>



phil cash cash wrote:

>Dear ILAT,
>
>i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
>indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
>ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
>
>please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
>you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.
>
>thanks,
>phil cash cash
>UofA, ILAT
>
>~~~
>
>ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
>
>AZTLAN: Maya
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
>CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
>CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
>http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
>
>ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
>
>GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
>Greenland
>http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
>
>Indigenous Languages and Technology
>http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
>
>NAHUAT-L: The Náhuatl Language of the Aztecs
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
>
>SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
>
>WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
>
>
>

--


André Cramblit: andre.p.cramblit.86 at alum.dartmouth.org is the Operations
Director Northern California Indian Development Council NCIDC
(http://www.ncidc.org) is a non-profit that meets the development needs
of American Indians

To subscribe to a news letter of interest to Natives send an email to:
IndigenousNewsNetwork-subscribe at topica.com or go to:
http://www.topica.com/lists/IndigenousNewsNetwork/subscribe/?location=listinfo


From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET  Fri Aug  6 23:01:37 2004
From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 16:01:37 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <411405E4.8080606@ncidc.org>
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.160137.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

cool!  thanks, Andre.  i will add to it my growing list.

phil
UofA, ILAT

On Aug 6, 2004, at 3:27 PM, Andre Cramblit wrote:

>    List Name   Karuk Language Restoration Issues (Karuk Language)
> Purpose:        A place for those interested in the Karuk Language to  
> discuse
> items, events, learning strategies, ideas etc
> Website URL:    http://www.ncidc.org
> List Type:      Unmoderated discussion
> Subscription:   Requires owner approval
> Archive:        Readable by anyone
> Created:        Mar 08, 2002
> Owner:  andre cramblit
> To Join:        Subscribe
> <http://lists.topica.com/lists/KarukLanguage/subscribe/? 
> location=listinfo>
> here, or send an email to KarukLanguage-subscribe at topica.com
> To Post:        Send mail to 'KarukLanguage at topica.com'
> Stats:  39 subscribers / 2 messages per week
> Categories:     Regional & Travel
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=182>  |  Countries
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=184>  |  United States
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=368>  |  Society & Culture
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=6897>  |  Cultures & Groups
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=7549>  |  Native American
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=2023>
>
>
>
> phil cash cash wrote:
>
>> Dear ILAT,
>>
>> i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
>> indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
>> ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
>>
>> please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
>> you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.
>>
>> thanks,
>> phil cash cash
>> UofA, ILAT
>>
>> ~~~
>>
>> ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
>>
>> AZTLAN: Maya
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>>
>> CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>>
>> CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
>> http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
>>
>> ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
>>
>> GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
>> Greenland
>> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
>>
>> Indigenous Languages and Technology
>> http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
>>
>> NAHUAT-L: The Náhuatl Language of the Aztecs
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
>>
>> SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
>>
>> WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
>>
>>
>>
>
> --
>
>
> André Cramblit: andre.p.cramblit.86 at alum.dartmouth.org is the  
> Operations
> Director Northern California Indian Development Council NCIDC
> (http://www.ncidc.org) is a non-profit that meets the development needs
> of American Indians
>
> To subscribe to a news letter of interest to Natives send an email to:
> IndigenousNewsNetwork-subscribe at topica.com or go to:
> http://www.topica.com/lists/IndigenousNewsNetwork/subscribe/? 
> location=listinfo
>


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Sat Aug  7 02:26:07 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 21:26:07 -0500
Subject: Study Guides & Strategies site
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.212607.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

If you're not already familiar with it, the Study Guides & Strategies site at
http://www.studygs.net/ is a great resource. What's more, the sites's creator,
Joe Landsberger of the University of St. Thomas (St. Paul, Minnesota), has
included translations into various languages and, as I understand it, is open
to adding more languages.

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net


From eduardo_rivail at YAHOO.COM  Sat Aug  7 03:37:17 2004
From: eduardo_rivail at YAHOO.COM (Eduardo Rivail Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 20:37:17 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <1091393476.ffa2985ff3c21@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.203717.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Dear Phil,

Hi. 'Etnoling��stica' is a discussion list on (lowland) South American indigenous languages.  It's located at the address below:

http://br.groups.yahoo.com/group/etnolinguistica/

Cordialmente,

Eduardo

phil cash cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU> wrote:
Dear ILAT,

i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
indigenous languages. a full listing will be made available on an
ilat-based informational website that is in progress.

please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
you may know of. enclosed below is my initial listing.

thanks,
phil cash cash
UofA, ILAT

~~~

ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html

AZTLAN: Maya
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree

ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html

GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
Greenland
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/

Indigenous Languages and Technology
http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html

NAHUAT-L: The N�huatl Language of the Aztecs
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html

SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html

WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html


----------------------------------
Eduardo Rivail Ribeiro
Museu Antropol�gico, Universidade Federal de Goi�s
Department of Linguistics, University of Chicago
http://www.etnolinguistica.org








---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages!
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040806/9e344045/attachment.html>

From mikinakn at SHAW.CA  Sat Aug  7 05:26:03 2004
From: mikinakn at SHAW.CA (Rolland Nadjiwon)
Date: Sat, 7 Aug 2004 01:26:03 -0400
Subject: Study Guides & Strategies site
Message-ID: <SAT.7.AUG.2004.012603.0400.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Excellent suggestion...I have just emailed it to the students in my last
class...ENG 506 - Cultural Encounters. The semester is finished but they can
always use this resource. Megwetch

-------
wahjeh
rolland nadjiwon


----- Original Message -----
From: "Donald Z. Osborn" <dzo at BISHARAT.NET>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 06, 2004 10:26 PM
Subject: Study Guides & Strategies site


> If you're not already familiar with it, the Study Guides & Strategies site
at
> http://www.studygs.net/ is a great resource. What's more, the sites's
creator,
> Joe Landsberger of the University of St. Thomas (St. Paul, Minnesota), has
> included translations into various languages and, as I understand it, is
open
> to adding more languages.
>
> Don Osborn
> Bisharat.net
>


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Sat Aug  7 16:36:52 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Sat, 7 Aug 2004 09:36:52 -0700
Subject: Learning to connect (fwd)
Message-ID: <SAT.7.AUG.2004.093652.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Learning to connect
Language, culture classes help create pride in Navajo heritage

[photo inset - Matt Slocum/The Arizona Republic
Teacher Rachel Antonio of Phoenix will teach Navajo language at the
Phoenix Indian Center.]

Mikaela Crank
The Arizona Republic
Aug. 7, 2004 12:00 AM
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/northphoenix/articles/0807phx-navajolang0807Z3.html

Carolene Bitsui left the Navajo Reservation in 1997 to pursue her
education.

Over the years in the Valley, she obtained her degree in drafting and
began working as a draft technician at Wilson and Co. to support her
daughter and two younger sisters in Mesa.

But through her journey, she had to cope with her homesickness and the
cost of not living in a Navajo environment. She was neglecting her
language and losing her heritage.

That all changed in 2000 when she took a Navajo language and culture
class at the Phoenix Indian Center.

The classes resume Aug. 23, with an enhancement: Children's classes will
be offered for the first time.

Bitsui, 29, has already enrolled her 8-year-old daughter, RoeShae, in
the class. She wants her daughter to learn Navajo so she doesn't have
to go through what she went through.

"It was embarrassing when elders would ask me questions and I couldn't
respond," Bitsui said.

"I have been in the classes for three years now, and it has improved my
confidence. When I go home, I can speak to my family, and they are
proud that I am learning."

RoeShae already has taken cultural courses with Freddie Johnson and has
become prouder of her heritage, Bitsui said.

"She is more excited about her culture and she can say her clans in a
drop of a hat," Bitsui said. "Her friends would always ask questions
about her culture and she didn't know how to answer, but now she is
able to tell them about it."

The high volume of requests from parents helped initiate the
kindergarten through third-grade course, Navajo language instructor
Rachel Antonio said.

Since 2000, Antonio has been the primary language teacher and will be
teaching the children's class.

"A lot of Navajos don't learn their native language because they moved
to the city for jobs and school," Antonio said. "The classes really
help them learn the values and principles as a Navajo. We need to keep
the language alive down here (Phoenix)."

She also said she has seen the program grow tremendously.

In the beginning it was difficult for the Diné College teacher graduate
to create a curriculum and get the word out.

After the first year, the interest and demand increased. Antonio began
to teach beginning, intermediate and advanced adult language classes.

The curriculum contains regular assignments and exams of the basic
principles of the Navajo language. There are two classes a year,
limited to 30 people for each class.

Established in 1947, the Phoenix Indian Center has been a facility for
urban Native Americans to get job training and educational resources
and to interact with other tribal members.

It is a prominent tool in the Native American communities to experience
a successful city lifestyle but keep ties with their native roots.

"It's a great program," Bitsui said. "I want my family to be proud of
being Navajo."


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Sun Aug  8 17:18:09 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Sun, 8 Aug 2004 10:18:09 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <20040807033717.30617.qmail@web52905.mail.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <SUN.8.AUG.2004.101809.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Eduardo, thanks. i will add this listing to the list.

phil cash cash
UofA, ILAt




> ----- Message from eduardo_rivail at YAHOO.COM ---------
>     Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 20:37:17 -0700
>     From: Eduardo Rivail Ribeiro <eduardo_rivail at YAHOO.COM>
> Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology
<ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>  Subject: Re: Indigenous Language listservs
>       To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>
> Dear Phil,
>
> Hi. 'Etnolingüística' is a discussion list on (lowland) South
> American indigenous languages.  It's located at the address below:
>
> http://br.groups.yahoo.com/group/etnolinguistica/
>
> Cordialmente,
>
> Eduardo
>
> phil cash cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU> wrote:
> Dear ILAT,
>
> i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
> indigenous languages. a full listing will be made available on an
> ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
>
> please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
> you may know of. enclosed below is my initial listing.
>
> thanks,
> phil cash cash
> UofA, ILAT
>
> ~~~
>
> ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
>
> AZTLAN: Maya
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
> CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
> CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
> http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
>
> ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
>
> GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
> Greenland
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
>
> Indigenous Languages and Technology
> http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
>
> NAHUAT-L: The Náhuatl Language of the Aztecs
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
>
> SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
>
> WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
>
>
> ----------------------------------
> Eduardo Rivail Ribeiro
> Museu Antropológico, Universidade Federal de Goiás
> Department of Linguistics, University of Chicago
> http://www.etnolinguistica.org
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> Do you Yahoo!?
> New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages!
>
> ----- End message from eduardo_rivail at YAHOO.COM -----


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug  9 15:41:03 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Mon, 9 Aug 2004 08:41:03 -0700
Subject: Action needed now to end abuse of =?iso-8859-1?b?d29ybGSScw==?=
 indigenous peoples =?iso-8859-1?b?lg==?= UN (fwd)
Message-ID: <MON.9.AUG.2004.084103.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Action needed now to end abuse of world’s indigenous peoples – UN
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=11582&Cr=indigenous&Cr1=people#

9 August 2004 – The United Nations today marked the International Day of
the World’s Indigenous People with calls to governments,
intergovernmental organizations and the international community
at-large for urgent action to end the gross human rights abuses,
discrimination and marginalization that all too often are still their
lot in society.

“For far too long, indigenous peoples’ lands have been taken away, their
cultures denigrated or directly attacked, their languages and customs
suppressed, their wisdom and traditional knowledge overlooked or
exploited, and their sustainable ways of developing natural resources
dismissed,” Secretary-General Kofi Annan said.

“Some have even faced the threat of extinction,” he added in a message
observing the 10th anniversary of the Day, which also marks the closing
year of the International Decade of the World’s Indigenous People
proclaimed by the UN General Assembly to raise awareness about the
situation of indigenous people.

“Governments, intergovernmental organizations and civil society must
work to empower indigenous peoples and ensure their participation in
decisions that affect their lives,” he declared.

The Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation of indigenous
peoples of the UN Commission on Human Rights, Rodolfo Stavenhagen,
voiced deep concern over continuing reports of gross violations against
indigenous peoples worldwide.

“Despite the progress made over the past 10 years, at the national and
international levels, indigenous peoples the world over continue to be
among the most marginalized and dispossessed sectors of society, the
victims of perennial prejudice and discrimination,” he declared.

Mr. Stavenhagen noted the “brutal killing” just last week of an
indigenous human rights activist in Colombia, Fredy Arias, allegedly by
a member of a paramilitary group, and called on the Colombian
Government to investigate this and other such violations and bring
those responsible to justice without delay.

“Indigenous peoples are also the victims of other types of violations,”
he added. “In too many places they lack access to basic services and
continue to suffer multiple forms of discrimination elsewhere. I call
on Governments to make real progress on their commitment to improve the
living and human rights conditions of indigenous peoples. Rhetoric must
become a thing of the past; action is what is needed now.”


From anguksuar at YAHOO.COM  Mon Aug  9 16:25:34 2004
From: anguksuar at YAHOO.COM (Richard LaFortune)
Date: Mon, 9 Aug 2004 09:25:34 -0700
Subject: Laura Bush advocates Native language revitalization
In-Reply-To: <1091817366.6dd0f0a266f5f@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <MON.9.AUG.2004.092534.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

First Lady Laura Bush advocate of Native American
Language Revitalization

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/05/20030508-19.html

For Immediate Release
Office of Mrs. Bush
May 8, 2003

Remarks by Mrs. Bush at Reach Out and Read Event
&#150; Kayenta Indian Health Services

Ya'at'eeh. Thank you, Dana, Principal Baker,
Superintendent Allsbrook, and all of the students for
welcoming me to the home of the Mustangs. Thank you,
First Lady Shirley, Vice President and Mrs. Dayish for
welcoming me to Tohdenasshai. This is a beautiful and
blessed land which the Navajo proudly call home. My
name is Laura Bush and I'm from the small town of
Midland, Texas.

 I am so glad to be here to visit with all of you and
with my good friend, Linda White, who is the CEO of
the Kayenta Service Unit of the Navajo Indian Health
Services. Thank you, Linda, and all of the men and
women who work at the Kayenta Indian Health Services
for your dedication to the good health of Kayenta's
families and children. I applaud IHS for their
continued accreditation and for the work doctors and
nurses are doing here through Reach Out and Read.

Through Reach Out and Read, doctors and nurses
encourage parents and caregivers to read aloud to
their babies from their earliest days. Doctors and
nurses know that just as the human touch is necessary
for babies' physical and emotional growth, reading to
them is necessary for language development. During
clinic visits, doctors talk with parents and
caregivers about the importance of reading and they
give every child a new book to take home. I am happy
that Kayenta's Reach Out and Read clinic provides
children with books about Navajo poetry and language.

Educating and nurturing children is one of the
strongest traditions of the Navajo people. Another
strong tradition is serving in our military. The world
recognizes the Navajo Code Talkers who provided a
critical service to the United States during World War
II.

Thank you, Samuel Holiday, who is here with us today,
for your service and your courage. We continue to pray
for all who serve in our military and those in Iraq.
We also pray for their families and for those who have
lost loved ones. We pray especially for the family of
Lori Piestewa.

I know that the family is the core of the Navajo
culture, and I've learned that the four seasons
reflect on the importance of family, tradition and
education. As a five-fingered people, children are the
center of a family, where they are surrounded and
nurtured by parents and grandparents. One of the best
ways we can help nurture our children is through
education - and their education should begin before
they are even born.

The first sound a child hears is her mother's heart
beat. This sound carries a child through her entire
life and is repeated in the rhythm of traditional drum
songs. When a parent reads to a baby, the baby will
grow to love the sound of her parent's voice and of
hearing stories. Reading to children not only helps
them to develop, but it comforts them as well.
Children who are read to learn that reading and
stories are important - and that they are important.

We are entering the spring season, which is the
direction of the East. Spring is a time to focus on
young babies and the beginning of new life. As we wait
each year for the first thunder and for mother earth
to wake the world, parents can read to their children
to wake them to words, stories and learning. If we
talk to and listen to children, read with them, and
surround them with books - then we can help them
establish the skills and knowledge they need for
school and for life. And we keep alive the traditions
of storytelling and oral teachings, which are so
precious in every culture.

Many parents know the joy of reading to their
children, whether during cozy moments at bedtime or
breaks in a long day. Some of my happiest memories
from childhood are of the times my mother read to me.
And some of my favorite memories as a mother are of
reading to my own daughters. This is why Reach Out and
Read is so great. Pediatricians who prescribe reading
are not just helping children learn to read, but they
are helping parents as well.

I want to share a story with you about my friend, Dr.
Donna Bacchi, a pediatrician in Texas. She started a
reading program in her practice and gave her very
first reading prescription to a young boy with asthma.
She talked with the boy's mother about the importance
of reading and showed her how to hold her baby and a
book while reading. After a few minutes, the mom
leaned over and whispered in Dr. Bacchi's ear,
"Doctor, I do not know how to read." Fortunately, Dr.
Bacchi was prepared.

She connected the mother with a local family literacy
provider so she could learn how to read - so she could
read stories to her child, and maybe even more
important, the labels on her son's asthma medicine.
What an extraordinary opportunity to break the cycle
of illiteracy for one family and to enrich their lives
with reading and books. This is what Reach Out and
Read does for millions of children and their families.
And it is what education does for America.

I understand soon you will be entering the direction
of the South. With summer comes preparing children for
the future. The children here are in school right now.
But soon, as you grow and learn, you will go out into
the world to work or to college. Remember the words of
Chief Manuelito who said, "My grandchild, education is
the ladder." He encouraged his people to go to school
and to use their skills and education in their
communities.

There are ways you can give to the Navajo community.
Consider becoming a teacher here so Navajo children
will learn their language and culture in school. The
Kayenta Health Clinic needs Navajo doctors and nurses.
I understand that a new hospital will open here in a
few years. What a wonderful time to think about a
career in science or health care. Perhaps someday you
will talk to parents about the importance of reading
with their babies.

Whether you work here or go off to college, remember
that you are ambassadors of the Navajo nation.
Wherever you go, you can teach others about the
history and tradition of your people. That is what
Navajo poet Lucy Tapahonso does. Lucy visited the
White House last year during the second National Book
Festival. During this festival, we celebrate authors,
stories, and reading. Lucy spoke about the importance
of tradition and of sharing stories and language with
children.

Her words inspired everyone there, and today I hope
they will inspire all of us to continue to share the
joy of books, reading and education with children.
Lucy said, "To honor our children we must first honor
our ancestors. Let us walk then into the future, bound
by the hopeful words of all our grandparents. Let us
honor their wisdom and love of language which sustains
us all."

Education, reading and stories sustain us all and will
lead children home to Tohdenasshai - this land at the
end of the rainbow. Thank you and walk in beauty.




_______________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Express yourself with Y! Messenger! Free. Download now.
http://messenger.yahoo.com


From anguksuar at YAHOO.COM  Mon Aug  9 16:35:04 2004
From: anguksuar at YAHOO.COM (Richard LaFortune)
Date: Mon, 9 Aug 2004 09:35:04 -0700
Subject: Bush awardsNative language codetalkers
In-Reply-To: <20040809162534.79935.qmail@web11201.mail.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <MON.9.AUG.2004.093504.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Navajo Code Talkers Receive Congressional Gold Medal

Mr. CAMPBELL: Mr. President earlier today I was
honored to join President Bush, four of the five
surviving Navajo code talkers, their families, and the
families of all the Code Talkers in a ceremony in
which the President awarded the Code Talkers the
Congressional Gold Medal.

The ceremony also included other members of Congress,
Indian tribal leaders, and dignitaries from around the
nation.

For far too many Americans, bred on cynicism and
hopelessness, these men remind us what real American
heroes are all about.

It is unfortunate that we could not have recognized
these men and their contributions sooner than this.

Think of this ~W just 77 years before World War II, the
grandfathers of these heroes were forced at gunpoint
with 9,000 other Navajos from their homeland and
marched 300 miles through the burning desert. For four
long years the Navajo people were interned at the
Bosque Redondo.

For these men and their comrades to rise above that
injustice in American history and put their lives on
the line speaks of their character and their
patriotism.

Just as the Japanese were never able to break the
Navajo Code, it is also a mystery why it took so long
for our nation to recognize the critical role the Code
Talkers played in achieving victory in the Pacific.

The answer may lie in the secrecy of their mission.

The Navajo Code Talkers took part in every major
assault the U.S. Marines conducted in the Pacific from
1942 to 1945. It was their duty to transmit messages
in their native language (Dine Bizaad) ~W a code the
Japanese were never able to decipher.

Mr. Phillip Johnston, the son of a missionary to the
Navajos and one of the few non-Navajos who spoke the
Navajo language fluently, was the individual
responsible for recognizing the potential of the
Navajo people and language and the contributions they
could make to World War II.

A World War I veteran who knew the value of secure
communications, Johnston was reared on the Navajo
reservation, and recommended the Navajo language be
used for this purpose.

The Navajo language is complex because it has no
alphabet or symbols and fit the military's need for an
"undecipherable code".

Johnston staged tests under simulated combat
conditions with the commanding general of the
Amphibious Corps, Pacific Fleet.

The tests demonstrated that Navajos could encode,
transmit and decode a three-line message in 20
seconds. After the simulation the Navajo were
recommended to the Commandant of the Marine Corps to
serve as Code Talkers. It was recommended that the
Marines recruit 200 Navajos.

In May 1942, the first 29 of the 200 requested Navajo
recruits attended boot camp. During this time they
developed and memorized a dictionary and numerous
words for military terms.

After the successful completion of boot camp, the Code
Talkers were sent to a Marine unit deployed in the
Pacific theater. At this duty station it became the
primary job of the Code Talkers to transmit
information on tactics, troop movements, orders, and
other vital battlefield communications over telephones
and radios.

The Navajos were praised for their skill, speed and
accuracy in communications throughout the War.

At Iwo Jima, Major Howard Connor, 5th Marine Division
Signal officer, declared, "Were it not for the
Navajos, the Marines would never have taken Iwo Jima."
Connor had six Navajo Code Talkers who worked around
the clock during the first two days of the battle
sending and receiving over 800 messages --- all
without error.

The Japanese, who were skilled code breakers, were
confused by the Navajo language. The Japanese chief of
intelligence, Lieutenant General Seizo Arisue said
that while they were at times able to decipher the
codes used by the other armed forces, they never were
able to crack the code used by the Marines and
Navajos.

American Indians and their commitment to this nation
can be described in one quote from David E. Patterson,
of the 4th Marine Division, "When I was inducted into
the service, one of the commitments I made was that I
was willing to die for my country~Vthe U.S., the Navajo
Nation, and my family. My [native] language was my
weapon."

I would like to thank the Navajo code talkers who
served in World War II for their dedication and
bravery to our nation.

They believed in what they fought for and were willing
to sacrifice their lives to create a communication
system that was unbreakable.

Without these brave men and their knowledge of their
language, the success of our nation's military efforts
in the Pacific would not have been possible.

I urge all Americans to thank these brave men for
their uncommon valor and dedication to a cause higher
than themselves.

I thank the chair and yield the floor.

* * *




__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage!
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Wed Aug 11 19:09:11 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Wed, 11 Aug 2004 12:09:11 -0700
Subject: UNESCO to Publish Handbook on Language Preservation and
 Documentation (fwd)
Message-ID: <WED.11.AUG.2004.120911.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

UNESCO
http://www.unesco.org/
Francia
Educación > Organizaciones @@
Noticia nº: 30621
Agencia emisora: 
mié 11 Ago 2004

UNESCO to Publish Handbook on Language Preservation and Documentation

Aimée Lahaussois, a Linguistic Expert in Nepalese languages, along with
several leading international experts in linguistic and language
revitalization, have been developing a Language Preservation Handbook.
This project is one of the activities carried out by UNESCO’s
Initiative B at bel which seeks to promote multilingualism in cyberspace
and preserve endangered languages.

Recently, Aimée was in Nepal carrying out independent research on
endangered languages. She seized the opportunity to use the handbook
and field test its effectiveness.

The handbook, entitled “Language Preservation and Documentation
Handbook: South Asia version”, provides a methodology for native
speakers of endangered languages to record their languages for
posterity. The project was inspired by requests from several members of
ethnic minorities in Nepal who were interested in self documenting
their languages. For many ethnic groups, assimilation and other
processes have lead to the decline of indigenous culture as well as
their languages and knowledge systems. UNESCO would like to see this
rich human heritage preserved.

The handbook guides the reader through the process of collecting
linguistic data on one’s endangered language in the absence of a
linguist, as well as stories which are an important part of the
heritage of the community. The document begins with a questionnaire
covering background information on the language community, followed by
advice on creating a writing system, and lists of key words. It then
guidelines them in recording and transcribing stories, and concludes
with material on various aspects of the grammar of the language,
through questionnaires and translation exercises. Oral recordings of
the languages are also an important part of this exercise.

Here are some of the impressions of Aimée Lahaussois’ first experience
with the handbook:

“Working with a young speaker of an endangered language reinforced for
me what documentation is all about, and why it is important to provide
tools so native speakers can carry out their own documentation: after
three weeks of excellent work with a very talented and enthusiastic
speaker, I tried to pay him as compensation for the time and energy he
put into our sessions, thinking this would be welcome, as life is
particularly difficult for students in a developing country. I was
moved when he refused the money, citing that it was I who deserved
compensation as I was doing his community the enormous favour of making
sure their language was recorded and preserved. Clearly there is a
great need for efforts such as this.”

It is hoped that the results will not only provide a record of the
language, as spoken by native speakers, but will also stimulate renewed
community-wide interest in the language, which may in turn reduce the
rate at which languages are being lost.

Indeed, a great many minority languages are disappearing around the
world and those which disappear without a trace represent a great loss
of cultural heritage. One critical reason is that they are not being
passed on to the younger generations. Some of the causes include
pressure on children to use national languages, unavailability of
education in the language spoken at home, migration away from the
homeland amongst others. Often, only older speakers are left and when
they disappear, so do these languages. In the case of languages with no
written form which have not been documented, no trace remains of what
was once a vibrant and unique language and culture.

A CD-ROM and print version of this handbook will be published by the end
of September.

11/08/2004


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Wed Aug 11 19:18:24 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Wed, 11 Aug 2004 12:18:24 -0700
Subject: UNESCO to Publish Handbook on Language Preservation and
 Documentation (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <1092251351.8e325630db546@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <WED.11.AUG.2004.121824.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

here is the news link...
http://www.noticias.info/Asp/aspComunicados.asp?nid=30621&src=0

> ----- Message from cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU ---------
>     Date: Wed, 11 Aug 2004 12:09:11 -0700
>     From: phil cash cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU>
> Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology
<ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>  Subject: UNESCO to Publish Handbook on Language Preservation and
Documentation (fwd)
>       To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>
> UNESCO
> http://www.unesco.org/
> Francia
> Educación > Organizaciones @@
> Noticia nº: 30621
> Agencia emisora: 
> mié 11 Ago 2004
>
> UNESCO to Publish Handbook on Language Preservation and Documentation
>
> Aimée Lahaussois, a Linguistic Expert in Nepalese languages, along
> with
> several leading international experts in linguistic and language
> revitalization, have been developing a Language Preservation
> Handbook.
> This project is one of the activities carried out by UNESCO’s
> Initiative B at bel which seeks to promote multilingualism in cyberspace
> and preserve endangered languages.
>
> Recently, Aimée was in Nepal carrying out independent research on
> endangered languages. She seized the opportunity to use the handbook
> and field test its effectiveness.
>
> The handbook, entitled “Language Preservation and Documentation
> Handbook: South Asia version”, provides a methodology for native
> speakers of endangered languages to record their languages for
> posterity. The project was inspired by requests from several members
> of
> ethnic minorities in Nepal who were interested in self documenting
> their languages. For many ethnic groups, assimilation and other
> processes have lead to the decline of indigenous culture as well as
> their languages and knowledge systems. UNESCO would like to see this
> rich human heritage preserved.
>
> The handbook guides the reader through the process of collecting
> linguistic data on one’s endangered language in the absence of a
> linguist, as well as stories which are an important part of the
> heritage of the community. The document begins with a questionnaire
> covering background information on the language community, followed
> by
> advice on creating a writing system, and lists of key words. It then
> guidelines them in recording and transcribing stories, and concludes
> with material on various aspects of the grammar of the language,
> through questionnaires and translation exercises. Oral recordings of
> the languages are also an important part of this exercise.
>
> Here are some of the impressions of Aimée Lahaussois’ first
> experience
> with the handbook:
>
> “Working with a young speaker of an endangered language reinforced
> for
> me what documentation is all about, and why it is important to
> provide
> tools so native speakers can carry out their own documentation: after
> three weeks of excellent work with a very talented and enthusiastic
> speaker, I tried to pay him as compensation for the time and energy
> he
> put into our sessions, thinking this would be welcome, as life is
> particularly difficult for students in a developing country. I was
> moved when he refused the money, citing that it was I who deserved
> compensation as I was doing his community the enormous favour of
> making
> sure their language was recorded and preserved. Clearly there is a
> great need for efforts such as this.”
>
> It is hoped that the results will not only provide a record of the
> language, as spoken by native speakers, but will also stimulate
> renewed
> community-wide interest in the language, which may in turn reduce the
> rate at which languages are being lost.
>
> Indeed, a great many minority languages are disappearing around the
> world and those which disappear without a trace represent a great
> loss
> of cultural heritage. One critical reason is that they are not being
> passed on to the younger generations. Some of the causes include
> pressure on children to use national languages, unavailability of
> education in the language spoken at home, migration away from the
> homeland amongst others. Often, only older speakers are left and when
> they disappear, so do these languages. In the case of languages with
> no
> written form which have not been documented, no trace remains of what
> was once a vibrant and unique language and culture.
>
> A CD-ROM and print version of this handbook will be published by the
> end
> of September.
>
> 11/08/2004
>
>
> ----- End message from cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU -----


From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG  Fri Aug 13 17:05:31 2004
From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit)
Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2004 10:05:31 -0700
Subject: Sacred Use Not Abuse
Message-ID: <FRI.13.AUG.2004.100531.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Some Fun Items For You

http://www.ncidc.org/tupe/trad.htm

Word Search!
Find the words hidden right to left, backwards, and diagonal! Can you
find them all?


Confidential Tobacco Survey-Please take a moment and fill out this
simple, short, and confidential survey! Your participation is very much
appreciated!!

Download posters and graphics! For non-commercial use only, please!


Tons of information also available @:
http://www.ncidc.org/tupe/tobaccolinks.htm


From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Mon Aug 16 16:52:11 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 10:52:11 -0600
Subject: Lipan Centennial, Elk Springs: Sept 4th & 5th
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.105211.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Nzu

The Lipan Apache People at Mescalero are having a Centennial Celebration commemorating their arrival in Mescalero on the Saturday and Sunday of Labor Day week-end, September 4th & 5th. All the Tribes are invited, and drum groups and dancers are encouraged to contact Lipan Elder Meredith Begay at 505.585.1258. 

Please call In the Afternoon, after 2 pm,  on Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays, or anytime during the day Tuesdays or Thursdays or on the week-ends. She has an answering machine, so leave a message if she isn't there and she will call you back. 

If people on this list are on other Native lists, can you please share the invitation? 

Thanks, 

Mia Kalish, 
Lipan Centennial Committee
for: Meredith Ma'iush Begay, Chairwoman


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/80c48c5e/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Ivy.gif
Type: image/gif
Size: 5665 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/80c48c5e/attachment.gif>

From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Mon Aug 16 17:01:35 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 11:01:35 -0600
Subject: No subject
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.110135.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Nzu

The Lipan Apache People at Mescalero are having a Centennial Celebration commemorating their arrival in Mescalero on the Saturday and Sunday of Labor Day week-end, September 4th & 5th. All the Tribes are invited, and drum groups and dancers are encouraged to contact Lipan Elder Meredith Begay at 505.585.1258. 

Please call In the Afternoon, after 2 pm,  on Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays, or anytime during the day Tuesdays or Thursdays or on the week-ends. She has an answering machine, so leave a message if she isn't there and she will call you back. 

If people on this list are on other Native lists, can you please share the invitation? 

Thanks, 

Mia Kalish, 
Lipan Centennial Committee
for: Meredith Ma'iush Begay, Chairwoman

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/907a350d/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Ivy.gif
Type: image/gif
Size: 5665 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/907a350d/attachment.gif>

From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Mon Aug 16 17:15:46 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 11:15:46 -0600
Subject: Lipan Centennial Web Site
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.111546.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Nzu. 

I forgot to mention that there is a website with all kinds of information for the Centennial, from directions to the site, where to get good car service and medical care, and local things to do. 

it is at: www.LearningForPeople.us/Lipan. 

best, 
Mia 

Sorry for the double posting. . . 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/9a10b1f1/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Ivy.gif
Type: image/gif
Size: 5665 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/9a10b1f1/attachment.gif>

From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug 16 17:41:40 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 10:41:40 -0700
Subject: United States considered the place `where languages come to die'
 (fwd)
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.104140.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Posted on Mon, Aug. 16, 2004

United States considered the place `where languages come to die'

BY GWENDOLYN DRISCOLL
The Orange County Register
http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/news/nation/9413651.htm

SANTA ANA, Calif. - (KRT) - To become one of the last living speakers of
the Acjachemen language, you first have to pass an unusual test.

Ka`chi Lobo Golden, the ceremonial teacher and "Revealer" of the San
Juan Capistrano, Calif.-based Acjachemen tribe, will sit on a hill near
her home and "release" your name into the wind. She will wait six days
for a response.

"If the wind says yes, I will teach."

For a tribe such as the Acjachemen, a scattered and as-yet federally
unrecognized group of approximately 3,000 Orange County American
Indians, such mysticism may seem a lackadaisical response to a pressing
dilemma: the extinction of their language.

Golden, however, is phlegmatic.

"I'm the last Mohican," she said, referring to her status as the last
living speaker of the Acjachemen language. "But I come from the
knowledge that nothing is ever lost. It just goes into the belly of
Earth Mother for a time."

Golden instructs a few students every year in the Acjachemen "spiritual"
language, a derivative of the Acjachemen common tongue that is used
mostly for ceremonial and spiritual purposes. Her efforts, and those of
a handful of others within and outside the tribe, may determine the
life or death of Orange County's first - and currently smallest -
language group.

It also illustrates the difficulty of preserving language in a nation
that linguists often grimly refer to as the "language cemetery."

"The United States is where languages come to die," said Rosemary Feal,
Executive Director of the Modern Language Association. "We often see
the first generation speaks (a language) but by the third generation
their children may know only a few words."

Different factors contribute to the loss of languages, including
migration, economics and the pressure to fit in, Feal said.

In the case of Acjachemen, racist attitudes in existence since the time
of first contact - the arrival of the Spanish in California in the 16th
century - are responsible for the steady erosion of native language,
according to Damien Shilo, chairman of the Acjachemen Nation Tribal
Council. In the mid-1800s a bounty encouraged white settlers to hunt
and kill American Indians, prompting many Acjachemen people to speak
Spanish and adopt Mexican names. California - once one of the most
linguistically diverse places in the world - lost up to 70 percent of
its native languages in the process.

"Your language and your culture had to be pushed underground, because to
openly admit that was a death sentence," Shilo said.

By the 1980s, as the last native speakers approached their 90s, many
tribes launched language revitalization programs to save what remained
of Navajo, Comanche, Creek and other native languages. California
tribes were aided by the discovery in the Smithsonian Institution of
notes and taped recordings of fluent speakers made in the 1930s by
famed linguist John Peabody Harrington. But the Acjachemen, embroiled
in a decades-long quest for federal recognition and riven by tribal
squabbles, say they do not have the resources to devote to learning
their mother tongue.

"So much energy is taken by this tribe trying to define themselves,"
said Micael Merrifield, a professor of anthropology at Saddleback
College who is writing a book about the tribe. "They don't have time to
organize a whole, structured language learning program."

A "dead" language may be a liability for the Acjachemen, who currently
stand second in line in the arduous process of federal recognition.
Some within the tribe say that the lack of a living language makes it
easier for the government to deny their existence. Others play down the
issue, noting that even federally recognized tribes are struggling to
preserve their languages.

In the meantime, well-meaning - if not always well-funded or organized -
volunteers try to fill the gap.

Ka`chi Golden teaches language through traditional song.

Kelina Lobo, a University of Arizona graduate student, conducted a
statistical comparison between the Acjachemen and the related Luiseno
language.

She drew on living dictionaries such as Marguerite Lobo, 89, who
remembers her mother speaking "Indian."

Her brother, Wick, 70, preserves a handwritten "Lobo Lexicon" compiled
in 1937 by his late sister, Viola, of 212 phonetically spelled
Acjachemen words.

"We need to find somebody who can speak it fluently and have classes,"
said Wick Lobo. "If we can reach a critical mass of speakers, it's
conceivable that in the next 20 years, our language will rise again."

---

© 2004, The Orange County Register (Santa Ana, Calif.).


From sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug 16 18:59:44 2004
From: sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Susan D Penfield)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 11:59:44 -0700
Subject: Fwd: Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy now posted on the
 web
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.115944.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>








----- Forwarded message from ssachs at iupui.edu -----
    Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2004 15:48:14 -0500
    From: "Stephen M. Sachs" <ssachs at iupui.edu>
Reply-To: "Stephen M. Sachs" <ssachs at iupui.edu>
 Subject: Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy now posted on the web
      Aho Kola!

The Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy, focusing on
international indigenous developments, is now posted on the web at
http://www.indigenouspolicy.org. The archive of  past issues of IPJ,
and its predecessor, Native American Policy, is being developed and
is partly available now (August 13).

We welcome articles, news, media information and announcements
relating to American Indian and international indigenous policy.

Walk in beauty.

Warmly,
Steve
Stephen Sachs
Coordinating Editor

----- End forwarded message -----
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/91eeeac0/attachment.html>

From HeitshuS at U.LIBRARY.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug 16 20:17:11 2004
From: HeitshuS at U.LIBRARY.ARIZONA.EDU (Heitshu, Sara)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 13:17:11 -0700
Subject: Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy now posted on the w
 eb
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.131711.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Susan,
I am having this cataloged for the library, the periodical, I mean.  It
looks like fall 2003 is available online as well.  I hope it will continue
to appear online.

Sara

Sara C. Heitshu
Librarian, Social Science Team
American Indian Studies, Linguistics, Anthropology
heitshus at u.library.arizona.edu
520-621-2297
fax 520-621-9733
University of Arizona Main Library
PO Box 210055
Tucson, AZ 85721-0055

-----Original Message-----
From: Susan D Penfield [mailto:sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU]
Sent: Monday, August 16, 2004 12:00 PM
To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
Subject: Fwd: Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy now posted on the
web








----- Forwarded message from ssachs at iupui.edu -----
    Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2004 15:48:14 -0500
    From: "Stephen M. Sachs" <ssachs at iupui.edu>
Reply-To: "Stephen M. Sachs" <ssachs at iupui.edu>
 Subject: Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy now posted on the web
      Aho Kola!

The Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy, focusing on
international indigenous developments, is now posted on the web at
http://www.indigenouspolicy.org. The archive of  past issues of IPJ,
and its predecessor, Native American Policy, is being developed and
is partly available now (August 13).

We welcome articles, news, media information and announcements
relating to American Indian and international indigenous policy.

Walk in beauty.

Warmly,
Steve
Stephen Sachs
Coordinating Editor

----- End forwarded message -----


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Tue Aug 17 16:54:33 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Tue, 17 Aug 2004 09:54:33 -0700
Subject: Lyrical Indian Tongue Thrives in Paraguay (fwd)
Message-ID: <TUE.17.AUG.2004.095433.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Lyrical Indian Tongue Thrives in Paraguay
Mon Aug 16, 2004 10:24 AM ET

By Mary Milliken
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=ourWorldNews&storyID=5986825

ASUNCION, Paraguay (Reuters) - A ring in the Guarani language translates
literally as "a companion of the finger," while an airplane is "a bird
with hard wings that flies" and a telephone is "a line that permits one
to speak from afar."

Every phrase evokes the beauty of South America's jungles and plains and
the ways of the indigenous peoples that populated them. Some say it is
a language stuck in time warp, from an era when Guarani women wooed
Spanish colonizers with their sing-song tongue.

But Guarani is alive and kicking, changing and evolving. And that is
because it is the only Indian language in the Americas designated as an
official language.

In 1992, Paraguay reformed its Constitution to make Spanish and Guarani
the two official languages of the landlocked nation of 5.6 million
mostly mixed race people.

Now there is a new champion for the bilingual cause -- President Nicanor
Duarte Frutos, an avid Guarani speaker who is called "tendota" or
supreme chief in Guarani. He used it on the campaign trail in last
year's election to charm voters, appealing to their love of the "teta"
or fatherland.

But this newfound hope for Guarani has also fueled the debate over the
role of an indigenous language in a rapidly modernizing Latin America,
where English and other foreign languages are making inroads with
students anxious to participate in the world.

"Since it was officially recognized, the language has certainly
prospered," said Marta Lafuente, Paraguay's vice minister of education.

"But there has also been resistance. Some say the consolidation of
Guarani means we will end up just talking among ourselves."

The language survived a 35-year dictatorship under Gen. Alfredo
Stroessner, who banned Guarani and reinforced its reputation as the
tongue of country bumpkins. Parents would speak Guarani to each other,
but scolded their children when they tried to do the same.

Today nearly everyone in Paraguay speaks some Guarani, no matter the
social class or education level. It is the dominant language in rural
Paraguay, but its also can be heard on most every street corner in the
capital, Asuncion.

No indigenous language in the Americas can boast such a broad following.
Quechua in Peru or Mayan in Central America and Mexico are rarely
spoken by non-Indians, while languages of the Indian tribes in the
United States are increasingly limited to the elders.

TO LOVE AND TO SCOLD

Duarte Frutos was education minister in 1994 when Paraguay began its
reform to provide bilingual education. Ten years on, educators and
linguists express a certain frustration with the results.

They say the debate has centered too much around vocabulary, like what
to call objects of the modern age. The so-called purists insist on
creating words while the other school is more in favor of "borrowing"
words from Spanish.

Television is a case in point. Almost every language in the world has a
word that is like television, but in Guarani it is "the object that
moves."

"They want to invent Guarani all over again," said linguist and diplomat
Ruben Bareiro Saguier, a pioneer of bilingual Paraguay. "We need a
Guarani that is useful."

Educators also have to overcome a history of discrimination against
Guarani speakers. Many parents in Guarani-speaking homes oppose
schooling for their children in their mother tongue and want only
Spanish, the language they think will take their offspring out of
poverty and illiteracy.

The backers of bilingualism also say Paraguay has yet to put Guarani in
all instances of public service, for example on street signs, court
rooms or documents. Guarani-speakers need to know they can always have
a trial or receive advanced medical care in their first language.

But professionals from the middle and upper classes are increasingly
aware of the need to be fluent in Guarani and even foreigners working
in Paraguay feel compelled to learn.

"Guarani is the soul or spirit of Paraguay. If we don't understand
Guarani, we don't understand Paraguay or its people," said Yoshikazu
Furukawa, consul at the Japanese Embassy in Asuncion.

Indeed, Guarani is the basis of Paraguay's rich oral culture and is best
suited for romance, relationships, family life and community
integration.

"It is a language for loving and for scolding," said Lafuente.

It was love that allowed Guarani to survive after the Spanish
conquistadores came to this isolated and distant heart of South America
without women from home.

Unlike many mestizos in colonial times, the offspring of the Spanish
with the Guarani women earned special rights to hold public office. And
for these love children, it was the mother tongue that mattered.

(Additional reporting by Daniela Desantis)


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Tue Aug 17 18:31:46 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Tue, 17 Aug 2004 11:31:46 -0700
Subject: Lexique Pro 2.0 release (fwd announcement)
Message-ID: <TUE.17.AUG.2004.113146.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

fwd from the "Lexicographylist"...

From: "Richard Margetts" <richard_margetts at sil.org>
Date: August 17, 2004 7:47:23 AM MST
To: <lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com>
Subject: [Lexicog]  Lexique Pro - software for viewing/distributing
lexicon data
Reply-To: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com

This is to announce the release of Lexique Pro 2.0.

Lexique Pro is an interactive lexicon viewer, with hyperlinks between
entries, category views, dictionary reversal, search and export tools.
It
can be configured to display your Toolbox/Shoebox database in a
user-friendly format so that you can distribute it to others.

It's available at www.lexiquepro.com. Here you can find a summary of
features, screenshots, as well as downloads.

You are free to use and distribute it with your lexicon data. It is
approved
as SIL experimental software and listed on the SIL software catalog
website.

Hope it can be useful.

-----
Richard Margetts
SIL Mali


From Rrlapier at AOL.COM  Tue Aug 17 22:11:10 2004
From: Rrlapier at AOL.COM (Rrlapier at AOL.COM)
Date: Tue, 17 Aug 2004 18:11:10 EDT
Subject: Blackfeet History Conference
Message-ID: <TUE.17.AUG.2004.181110.EDT.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Please Forward


Nitawahsin-nanni (Our Land) History Conference

The Piegan Institute will hold a one-day history conference Nitawahsin-nanni 
(Our Land) which will examine Blackfeet land use practices and the ancestral 
landscape on Friday, August 20, 2004 at the Nizipuhwahsin School in Browning 
from 10:00am to 4:00PM. The conference is free and open to the public.

The conference will be moderated by Darrell Robes Kipp, Executive Director of 
Piegan Institute, and feature presenters who will discuss land use practices, 
the ancestral landscape and places of significance to the Blackfeet in 
present day Alberta and Montana.

Narcisse Blood and Francis First Charger from the Kainai Studies Department 
at Red Crow College, Alberta will discuss their on-going project on Blackfeet 
place names and developing a map of the Blackfeet landscape. 

Gerald A. Oetelaar and Joy Oetelaar from the Department of Archaeology at the 
University of Calgary will discuss the lost landscape of the Blackfeet and 
understanding Blackfoot perceptions and uses of the landscape on the Northern 
Plains.

Glen Still Smoking, a graduate student in the Anthropology Department at the 
University of Montana will discuss Blackfeet uses of pisskan or buffalo jumps 
across ancestral Blackfeet territory.

Piegan Institute is a private not-for-profit organization with programs 
dedicated to researching, promoting and preserving the Blackfeet  language. This 
conference is co-sponsored by the O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West 
and the Native American Studies Department at the University of Montana. 

For more information on the conference or directions to Nizipuhwahsin please 
call Rosalyn LaPier at 406-338-3518 or rrlapier at pieganinstitute.org.





Rosalyn LaPier
Piegan Institute
www.pieganinstitute.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040817/99483792/attachment.html>

From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Wed Aug 18 18:30:07 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Wed, 18 Aug 2004 11:30:07 -0700
Subject: Technology-Enhanced Language Revitalization
Message-ID: <WED.18.AUG.2004.113007.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

tá’c haláXp!
(good day)

I am announcing a newly created website: Technology-Enhanced Language
Revitalization.

http://projects.ltc.arizona.edu/gates/TELR.html

The goal of Technology-Enhanced Language Revitalization (@ the
university of arizona) is to establish an informational resource for
community language specialists, advocates, and linguists centering on
the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) in language
revitalization.

Feel free to distribute this announcement!  We also ask for your kind
comments on the content and structure of this website as we continue to
update, improve, and add information.

qe’ciyéewy’ew,
(thank you)

Phil Cash Cash (Cayuse/Nez Perce)
Ph.d in the Joint Program in Anthropology and Linguistics
University of Arizona, Tucson
mailto: cashcash at u.arizona.edu
http://www.u.arizona.edu/~cashcash

ps: thank you Bill and Melinda Gates.


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Thu Aug 19 15:53:58 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2004 08:53:58 -0700
Subject: Inuit researchers to give more information to Inuit (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.19.AUG.2004.085358.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

August 20, 2004

Inuit researchers to give more information to Inuit
Language, history and culture top Inuit Studies Conference agenda
http://www.nunatsiaq.com/news/nunavut/40820_10.html

NUNATSIAQ NEWS

How to communicate research results and information to Inuit: that's
what brought 100 or so academics, researchers and bureaucrats to the
14th International Inuit Studies Conference this week in Calgary.

The conference at the Arctic Institute of North America, which wrapped
us last week, focused on Bringing knowledge home: communicating
research to the Inuit.

Participants from Canada, the U.S., Greenland, Russia and France,
discussed how knowledge can cross from one culture to the next, the
ways Inuit and Qallunaat communicate and how to make sure the results
of community-based research reach communities.

Research papers presented at the conference included a look back at the
Watkins Gospel Selections, the first book published in Inuktitut
syllabics.

Iqaluit businessman, author and historian Kenn Harper spoke about the
missionaries' early efforts to develop literacy for missionary purposes
among Inuit.

Harper tells how the syllabic writing system invented for the Cree was
first introduced to the Inuit in 1855 by Rev. E.A. Watkins at Fort
George and Little Whale River on the James Bay and Hudson Bay coasts.

In that same year, Watkins prepared a small book of gospel selections in
syllabics and sent it to Rev. John Horden in Moose Factory who printed
it on his mission press.

This small book, says Harper, is one of the earliest items printed on
Horden's press and the only one that was printed in Inuktitut. Only one
copy is known to have survived.

The use of Inuktitut languages as a means of communication in today's
North was also on the conference's program, with Eva Aariak, Nunavut's
official languages commissioner, speaking about "How will Nunavut speak
to the future? Changes to Nunavut's Official Languages Act."

Several Greenlanders, including Carl "Puju" Olsen, were at the
conference to speak about Greenland's language policy review and the
need for more Greenlandic terminology, that is, more specialized,
modern words.

Bolatta Vahl from the Greenland Language Secretariat says Greenlandic
needs to develop more terminology because many Greenlanders, who study
in Danish, can "better express their knowledge of the subject in
Danish, even though they have Greenlandic as their mother tongue."

Representatives from ArcticNet, the new environmental ship-board
research project, the Nasivvik centre for environmental health and the
Nunavik Research Centre also told how they communicate information to
Inuit.

Several researchers highlighted their experience using the Internet and
new technology as communication tools for projects including "Healthy
living in Nunavut," a new on-line nutrition course for health workers
in Nunavut, an Alaskan CD-ROM called the "People Awakening Project,"
which encourages sobriety, and "When the weather is Uggianaqtuq," Shari
Fox Gearheard's CD-ROM that uses interactive, multimedia technology to
document and communicate Inuit knowledge about the environment in two
Nunavut communities.

Norman Cohn and Zacharias Kunuk from Igloolik Isuma Productions spoke
about the art of community-base filmmaking and its role in
communication.

"We create traditional artifacts, digital multimedia and
desperately-needed jobs in the same activity."

>From the Siberian Far East region of Kamchatka, Nina Belomestnova gave
an impassioned defence of how newspaper articles promote the culture,
language and well-being of the small indigenous population of Evenks.

How to get information from archives and bring this to the public was
also discussed, with several researchers interested in the history of
Panniqtuuq's former St. Luke's Hospital.


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Thu Aug 19 15:56:38 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2004 08:56:38 -0700
Subject: Africa's indigenous-language press is focus of new study (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.19.AUG.2004.085638.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Africa's indigenous-language press is focus of new study
Aug 19, 2004
http://www.ijnet.org/FE_Article/newsarticle.asp?UILang=1&CId=241571&CIdLang=1

African media academics and publishers are invited to submit research
papers on the current status and future potential of the continent's
indigenous-language press.

The University of Lagos project is designed to highlight the history of
indigenous-language newspapers and journals in Africa, beginning with
the earliest known indigenous-language newspaper in Nigeria, Iwe Irohin
Fun Awon Ara Egba ati Yoruba, first published in 1859.

The initiative will also chart possible growth strategies for the
indigenous-language press. They plan to explore the reasons behind the
phenomenal boom in isiZulu newspapers in South Africa over the past two
years.

Abiodun Salawu, a lecturer at the University of Lagos and the project's
coordinator, says scholars have neglected the study of Africa's
indigenous language press despite the fact that language is one of the
most characteristic elements of any culture.

Organizers are looking for papers on the following topics: the history
of specific indigenous language publications in Africa; editorial
content policies and strategies; advertisements, graphics and design;
language styles; use for development communication; readership; and
management. Interested researchers should send abstracts outlining
their proposed papers before submitting any finished work.

For more information, contact Salawu at salawuabiodun at yahoo.com or
telephone (+234-802) 345-1461.


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Thu Aug 19 22:47:17 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2004 15:47:17 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.19.AUG.2004.154717.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.


From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US  Fri Aug 20 13:57:12 2004
From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 07:57:12 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.075712.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Once again, as with these kinds of studies, it's a deficit grammar
postulated ("primitive tribe unable to count because of their
language!").  To the degree which this study is accurate, (I'm always
amazed as to how often they turn out to not in fact be accurate), it is
simply showing a culture that has not found a compelling reason to
count, so, not surprisingly, adults are not good at it, and, not
surprisingly, the lexical items are absent in the language.  The article
notes that children in the tribe are able to learn to count, but does
not mention whether they are doing so in the tribe's native language or
Portuguese--that would be a useful detail.  At any rate, give these
people a compelling reason to count, and they will do so, in their own
language--they will borrow a number system from another language if one
is not created using native roots.  The lack of lexical items in the
language is explained by the lack of the tradition of counting, not the
other way around.

These kinds of articles are frequently cited by those who believe it's
useless to preserve indigenous languages--"their language prevents them
from COUNTING."  It seems that the battle to prove that indigenous
languages limit thinking never ends.

phil cash cash wrote:

>Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
>http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
>
>Contact: Diane Dobry
>dd173 at columbia.edu
>212-678-3979
>Teachers College, Columbia University
>
>Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
>perception
>
>Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
>(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
>contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
>During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
>theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
>But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
>simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
>
>No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
>Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
>Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
>the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
>fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
>beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
>to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
>connotation of singleness in other languages.
>
>What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
>that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
>said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
>another affects how an individual perceives reality."
>
>When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
>small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
>tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
>performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
>dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
>performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
>performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
>increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
>near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
>Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
>perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
>then match to corresponding groups.
>
>According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
>above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
>trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
>understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
>using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
>larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
>students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
>skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
>birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
>studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
>to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
>noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
>Piraha children did not.
>
>While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
>refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
>tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
>quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
>their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
>to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
>
>The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
>designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
>quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
>general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
>Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
>certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
>possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
>nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
>Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
>language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
>together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
>
>###
>
>
>Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
>the journal Science.
>
>Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
>nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
>is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
>World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
>graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
>please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
>
>
>


From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US  Fri Aug 20 14:02:33 2004
From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 08:02:33 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.080233.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.

I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...



phil cash cash wrote:

>Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
>http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
>
>Contact: Diane Dobry
>dd173 at columbia.edu
>212-678-3979
>Teachers College, Columbia University
>
>Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
>perception
>
>Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
>(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
>contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
>During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
>theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
>But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
>simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
>
>No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
>Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
>Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
>the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
>fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
>beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
>to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
>connotation of singleness in other languages.
>
>What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
>that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
>said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
>another affects how an individual perceives reality."
>
>When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
>small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
>tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
>performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
>dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
>performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
>performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
>increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
>near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
>Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
>perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
>then match to corresponding groups.
>
>According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
>above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
>trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
>understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
>using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
>larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
>students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
>skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
>birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
>studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
>to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
>noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
>Piraha children did not.
>
>While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
>refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
>tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
>quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
>their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
>to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
>
>The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
>designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
>quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
>general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
>Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
>certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
>possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
>nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
>Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
>language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
>together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
>
>###
>
>
>Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
>the journal Science.
>
>Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
>nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
>is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
>World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
>graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
>please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
>
>
>


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Fri Aug 20 16:48:07 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 09:48:07 -0700
Subject: Native Curriculum Makes Learning Relevant (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.094807.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Native Curriculum Makes Learning Relevant

By rob mcmahon
Publish Date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.straight.com/content.cfm?id=4486

[photo inset - Erin Bolton, a grade 9 student in Cameron Hill's class,
writes down notes about her chosen plant, skunk cabbage, in her field
notebook. Photo: Simone Westgarth]

The Gitga'at community of Hartley Bay is located 145 kilometres
southeast of Prince Rupert. The school there houses just 55 students
from kindergarten to Grade 12. Tiny and remote, with a close
relationship with the local Tsimshian band council, Hartley Bay is
perfectly suited for an experiment in a new style of teaching.

Instead of taking notes from a chalkboard, First Nations students at
Hartley Bay learn from their elders by visiting members of the
community to learn the traditional names and uses of plants. By
interviewing local authorities, the students discover how
blueberries--or smmaay, as they are known in the Tsimshian language,
Sm'algyax--can be eaten during feasts or used to dye clothes or treat
diabetes. Each fact is carefully recorded in a field notebook, which is
then used to create a summary of the plant that incorporates both
scientific and aboriginal-based knowledge.

"One year I went out with the kids as they interviewed elders," said
Judy Thompson, a First Nations instructor and curriculum developer
working at Hartley Bay school. "Some were scared and didn't feel like
it. Some found out their aunties and uncles and the elders knew a lot."

Thompson, who is Tahltan, created a series of six lesson plans on
traditional plant knowledge for students at Hartley Bay. In it, she
outlined a series of exercises that teach the youth to become
researchers. Each student was assigned a culturally important plant,
and then went into the community to learn about it. Along with the
traditional, botanical, and common names of each plant, they recorded
whether it was used for food, medicinal, material, or ceremonial
purposes, eventually creating a Gitga'at plant booklet. Results have
been encouraging. Thompson remembered one student who returned after
interviewing the chief's wife.

"It was first thing in the morning, and her eyes were so bright,"
Thompson said. "She said, 'I didn't know yew wood was so important.' "

Hartley Bay principal Ernie Hill, who is also a hereditary chief,
stressed the importance of such knowledge. "As First Nations people, we
have to know ourselves," Hill said. "If you do that, you can have a
better chance of success."

Although multicultural education in the past has attempted to do this,
some researchers are coming to the conclusion that it has not gone far
enough.

Statistics from B.C.'s Ministry of Education state that in the 2001-02
school year, more than four times as many nonaboriginal students passed
the mathematics 12 provincial exam compared with aboriginal students.

First Nations curriculum developer Veronica Ignas said that this is
partly because aboriginal and nonaboriginal students see the world
differently. Classes like mathematics and science, as they are usually
taught, focus on abstract concepts that are divorced from daily
experience. This approach can be difficult for aboriginal people, who
often have a world-view that is more connected to concrete
manifestations of nature.

"Students are motivated and do best if the information they're taught is
relevant," Ignas said.

Rather than look at this difference in perception, Ignas said,
multicultural education typically focuses on the "four Ds": diet,
dress, dance, and dialect. What is needed, she argued, is a more
fundamental acceptance of alternative ways of knowing.

"Research says that meaningful differences go beyond just infusing
content [with the four D's]," she said. "We need to say there's a
different way of thinking about the land and the people's relationship
with it."

Now, a handful of schools in rural towns like Hartley Bay and Gitxaa_a
are working with researchers from UVic and UBC to integrate traditional
ecological knowledge (TEK) into their curriculum.

UBC anthropologist Charles Menzies has been working four-and-a-half
years with Ignas, Thompson, and other academics and First Nations
representatives on Forests for the Future, a project that collects TEK
for use in both resource management and education. Menzies's project
stems from recent attempts by researchers to give something back to the
communities they study.

Traditionally, anthropologists visited a community, extracted the
information they needed, and left. This expropriation of knowledge is
now recognized by some as being just as problematic as the removal of
gold and other physical resources during the colonial era.

Now, researchers such as Menzies are trying to change this process by
returning the information they collect in the form of educational
resources such as those developed by Ignas and Thompson.

"People are trying to be more responsive to the community they work
with," Ignas said. "[They also] want to make sure the information
collected doesn't sit in a static filing cabinet somewhere, but [as]
curriculum goes back into the community."

Menzies is supervising the creation of seven unit plans by Ignas,
Thompson, and others to be used as learning resources for teachers.

Simply put, traditional ecological knowledge is an ever-evolving body of
knowledge about the environment and its relationship with human beings
that is passed down through generations.

In a typical class, community elders teach the children about the ways
of living that have been passed down in the community for centuries.
Within the Tsimshian world, humans have social relationships with
plants and animals.

"It's a different way of making sense of the natural world," Ignas said.
"You need to cross the bridge between abstract understanding and their
more 'hands-on' learning."

For example, in math class students learn the different Tsimshian ways
of counting (people, long objects, people inside a canoe, size of
animal catches, and general). As well as learning their Latin names and
scientific characteristics, students discover traditional names and
medical and ritual uses of plants.

Some critics argue about the validity of TEK, because it is inherently
different than western science. Being based on oral testimony and
holistic in nature, it has also faced opposition from scientists.

Today, TEK is becoming more widespread in fields such as
natural-resource management. Starting in the 1980s, it began to be used
in fisheries management as a complementary source of knowledge to that
gathered by western-trained biologists.

Part of this process is due to a realization that science does not have
all the answers, at least with respect to managing natural resources.

"Past practices have proven that science is not the be all and end all,"
said John Lewis, chief treaty negotiator for the Gitxaa_a First Nation.
Lewis has been trying to incorporate TEK within local resource
management since 2001. "At the end of the day, you have to look at what
science-based management has done to our resources since [European]
contact."

For example, in B.C. federal fisheries management makes predictions of
how many salmon will arrive every year, forecasts that are based on
empirical evidence collected by biologists. However, the actual returns
often don't match these predictions.

In the 1980s and '90s, that system started to change.

"Fisheries began listening to what local-level fishermen were saying
[and finding] it was as good as or better than what the managers were
saying," Menzies said.

When applying TEK, a fisherman would watch a particular fishing spot for
years, observing when the salmon arrive and then acting on his
observations. By accumulating this observational evidence over decades,
and sometimes generations, a body of traditional ecological knowledge
is formed and can be used to predict the levels and activities of fish
in a given area. Variables such as shifting weather patterns or other
environmental changes are observed by the fisherman and noted with
regards to their effect on the fish population. By using such
long-range data, the TEK can sometimes be more effective in predicting
salmon stocks than biological data, which is often collected during
intermittent field research trips over a short period of time.

Even though scientists were skeptical of the storytelling format of TEK,
when collected and distilled into a form of data that can be
manipulated in the same way scientific field data is, it became easier
for them to use.

"When you incorporate and mesh science-based managerial systems with
local and traditional knowledge...it gives you more tools to manage the
resources," Lewis said.

TEK has also gained popularity due to an increased desire on the part of
government to include First Nations groups in the decision-making
processes that affect their lives.

"[First Nations people] see TEK as a validation of what they know,"
Menzies said. "But it's also something they can take to the table in
negotiations...TEK demonstrates their ability to manage their own
resources."

Now that some scientists are validating the claims made by TEK, it is
being used more commonly and has found its way into schools like
Hartley Bay.

All of the TEK-based curriculum is designed to fit into the mainstream
school system. In order to do this, each lesson plan is designed to fit
with the province's "prescribed learning outcomes".

For example, Ignas's unit Two Ways of Knowing: Traditional Ecological
Knowledge and Scientific Knowledge fits the province's prescribed
learning outcome "describe how scientific principles are applied in
technology." To assist teachers, each lesson plan includes a list of
its corresponding learning outcomes.

However, even with relatively simple integration within the provincial
system, it is up to the judgment of individual teachers to actually use
the material. The Ministry of Education currently allows educational
professionals to select their own learning resources, as long as the
material passes a formal evaluation process at the provincial or the
district level and fits within the learning outcomes set by the
province. This system, which has been in place since 1989, is designed
to allow schools more autonomy to choose resources that meet their
individual needs.

Since there are relatively few First Nations teachers, the more
nonaboriginal teachers who attempt to integrate the curriculum, the
better.

Yet it can be hard for western-trained teachers to impart indigenous
knowledge, both politically and conceptually. They must be taught to
look at the world in a new way, which can be difficult, so alternative
learning sources often sit on the shelves, unused.

Peter Freeman is a nonaboriginal teacher who integrated TEK curriculum
in his science classes at Charles Hays secondary school in Prince
Rupert. Although he felt the material was more applicable to
communities such as Hartley Bay that have more direct access to the
environment, he said it was still useful. Freeman's classes held
discussions on the pros and cons of traditional knowledge, and students
were generally interested in the material.

"Some of the students may know and understand a lot more than I do, and
they enlighten all of us," Freeman said.

A big part of incorporating TEK into the classroom is gaining the
acceptance and respect of the community--something that can be
difficult for an outsider.

"You have to prove to the people that you know and understand and are
empathetic to traditional education," Hill said. "If you get elder
approval, it'll be okay...That's the way it should be."

As well as gaining acceptance from the community, teachers are often
afraid to use First Nations material because of concerns over political
correctness. However, Menzies said that feeling bad about the effects
of colonization should not be an issue.

"I don't know how making me feel guilty will make the world a better
place," he said. By using a prepackaged learning resource, Menzies
said, the worry is gone. "[A teacher] would just grab it, open it up,
and work with it," he said, adding that mainstream society has much to
learn from incorporating this kind of material into regular schools. "I
want to see beyond First Nations," he said.

For example, when studying Canadian history, students focus on the story
of the nation from a strictly European point of view. There is a
profound lack of any sense of the past as seen by the country's First
Nations, Menzies said.

"The lack of awareness in society is really strong."

By sharing ways of perceiving the world, Hill said he thought that
education could help these groups reconcile what has been, at times, a
difficult relationship.

"Maybe these little courses give a little bit of understanding, rather
than the stereotypical view that seems to exist out there."


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Fri Aug 20 17:18:50 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 10:18:50 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <41260479.1000707@luna.cc.nm.us>
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.101850.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

the deficit view, whether intentional or not, really does a deservice to
humanity in general as smaller minds grasp for understanding.

"Brazil Tribe Has Great Excuse for Poor Math Skills"
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=570&ncid=753&e=6&u=/nm/20040819/sc_nm/science_counting_dc

phil
UofA

> ----- Message from mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US ---------
>     Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 08:02:33 -0600
>     From: Matthew Ward <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
> Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology
<ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how
language affects perception (fwd)
>       To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>
> I particularly like this sentence:
>
> "What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."
>
> The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is
> seen as evidence that some people just don't have the right
> stuff--gotta get those Portuguese-speakers in there to right the
> situation.
>
> I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
> showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate
> as Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
>
>
>
> phil cash cash wrote:
>
> >Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
> >http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
> >
> >Contact: Diane Dobry
> >dd173 at columbia.edu
> >212-678-3979
> >Teachers College, Columbia University
> >
> >Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
> affects
> >perception
> >
> >Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
> >(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose
> language
> >contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
> >During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
> >theory that language can determine the nature and content of
> thought.
> >But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
> >simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
> >
> >No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new
> findings by
> >Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
> >Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has
> spent
> >the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe
> of
> >fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
> >beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one"
> appears
> >to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the
> exact
> >connotation of singleness in other languages.
> >
> >What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> >right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
> >that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
> >said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
> >another affects how an individual perceives reality."
> >
> >When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to
> match
> >small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of
> the
> >tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
> >performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
> >dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to
> this
> >performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here,
> the
> >performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
> >increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance
> was
> >near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
> >Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
> >perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they
> could
> >then match to corresponding groups.
> >
> >According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set
> sizes
> >above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were
> actually
> >trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
> >understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
> >using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
> >larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as
> college
> >students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
> >skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants,
> monkeys,
> >birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
> >studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that
> seems
> >to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly,
> Gordon
> >noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
> >Piraha children did not.
> >
> >While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
> >refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of
> the
> >tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
> >quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition
> to
> >their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was
> found
> >to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
> >
> >The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
> >designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
> >quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist.
> In
> >general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to
> many
> >Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
> >certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
> >possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
> >nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
> >Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
> >language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
> >together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
> >
> >###
> >
> >
> >Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue
> of
> >the journal Science.
> >
> >Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
> >nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but
> it
> >is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
> >World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
> >graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
> >please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
> >
> >
> >
>
>
> ----- End message from mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US -----


From mshawaway at WSTRIBES.ORG  Fri Aug 20 19:25:45 2004
From: mshawaway at WSTRIBES.ORG (Myra Shawaway)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 12:25:45 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.122545.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


> I particularly like this sentence:
>
> "What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."
>
> The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
>
> I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
>
>
>
> phil cash cash wrote:
>
> >Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
> >http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
> >
> >Contact: Diane Dobry
> >dd173 at columbia.edu
> >212-678-3979
> >Teachers College, Columbia University
> >
> >Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
> >perception
> >
> >Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
> >(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
> >contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
> >During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
> >theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
> >But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
> >simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
> >
> >No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
> >Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
> >Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
> >the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
> >fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
> >beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
> >to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
> >connotation of singleness in other languages.
> >
> >What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> >right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
> >that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
> >said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
> >another affects how an individual perceives reality."
> >
> >When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
> >small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
> >tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
> >performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
> >dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
> >performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
> >performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
> >increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
> >near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
> >Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
> >perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
> >then match to corresponding groups.
> >
> >According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
> >above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
> >trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
> >understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
> >using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
> >larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
> >students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
> >skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
> >birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
> >studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
> >to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
> >noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
> >Piraha children did not.
> >
> >While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
> >refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
> >tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
> >quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
> >their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
> >to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
> >
> >The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
> >designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
> >quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
> >general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
> >Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
> >certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
> >possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
> >nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
> >Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
> >language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
> >together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
> >
> >###
> >
> >
> >Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
> >the journal Science.
> >
> >Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
> >nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
> >is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
> >World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
> >graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
> >please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
> >
> >
> >


From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US  Fri Aug 20 23:31:15 2004
From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 17:31:15 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.173115.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use
them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of
communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well
in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found
in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some
things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a
treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but
the past as well.

What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the
human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe
that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that
their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people
are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article
states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and
will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing,
which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.

The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive
quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of
research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of
language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't
possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.
 If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial
language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any
language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a
"primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined
to discover one.

Myra Shawaway wrote:

>Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
>a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
>languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
>concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
>environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
>have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
>grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
>natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
>of science and the outcomes.
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
>To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
>Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
>affects perception (fwd)
>
>
>
>
>>I particularly like this sentence:
>>
>>"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
>>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."
>>
>>The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
>>
>>
>evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
>Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
>
>
>>I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
>>
>>
>showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
>Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
>
>
>>
>>phil cash cash wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>>Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
>>>http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
>>>
>>>Contact: Diane Dobry
>>>dd173 at columbia.edu
>>>212-678-3979
>>>Teachers College, Columbia University
>>>
>>>Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
>>>perception
>>>
>>>Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
>>>(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
>>>contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
>>>During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
>>>theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
>>>But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
>>>simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
>>>
>>>No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
>>>Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
>>>Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
>>>the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
>>>fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
>>>beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
>>>to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
>>>connotation of singleness in other languages.
>>>
>>>What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
>>>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
>>>that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
>>>said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
>>>another affects how an individual perceives reality."
>>>
>>>When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
>>>small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
>>>tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
>>>performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
>>>dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
>>>performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
>>>performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
>>>increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
>>>near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
>>>Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
>>>perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
>>>then match to corresponding groups.
>>>
>>>According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
>>>above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
>>>trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
>>>understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
>>>using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
>>>larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
>>>students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
>>>skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
>>>birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
>>>studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
>>>to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
>>>noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
>>>Piraha children did not.
>>>
>>>While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
>>>refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
>>>tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
>>>quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
>>>their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
>>>to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
>>>
>>>The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
>>>designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
>>>quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
>>>general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
>>>Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
>>>certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
>>>possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
>>>nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
>>>Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
>>>language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
>>>together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
>>>
>>>###
>>>
>>>
>>>Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
>>>the journal Science.
>>>
>>>Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
>>>nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
>>>is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
>>>World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
>>>graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
>>>please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>
>
>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040820/e3d863ec/attachment.html>

From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Sat Aug 21 02:51:23 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 19:51:23 -0700
Subject: ILAT news...
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.195123.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

hi all,

there will be no news items in the coming week as i will be away from my
desk and on a distant shore.

take care and continue your discussions,

phil cash cash
UofA, ILAT list manager


From sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Sat Aug 21 14:29:57 2004
From: sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Susan D Penfield)
Date: Sat, 21 Aug 2004 07:29:57 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <412689C3.1070400@luna.cc.nm.us>
Message-ID: <SAT.21.AUG.2004.072957.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Matthew, Myra and all,
Thanks for this discussion...it is a good reminder of how flexible and adaptable
human language is. The communities I work with are busy developing new
vocabulary to meet the demands of science and technology -- new words for
computers, cameras, digital anything, etc. It is an effort to 'own' the present
time in the unique language/cultural environments represented by indigenous
communities. The language will follow the people's needs to the extent that the
people choose to use it for that purpose. Hebrew is a great example and one we
should revisit from time to time. The struggle to save indigenous languages
rests, it seems to me, on making them as much a part of the present as the
past...simply another version of language shift. Much depends on how a given
group envisions the language being used.

Here is a real aside, but maybe still a good example:
  The Pope's Latinist recently revised all the ATMs within Vatican City--all
screen options are written in Latin.... (just food for thought!)


Susan

Susan D. Penfield, Ph.D.
Department of English
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721


Quoting Matthew Ward <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>:

> No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use
> them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of
> communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well
> in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found
> in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some
> things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a
> treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but
> the past as well.
>
> What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the
> human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe
> that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that
> their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people
> are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article
> states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and
> will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing,
> which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.
>
> The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive
> quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of
> research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of
> language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't
> possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.
>  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial
> language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any
> language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a
> "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined
> to discover one.
>
> Myra Shawaway wrote:
>
> >Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
> >a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
> >languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
> >concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
> >environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
> >have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
> >grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
> >natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
> >of science and the outcomes.
> >
> >----- Original Message -----
> >From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
> >To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
> >Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
> >Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
> >affects perception (fwd)
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >>I particularly like this sentence:
> >>
> >>"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> >>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."
> >>
> >>The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
> >>
> >>
> >evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
> >Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
> >
> >
> >>I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
> >>
> >>
> >showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
> >Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
> >
> >
> >>
> >>phil cash cash wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>>Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
> >>>http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
> >>>
> >>>Contact: Diane Dobry
> >>>dd173 at columbia.edu
> >>>212-678-3979
> >>>Teachers College, Columbia University
> >>>
> >>>Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
> >>>perception
> >>>
> >>>Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
> >>>(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
> >>>contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
> >>>During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
> >>>theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
> >>>But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
> >>>simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
> >>>
> >>>No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
> >>>Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
> >>>Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
> >>>the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
> >>>fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
> >>>beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
> >>>to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
> >>>connotation of singleness in other languages.
> >>>
> >>>What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> >>>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
> >>>that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
> >>>said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
> >>>another affects how an individual perceives reality."
> >>>
> >>>When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
> >>>small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
> >>>tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
> >>>performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
> >>>dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
> >>>performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
> >>>performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
> >>>increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
> >>>near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
> >>>Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
> >>>perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
> >>>then match to corresponding groups.
> >>>
> >>>According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
> >>>above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
> >>>trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
> >>>understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
> >>>using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
> >>>larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
> >>>students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
> >>>skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
> >>>birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
> >>>studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
> >>>to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
> >>>noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
> >>>Piraha children did not.
> >>>
> >>>While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
> >>>refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
> >>>tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
> >>>quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
> >>>their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
> >>>to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
> >>>
> >>>The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
> >>>designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
> >>>quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
> >>>general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
> >>>Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
> >>>certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
> >>>possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
> >>>nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
> >>>Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
> >>>language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
> >>>together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
> >>>
> >>>###
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
> >>>the journal Science.
> >>>
> >>>Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
> >>>nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
> >>>is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
> >>>World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
> >>>graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
> >>>please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >
> >
> >
>
>


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Sun Aug 22 00:33:21 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Sat, 21 Aug 2004 19:33:21 -0500
Subject: Fwd: He was beaten when he spoke his native language
Message-ID: <SAT.21.AUG.2004.193321.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

[reposted from multied-l at usc.edu]


"He was beaten when he spoke his native language instead of English,
sometimes with a broken conveyor belt, in a cycle of abuse that continued until
he left at 17."


http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20040817/CBASCHOOLS17/TPNational/TopStories
Lawyers praised for support of native survivors
By KIM LUNMAN
Tuesday, August 17, 2004 - Page A5

Ray Mason had never taken a bus until one mysteriously pulled up at his door on
the Peguis First Nation at dawn to collect the frightened seven-year-old. He
still remembers watching his Manitoba reserve disappear in the distance through
the rear-view mirror. "My mother was crying and saying, 'I hope he comes back.'
The Indian agent said, 'Don't worry; he'll be back.' " Mr. Mason, who is among
thousands of survivors of residential schools seeking compensation from the
federal government, spent the next 10 years of his life bouncing from one
school to another. He was beaten when he spoke his native language instead of
English, sometimes with a broken conveyor belt, in a cycle of abuse that
continued until he left at 17.

"It's a horrible thing," said Mr. Mason, chairman of the Spirit Wind Association
representing about 5,000 residential school survivors in Manitoba. "We suffered
psychological and mental torture." He commended the Canadian Bar Association
yesterday for passing a resolution at its annual meeting in Winnipeg calling on
the federal government to compensate all surviving victims of residential
schools. As many as 90,000 of the survivors are estimated to be still alive.
"The government should realize we were all in it together," said Mr. Mason, 57.
"Why does the Canadian government have to take us to court to see what they've
done to us?"

"We're saying that's not fair," said Darcy Merkur, one of the lawyers
representing survivors in a national class action lawsuit involving 19 law
firms. "This was institutional child abuse. They were basically scarred for
life." Mr. Merkur said former students should be entitled to compensation
packages in the range of $20,000 to $40,000. Ottawa apologized six years ago
for abuses in the residential schools, which were owned by the government but
run by churches. Few claims have been settled, however.

The government's $1.7-billion dispute settlement plan, which is designed to
compensate an estimated 15 per cent of all residential school survivors, has
been criticized by native leaders, victims and their lawyers. The plan aims to
settle over 12,000 lawsuits launched by former students. So far, more than
1,250 settlements have been reached, at a cost of $71-million to the federal
government.

Eric Pelletier, a spokesman for the Office of Indian Residential Schools
Resolution, said the current program is addressing a sad chapter in Canada's
history as best it can. "We have been looking at different responses  and still
think our current program is the best response," he said. The federal plan puts
cases before adjudicators, with Ottawa covering 70 per cent of proven damages
for physical and sexual abuse. But plaintiffs must sign away their future right
to sue for language and cultural losses. The remainder of the settlement must
be collected from churches that ran the schools.

Churches ran residential schools in partnership with Ottawa until most were
closed in the 1970s. The last school shut its doors in 1996. In February,
Ottawa announced it was appealing to the Supreme Court to overturn a B.C.
ruling that held the federal government 100-per-cent liable for native
residential school settlements in that province. The B.C. Court of Appeal last
year overturned a 1998 ruling that made the United Church partly liable for
abuse at a former residential school in Port Alberni.

Mr. Mason's painful memories followed him on a recent visit to one of his former
schools. "It was like a horrible dream," he said. "I thought 'My God, I lived
in this box for how many years? Just standing there. It was so gray looking.
Dead."

----- End forwarded message -----

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040821/37a7b778/attachment.html>

From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Wed Aug 25 05:08:38 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 2004 00:08:38 -0500
Subject: ILAT news...
In-Reply-To: <1093056683.c839677380eae@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <WED.25.AUG.2004.000838.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

While Phil's away you may want to check out a new web source for language news,
"The Language Feed" (announcement appended below). Not to suggest that this
gets at the same range of stories that Phil has so helpfully provided us, but
it is interesting...

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net



Quoting phil cash cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU>:

> hi all,
>
> there will be no news items in the coming week as i will be away from my
> desk and on a distant shore.
>
> take care and continue your discussions,
>
> phil cash cash
> UofA, ILAT list manager
>

[reposted from the Linguist list]

Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 20:02:35 -0400 (EDT)
From: Sally Morrison <smorris2 at gmu.edu>
Subject: The Language Feed

A new website that provides links to language news stories found
around the web. Updated every Friday. A free weekly email service is
also offered.

http://mason.gmu.edu/~smorris2/feed


From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Thu Aug 26 14:12:00 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 08:12:00 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.081200.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

I'm not sure that this is a true statement "As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages." in that I don't believe that our "ability" is tied to "oral tradition". Instead, I believe that our failure is based on the refusal to understand the basic nature of words. First, they are references. They are not the referent. Secondly, on the primary or basic level, nouns and verbs are different from each other. They are processed in different parts of the brain, are accompanied by different cognitive processes and different kinesthetic responses. Thirdly, within a language, collections words are processed into different levels of abstraction. And abstractions are culture dependent. I believe that it is right here, at issues of abstraction, that language-anything, preservation, revitalization, and understanding, all fail. 

People jumped all over the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, without thinking it through. The mere fact that the deficit view exists vis a vis language is a clear indication that people are still engaged in wrong-making. 

I am going to hazard the hypothesis that the penalties for wrong-making are experienced and lived by its makers, for as time passes, native technology speakers emerge. These tech languages serve their function, and have their own meanings as do other human languages. But they do not run away and hide as do some of the native languages. Instead, they exist, and continue to thrive, and the penalties are exclusion. Wrong-making excludes those who do it from understanding the nature of the languages, and we are seeing all around us the failure of tech-language immigrants to be successful at understanding and applying the new technologies developed by the tech natives. 

Daniel Wildcat said, in a presentation at New Mexico State, that "the problem with Indian education is the problem  with education". I believe that this same principle applies: The problem with Indian language learning and revitalization is the problem with language learning and revitalization (including the tech languages)." 

Mia

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Matthew Ward 
  To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
  Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 5:31 PM
  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


  No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but the past as well.  

  What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing, which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.  

  The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined to discover one.  

  Myra Shawaway wrote:

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


  I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
    evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
  I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
    showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
  
phil cash cash wrote:

    Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.



      
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/a20f721c/attachment.html>

From mshawaway at WSTRIBES.ORG  Thu Aug 26 16:03:37 2004
From: mshawaway at WSTRIBES.ORG (Myra Shawaway)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 09:03:37 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.090337.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic', 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent speakers today.  This is great conversation.  
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: MiaKalish - LFP 
  To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
  Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 7:12 AM
  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


  I'm not sure that this is a true statement "As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages." in that I don't believe that our "ability" is tied to "oral tradition". Instead, I believe that our failure is based on the refusal to understand the basic nature of words. First, they are references. They are not the referent. Secondly, on the primary or basic level, nouns and verbs are different from each other. They are processed in different parts of the brain, are accompanied by different cognitive processes and different kinesthetic responses. Thirdly, within a language, collections words are processed into different levels of abstraction. And abstractions are culture dependent. I believe that it is right here, at issues of abstraction, that language-anything, preservation, revitalization, and understanding, all fail. 

  People jumped all over the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, without thinking it through. The mere fact that the deficit view exists vis a vis language is a clear indication that people are still engaged in wrong-making. 

  I am going to hazard the hypothesis that the penalties for wrong-making are experienced and lived by its makers, for as time passes, native technology speakers emerge. These tech languages serve their function, and have their own meanings as do other human languages. But they do not run away and hide as do some of the native languages. Instead, they exist, and continue to thrive, and the penalties are exclusion. Wrong-making excludes those who do it from understanding the nature of the languages, and we are seeing all around us the failure of tech-language immigrants to be successful at understanding and applying the new technologies developed by the tech natives. 

  Daniel Wildcat said, in a presentation at New Mexico State, that "the problem with Indian education is the problem  with education". I believe that this same principle applies: The problem with Indian language learning and revitalization is the problem with language learning and revitalization (including the tech languages)." 

  Mia

    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: Matthew Ward 
    To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
    Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 5:31 PM
    Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


    No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but the past as well.  

    What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing, which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.  

    The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined to discover one.  

    Myra Shawaway wrote:

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


  I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
    evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
  I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
    showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
  phil cash cash wrote:

    Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.



      
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/8a91afb3/attachment.html>

From phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET  Thu Aug 26 18:04:36 2004
From: phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET (jess tauber)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 14:04:36 -0400
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.140436.0400.PHONOSEMANTICS@EARTHLINK.NET>

Dan Everett, whose work was ultimately the basis for this report, posted this (see below my contribution) a few days ago on LINGUIST- I suggest that readers take a look particularly at the paper link on his website:   Cultural constraints on grammar(http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/cultgram.pdf)

My own take is that the Piraha~ situation is symptomatic only of its morphosyntactic/phonological status, which prevents deep hierarchicalization- in its syntax, in its morphology, in its phonology, and in parallel with cultural knowledge organization (complexity of tools, depth of generational knowledge of kin, myth, etc.). This status may in fact be a normal fact of life in the morphosyntactic cycle when heavily polysythetic languages with a lot of morphological fusion break down towards the isolating/analytical type again. One sees in various parts of this phase of the cycle languages with low numerical specification, tendency towards borrowing pronouns (either from external sources or from internal ones such as distance demonstratives), lack of syntactic embedding, perhaps a trend towards serialization, and ultimately monosyllabification, which helps to re-complexify the phonology and also may give rise to tonal and/or vocalic register, and in extreme cases, clicks.

Grammatical complexity in such languages is completely overshadowed by complexity in the pragmatic side of the coin, and possibly also in dominance of prototypically right-brain processes over left-, prosody over segmentality phonologically, and so on.

Piraha~ is in the early-mid stages of such breakdown, if my hypothesis is correct. Information in such a language is radically distributed over the entire discourse, and also not limited mostly to the speech channel, and thus one would expect a great deal of paralinguistic effect to accompany it. Nothing in Everett's paper (and see also the story text:   http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/panther.pdf) really seems to contradict such an analysis.

One symptom to look for in languages in this part of the cycle (grossly) is a strong tendency towards phonological monosegmentality of morphology, as well as incorporation of adverbial and higher level materials into it (the residue of former polysynthesis).

Jess Tauber


Message 1: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 10:09:10 -0400 (EDT)
From: Daniel Everett <dan.everett at man.ac.uk>
Subject: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture

Many readers of this list may have seen today's CNN report on the
Science article which was published yesterday on Piraha
(http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/08/19/science.counting.reut/index.html).
The Science article reports on research carried out by Peter Gordon,
along with me and my wife, Keren, several years ago to test my view
that Piraha had no counting. Gordon confirmed that indeed Pirahas have
no concept of counting and further refined my original ideas on the
matter.

Gordon's conclusion in Science is that Piraha offers support for the
Whorf hypothesis. While I believe that this is plausible, my own view
is that the lack of counting must be seen in the larger cultural
context and that when thus viewed in conjunction with the lack of
color words, the lack of embedding, the simplest kinship system ever
documented, and various other characteristics, a different,
non-Whorfian picture emerges. The basic conclusion I reach is that
culture constrains grammar in ways many of us have not previously
imagined. I take this to be an argument against, for example,
Universal Grammar, at least the more widely-accepted versions of it.

Anyone interested in reading on this further (and the Piraha case does
seem to be getting a lot of attention from various countries, based on
my email folder this morning), my paper "Cultural Constraints on
Grammar in Piraha", currently under review, is available from my
University of Manchester website: at
http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/DEHome.html


From coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU  Thu Aug 26 18:28:45 2004
From: coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU (David Lewis)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 11:28:45 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <1660720.1093543477911.JavaMail.root@donald.psp.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.112845.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Translation please.
Excuse me, for those native people on the list who are working on issues 
of their own language survival, what does the below article mean, in 
non-cryptic english please? This is a significant issue in the areas of 
anthropology and linguistics, the lack of pratical applicability of the 
theoretical notions of scientists to issues of native language survival 
within native communities. I think there needs to be a supreme attempt 
to explain these theories and other notions at the community level so 
that we all can benefit. Otherwise the critiques of Vine Deloria Jr. are 
proven true (big heads talking with each other). I also think this is a 
significant issue that needs discussion on this listserve as technology 
and the application of technology within the struggle for native 
language survival, should be at some level accessible to the native 
communities who are at the forefront of this struggle. Not that Jess in 
particular is unaware of this issue, but simply a wakeup call for him 
and other linguists on the listserve.
Thanks,
David Lewis
University of Oregon
Department of Anthropology

jess tauber wrote:

>Dan Everett, whose work was ultimately the basis for this report, posted this (see below my contribution) a few days ago on LINGUIST- I suggest that readers take a look particularly at the paper link on his website:   Cultural constraints on grammar(http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/cultgram.pdf)
>
>My own take is that the Piraha~ situation is symptomatic only of its morphosyntactic/phonological status, which prevents deep hierarchicalization- in its syntax, in its morphology, in its phonology, and in parallel with cultural knowledge organization (complexity of tools, depth of generational knowledge of kin, myth, etc.). This status may in fact be a normal fact of life in the morphosyntactic cycle when heavily polysythetic languages with a lot of morphological fusion break down towards the isolating/analytical type again. One sees in various parts of this phase of the cycle languages with low numerical specification, tendency towards borrowing pronouns (either from external sources or from internal ones such as distance demonstratives), lack of syntactic embedding, perhaps a trend towards serialization, and ultimately monosyllabification, which helps to re-complexify the phonology and also may give rise to tonal and/or vocalic register, and in extreme cases, clicks.
>
>Grammatical complexity in such languages is completely overshadowed by complexity in the pragmatic side of the coin, and possibly also in dominance of prototypically right-brain processes over left-, prosody over segmentality phonologically, and so on.
>
>Piraha~ is in the early-mid stages of such breakdown, if my hypothesis is correct. Information in such a language is radically distributed over the entire discourse, and also not limited mostly to the speech channel, and thus one would expect a great deal of paralinguistic effect to accompany it. Nothing in Everett's paper (and see also the story text:   http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/panther.pdf) really seems to contradict such an analysis.
>
>One symptom to look for in languages in this part of the cycle (grossly) is a strong tendency towards phonological monosegmentality of morphology, as well as incorporation of adverbial and higher level materials into it (the residue of former polysynthesis).
>
>Jess Tauber
>
>
>Message 1: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture
>Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 10:09:10 -0400 (EDT)
>From: Daniel Everett <dan.everett at man.ac.uk>
>Subject: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture
>
>Many readers of this list may have seen today's CNN report on the
>Science article which was published yesterday on Piraha
>(http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/08/19/science.counting.reut/index.html).
>The Science article reports on research carried out by Peter Gordon,
>along with me and my wife, Keren, several years ago to test my view
>that Piraha had no counting. Gordon confirmed that indeed Pirahas have
>no concept of counting and further refined my original ideas on the
>matter.
>
>Gordon's conclusion in Science is that Piraha offers support for the
>Whorf hypothesis. While I believe that this is plausible, my own view
>is that the lack of counting must be seen in the larger cultural
>context and that when thus viewed in conjunction with the lack of
>color words, the lack of embedding, the simplest kinship system ever
>documented, and various other characteristics, a different,
>non-Whorfian picture emerges. The basic conclusion I reach is that
>culture constrains grammar in ways many of us have not previously
>imagined. I take this to be an argument against, for example,
>Universal Grammar, at least the more widely-accepted versions of it.
>
>Anyone interested in reading on this further (and the Piraha case does
>seem to be getting a lot of attention from various countries, based on
>my email folder this morning), my paper "Cultural Constraints on
>Grammar in Piraha", currently under review, is available from my
>University of Manchester website: at
>http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/DEHome.html
>
>  
>


From jtucker at STARBAND.NET  Thu Aug 26 18:48:24 2004
From: jtucker at STARBAND.NET (Jan Tucker)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 14:48:24 -0400
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.144824.0400.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

I read the previous highly technical descriptive linguistic explanation of
Piraha language, and had the same reaction to the article. It would be
extreemly helpful to any readers unfamiliar with descriptive linguistics
jargon to have a translation of this into language that other academics can
understand as well. I've been following the dialogue and would very much
like to understand the explanation in non-jargon terms. I haven't yet looked
at the articles you provided. Thanks

Jan Tucker
Applied Cultural Anthropologist

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Lewis" <coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 2:28 PM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


Translation please.
Excuse me, for those native people on the list who are working on issues
of their own language survival, what does the below article mean, in
non-cryptic english please? This is a significant issue in the areas of
anthropology and linguistics, the lack of pratical applicability of the
theoretical notions of scientists to issues of native language survival
within native communities. I think there needs to be a supreme attempt
to explain these theories and other notions at the community level so
that we all can benefit. Otherwise the critiques of Vine Deloria Jr. are
proven true (big heads talking with each other). I also think this is a
significant issue that needs discussion on this listserve as technology
and the application of technology within the struggle for native
language survival, should be at some level accessible to the native
communities who are at the forefront of this struggle. Not that Jess in
particular is unaware of this issue, but simply a wakeup call for him
and other linguists on the listserve.
Thanks,
David Lewis
University of Oregon
Department of Anthropology

jess tauber wrote:

>Dan Everett, whose work was ultimately the basis for this report, posted
this (see below my contribution) a few days ago on LINGUIST- I suggest that
readers take a look particularly at the paper link on his website:
Cultural constraints on
grammar(http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/cultgram.pdf)
>
>My own take is that the Piraha~ situation is symptomatic only of its
morphosyntactic/phonological status, which prevents deep
hierarchicalization- in its syntax, in its morphology, in its phonology, and
in parallel with cultural knowledge organization (complexity of tools, depth
of generational knowledge of kin, myth, etc.). This status may in fact be a
normal fact of life in the morphosyntactic cycle when heavily polysythetic
languages with a lot of morphological fusion break down towards the
isolating/analytical type again. One sees in various parts of this phase of
the cycle languages with low numerical specification, tendency towards
borrowing pronouns (either from external sources or from internal ones such
as distance demonstratives), lack of syntactic embedding, perhaps a trend
towards serialization, and ultimately monosyllabification, which helps to
re-complexify the phonology and also may give rise to tonal and/or vocalic
register, and in extreme cases, clicks.
>
>Grammatical complexity in such languages is completely overshadowed by
complexity in the pragmatic side of the coin, and possibly also in dominance
of prototypically right-brain processes over left-, prosody over
segmentality phonologically, and so on.
>
>Piraha~ is in the early-mid stages of such breakdown, if my hypothesis is
correct. Information in such a language is radically distributed over the
entire discourse, and also not limited mostly to the speech channel, and
thus one would expect a great deal of paralinguistic effect to accompany it.
Nothing in Everett's paper (and see also the story text:
http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/panther.pdf) really seems to contradict
such an analysis.
>
>One symptom to look for in languages in this part of the cycle (grossly) is
a strong tendency towards phonological monosegmentality of morphology, as
well as incorporation of adverbial and higher level materials into it (the
residue of former polysynthesis).
>
>Jess Tauber
>
>
>Message 1: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture
>Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 10:09:10 -0400 (EDT)
>From: Daniel Everett <dan.everett at man.ac.uk>
>Subject: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture
>
>Many readers of this list may have seen today's CNN report on the
>Science article which was published yesterday on Piraha
>(http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/08/19/science.counting.reut/index.htm
l).
>The Science article reports on research carried out by Peter Gordon,
>along with me and my wife, Keren, several years ago to test my view
>that Piraha had no counting. Gordon confirmed that indeed Pirahas have
>no concept of counting and further refined my original ideas on the
>matter.
>
>Gordon's conclusion in Science is that Piraha offers support for the
>Whorf hypothesis. While I believe that this is plausible, my own view
>is that the lack of counting must be seen in the larger cultural
>context and that when thus viewed in conjunction with the lack of
>color words, the lack of embedding, the simplest kinship system ever
>documented, and various other characteristics, a different,
>non-Whorfian picture emerges. The basic conclusion I reach is that
>culture constrains grammar in ways many of us have not previously
>imagined. I take this to be an argument against, for example,
>Universal Grammar, at least the more widely-accepted versions of it.
>
>Anyone interested in reading on this further (and the Piraha case does
>seem to be getting a lot of attention from various countries, based on
>my email folder this morning), my paper "Cultural Constraints on
>Grammar in Piraha", currently under review, is available from my
>University of Manchester website: at
>http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/DEHome.html
>
>
>


From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US  Thu Aug 26 19:28:53 2004
From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 13:28:53 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.132853.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

I would suspect that if such words exist in tribal languages, they were
recently coined or borrowed--after all, many of them are relatively new
concepts even in the cultures which they originated in.  Words for these
terms exist in all the languages that I speak, but many are relatively
recent coinaged created to deal with new concepts.  The important thing
is that both languages and cultures are flexible, and can accomodate new
concepts as needed.

Myra Shawaway wrote:

> The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do
> not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any
> more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and
> hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the
> connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the
> changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward
> with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing
> our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I
> continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic',
> 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are
> parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an
> understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent
> speakers today.  This is great conversation.
>
>     ----- Original Message -----
>     From: MiaKalish - LFP <mailto:MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US>
>     To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU <mailto:ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>     Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 7:12 AM
>     Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how
>     language affects perception (fwd)
>


Myra Shawaway wrote:

> The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do
> not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any
> more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and
> hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the
> connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the
> changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward
> with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing
> our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I
> continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic',
> 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are
> parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an
> understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent
> speakers today.  This is great conversation.
>
>     ---
>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/c6c1bd5b/attachment.html>

From jtucker at STARBAND.NET  Thu Aug 26 20:56:27 2004
From: jtucker at STARBAND.NET (Jan Tucker)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 16:56:27 -0400
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.165627.0400.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Myra, I was wondering myself what the definiton of "tech-language' is and who are the 'native technology speakers'? I like the way you think when you ask the practical question of "...how do we create an understanding of those words ["kinesthetic, hypothesis, abstraction, tech-language, nouns, verbs"]? Even teaching English speakers the meanings of these words isn't an easy task. Would it be helpful to look for examples of the words as they are applied to real life situations. Take kinesthetic for example. First I'd define the word. A quick look-up defines the word as part of kinetic energy,  or energy of motion. Certainly within linguistics there will be a different definiton. I did find this intersting information though in the context of learning styles. 

 http://www.mkircus.lunarpages.com/Tutorials/MaxLrnWS/Maximizing%20Learning.ppt
Tactile/Kinesthetic Learners Need:
hands-on activities. 
role-playing or acting-out activities.
to manipulate materials.
to incorporate physical activity and feelings into activities. 
to move among centers.
be given opportunities to move during lessons. 

Jan
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Myra Shawaway 
  To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
  Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 12:03 PM
  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


  The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic', 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent speakers today.  This is great conversation.  
    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: MiaKalish - LFP 
    To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
    Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 7:12 AM
    Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


    I'm not sure that this is a true statement "As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages." in that I don't believe that our "ability" is tied to "oral tradition". Instead, I believe that our failure is based on the refusal to understand the basic nature of words. First, they are references. They are not the referent. Secondly, on the primary or basic level, nouns and verbs are different from each other. They are processed in different parts of the brain, are accompanied by different cognitive processes and different kinesthetic responses. Thirdly, within a language, collections words are processed into different levels of abstraction. And abstractions are culture dependent. I believe that it is right here, at issues of abstraction, that language-anything, preservation, revitalization, and understanding, all fail. 

    People jumped all over the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, without thinking it through. The mere fact that the deficit view exists vis a vis language is a clear indication that people are still engaged in wrong-making. 

    I am going to hazard the hypothesis that the penalties for wrong-making are experienced and lived by its makers, for as time passes, native technology speakers emerge. These tech languages serve their function, and have their own meanings as do other human languages. But they do not run away and hide as do some of the native languages. Instead, they exist, and continue to thrive, and the penalties are exclusion. Wrong-making excludes those who do it from understanding the nature of the languages, and we are seeing all around us the failure of tech-language immigrants to be successful at understanding and applying the new technologies developed by the tech natives. 

    Daniel Wildcat said, in a presentation at New Mexico State, that "the problem with Indian education is the problem  with education". I believe that this same principle applies: The problem with Indian language learning and revitalization is the problem with language learning and revitalization (including the tech languages)." 

    Mia

      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: Matthew Ward 
      To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
      Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 5:31 PM
      Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


      No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but the past as well.  

      What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing, which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.  

      The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined to discover one.  

      Myra Shawaway wrote:

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


  I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
    evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
  I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
    showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
  phil cash cash wrote:

    Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.



      
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/52720846/attachment.html>

From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Thu Aug 26 23:38:11 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:38:11 -0500
Subject: Khoisan Language Student Scholarship Scheme
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.183811.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

FYI, from Pambazuka News #171 (26 Aug. 04)...

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net


KHOISAN LANGUAGE STUDENT SCHOLARSHIP SCHEME
http://www.casas.co.za/khoisan_language.htm
In order to create a cadre of Khoisan linguists capable of facilitating the
preservation and development of the Khoisan languages of Southern Africa,
Centre for Advanced Study of African Societies (CASAS) administers a
scholarship scheme for University linguistic studies in Cape Town, at the
undergraduate level with possibilities of advancement  to post-graduate studies
thereafter. The KLSSS is supported by Brot fur die Welt, Stuttgart, Germany.
The scholarship scheme started with the first cohort in the academic year
starting in January 2002. Scholars are Khoisan mother-tongue speakers, with
good academic achievements to date at Grade 12 or matric level, from any
country in Southern Africa.


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Fri Aug 27 00:23:51 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 19:23:51 -0500
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <412E39F5.4040306@luna.cc.nm.us>
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.192351.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

I'm not sure what the late Senegalese scholar Cheick Anta Diop would do with
regard to language were he were alive today, but a half-century ago he made a
point of translating an explanation of the theory of relativity as well as
several literary passages from European languages into Wolof (published in
Présence Africaine in 1955). I don't speak that language, but as I understand
it he was not relying on borrowed words but rather using terms existing in
Wolof. Still an interesting example and point of reference when discussions
such as this come up.

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net



Quoting Matthew Ward <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>:

> I would suspect that if such words exist in tribal languages, they were
> recently coined or borrowed--after all, many of them are relatively new
> concepts even in the cultures which they originated in.  Words for these
> terms exist in all the languages that I speak, but many are relatively
> recent coinaged created to deal with new concepts.  The important thing
> is that both languages and cultures are flexible, and can accomodate new
> concepts as needed.
>
[ . . . ]


From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Fri Aug 27 05:11:32 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 23:11:32 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.231132.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Native technology  speakers are those people who were born when computers were already present in their life space. They are considered "native speakers of technology" because technology has its own language (bit, byte, Gig, object, avatar, core dump, dumping, blue screen, transaction, memory leak, to name but a few "words"). People who learned the language of technology early speak it as well (or sometimes better than) conversational languages. However, what is noticeable is that people who are native technology speakers have a fluency with technology that the "immigrants" don't have. 

This is becoming important as technology becomes more pervasive. Being "computer literate" is no longer the same thing. Now, "computer literate" people can turn on the box, suft the web, send some email. Native speakers push the envelope of multi-media fusions, evidenced by the Flash movies showing up everywhere, and things like voice and picture recognition, sophisticated compression algorigthms, and even a small bit of cool software that can be used for revitalization. 

Mia

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Myra Shawaway 
  To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
  Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 10:03 AM
  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


  The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic', 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent speakers today.  This is great conversation.  
    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: MiaKalish - LFP 
    To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
    Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 7:12 AM
    Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


    I'm not sure that this is a true statement "As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages." in that I don't believe that our "ability" is tied to "oral tradition". Instead, I believe that our failure is based on the refusal to understand the basic nature of words. First, they are references. They are not the referent. Secondly, on the primary or basic level, nouns and verbs are different from each other. They are processed in different parts of the brain, are accompanied by different cognitive processes and different kinesthetic responses. Thirdly, within a language, collections words are processed into different levels of abstraction. And abstractions are culture dependent. I believe that it is right here, at issues of abstraction, that language-anything, preservation, revitalization, and understanding, all fail. 

    People jumped all over the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, without thinking it through. The mere fact that the deficit view exists vis a vis language is a clear indication that people are still engaged in wrong-making. 

    I am going to hazard the hypothesis that the penalties for wrong-making are experienced and lived by its makers, for as time passes, native technology speakers emerge. These tech languages serve their function, and have their own meanings as do other human languages. But they do not run away and hide as do some of the native languages. Instead, they exist, and continue to thrive, and the penalties are exclusion. Wrong-making excludes those who do it from understanding the nature of the languages, and we are seeing all around us the failure of tech-language immigrants to be successful at understanding and applying the new technologies developed by the tech natives. 

    Daniel Wildcat said, in a presentation at New Mexico State, that "the problem with Indian education is the problem  with education". I believe that this same principle applies: The problem with Indian language learning and revitalization is the problem with language learning and revitalization (including the tech languages)." 

    Mia

      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: Matthew Ward 
      To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
      Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 5:31 PM
      Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


      No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but the past as well.  

      What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing, which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.  

      The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined to discover one.  

      Myra Shawaway wrote:

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


  I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
    evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
  I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
    showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
  phil cash cash wrote:

    Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.



      
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/5822ef65/attachment.html>

From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Fri Aug 27 05:16:44 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 23:16:44 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.231644.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

"Native languages run away and hide" is about how people refuse to speak their languages when they are not English. There is a whole psychological complex around this, a kind of passive-aggressive "look what you did to me now I'll punish you by not saying anything". (Yes, I do know. I live it almost daily). Technology languages are things like COBOL, C, C++, FORTRAN, PHP, SQL, ORACLE, CGI, LISP, UNIX, LINUX, WINDOWS, XP, MAC, (this last bunch being operating systems with their own languages and grammatical rues, different from the simple transactional languages). 

Once I used to wonder how to include things like "kinesthetic", "cognitive", that sort of thing. Now, I wonder how not to lose things like for example the numbers after ashdlai (5). 

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Jan Tucker 
  To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
  Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 2:56 PM
  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


  Myra, I was wondering myself what the definiton of "tech-language' is and who are the 'native technology speakers'? I like the way you think when you ask the practical question of "...how do we create an understanding of those words ["kinesthetic, hypothesis, abstraction, tech-language, nouns, verbs"]? Even teaching English speakers the meanings of these words isn't an easy task. Would it be helpful to look for examples of the words as they are applied to real life situations. Take kinesthetic for example. First I'd define the word. A quick look-up defines the word as part of kinetic energy,  or energy of motion. Certainly within linguistics there will be a different definiton. I did find this intersting information though in the context of learning styles. 

   http://www.mkircus.lunarpages.com/Tutorials/MaxLrnWS/Maximizing%20Learning.ppt
  Tactile/Kinesthetic Learners Need:
  hands-on activities. 
  role-playing or acting-out activities.
  to manipulate materials.
  to incorporate physical activity and feelings into activities. 
  to move among centers.
  be given opportunities to move during lessons. 

  Jan
    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: Myra Shawaway 
    To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
    Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 12:03 PM
    Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


    The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic', 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent speakers today.  This is great conversation.  
      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: MiaKalish - LFP 
      To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
      Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 7:12 AM
      Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


      I'm not sure that this is a true statement "As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages." in that I don't believe that our "ability" is tied to "oral tradition". Instead, I believe that our failure is based on the refusal to understand the basic nature of words. First, they are references. They are not the referent. Secondly, on the primary or basic level, nouns and verbs are different from each other. They are processed in different parts of the brain, are accompanied by different cognitive processes and different kinesthetic responses. Thirdly, within a language, collections words are processed into different levels of abstraction. And abstractions are culture dependent. I believe that it is right here, at issues of abstraction, that language-anything, preservation, revitalization, and understanding, all fail. 

      People jumped all over the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, without thinking it through. The mere fact that the deficit view exists vis a vis language is a clear indication that people are still engaged in wrong-making. 

      I am going to hazard the hypothesis that the penalties for wrong-making are experienced and lived by its makers, for as time passes, native technology speakers emerge. These tech languages serve their function, and have their own meanings as do other human languages. But they do not run away and hide as do some of the native languages. Instead, they exist, and continue to thrive, and the penalties are exclusion. Wrong-making excludes those who do it from understanding the nature of the languages, and we are seeing all around us the failure of tech-language immigrants to be successful at understanding and applying the new technologies developed by the tech natives. 

      Daniel Wildcat said, in a presentation at New Mexico State, that "the problem with Indian education is the problem  with education". I believe that this same principle applies: The problem with Indian language learning and revitalization is the problem with language learning and revitalization (including the tech languages)." 

      Mia

        ----- Original Message ----- 
        From: Matthew Ward 
        To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
        Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 5:31 PM
        Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


        No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but the past as well.  

        What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing, which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.  

        The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined to discover one.  

        Myra Shawaway wrote:

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


  I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
    evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
  I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
    showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
  phil cash cash wrote:

    Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirahã, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirahã participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirahã adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirahã words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirahã language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirahã language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirahã grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.



      
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/1472f364/attachment.html>

From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US  Fri Aug 27 17:54:25 2004
From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward)
Date: Fri, 27 Aug 2004 11:54:25 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.27.AUG.2004.115425.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Good point, Don.  I was reading an article by a linguist studying
Australian Aboriginal languages who referred to a textbook on nuclear
physics, if I remember correctly, that had been translated into a
certain Aboriginal language.  For many indigenous languages, the
resources, will, or perceived need to do such translations is lacking,
but that doesn't mean that these translations cannot be done.

People tend to get very hung-up on lexicon when they get the idea that
you somehow cannot express certain thoughts in certain languages.  The
problem is, most of the pretty much infinite number of ideas that the
human brain is capable of thinking up don't have vocabulary items to go
along with them.  For every concept that has a specific term, there are
many that are expressed by combinations of words.  In other words, most
of the meaning that we make with language is not expressed by single
words, but by putting words together.  What I am writing here is a good
example:  there is not a single word for the idea I am expressing, but
that doesn't stop me from expressing it.    This is one reason why human
language is so flexible:  when a vocabularly item is lacking, one can
paraphrase or otherwise explain.

Of course, there are concepts that are difficult to understand because
of people's cultural backgrounds, but it's not a case of people being
unable to think certain thoughts because their languages lack the "right
resources," as the original article unfortunately put it.



Donald Z. Osborn wrote:

>I'm not sure what the late Senegalese scholar Cheick Anta Diop would do with
>regard to language were he were alive today, but a half-century ago he made a
>point of translating an explanation of the theory of relativity as well as
>several literary passages from European languages into Wolof (published in
>Présence Africaine in 1955). I don't speak that language, but as I understand
>it he was not relying on borrowed words but rather using terms existing in
>Wolof. Still an interesting example and point of reference when discussions
>such as this come up.
>
>Don Osborn
>Bisharat.net
>
>
>
>Quoting Matthew Ward <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>:
>
>
>
>>I would suspect that if such words exist in tribal languages, they were
>>recently coined or borrowed--after all, many of them are relatively new
>>concepts even in the cultures which they originated in.  Words for these
>>terms exist in all the languages that I speak, but many are relatively
>>recent coinaged created to deal with new concepts.  The important thing
>>is that both languages and cultures are flexible, and can accomodate new
>>concepts as needed.
>>
>>
>>
>[ . . . ]
>
>
>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040827/c027db93/attachment.html>

From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Sun Aug  1 20:51:16 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Sun, 1 Aug 2004 13:51:16 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
Message-ID: <SUN.1.AUG.2004.135116.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Dear ILAT,

i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
ilat-based informational website that is in progress.

please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.

thanks,
phil cash cash
UofA, ILAT

~~~

ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html

AZTLAN: Maya
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree

ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html

GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
Greenland
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/

Indigenous Languages and Technology
http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html

NAHUAT-L: The N?huatl Language of the Aztecs
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html

SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html

WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html


From pmeyer at SDCOE.K12.CA.US  Sun Aug  1 21:46:57 2004
From: pmeyer at SDCOE.K12.CA.US (Paula Meyer)
Date: Sun, 1 Aug 2004 14:46:57 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
Message-ID: <SUN.1.AUG.2004.144657.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Phil, Kumeyaay is in San Diego County, CA and northern Baja California.
Here are some websites that deal with it.
Paula

KUMEYAAY:  www.kumeyaay.org, www.kumeyaay.com, www.americanindiansource.com.

----- Original Message -----
From: "phil cash cash" <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Sunday, August 01, 2004 1:51 PM
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs


Dear ILAT,

i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
ilat-based informational website that is in progress.

please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.

thanks,
phil cash cash
UofA, ILAT

~~~

ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html

AZTLAN: Maya
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree

ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html

GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
Greenland
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/

Indigenous Languages and Technology
http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html

NAHUAT-L: The N?huatl Language of the Aztecs
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html

SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html

WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html


From phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET  Mon Aug  2 03:41:52 2004
From: phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET (jess tauber)
Date: Sun, 1 Aug 2004 23:41:52 -0400
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
Message-ID: <SUN.1.AUG.2004.234152.0400.PHONOSEMANTICS@EARTHLINK.NET>

Hi. The discussion list for the Yahgan language of Tierra del Fuego can be found at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/waata_chis


Jess Tauber


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Mon Aug  2 06:56:17 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 01:56:17 -0500
Subject: Ethnocomputing
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.015617.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

"Ethnocomputing" is one of those terms that sounds like I've heard it someplace,
but in fact it is relatively new (searchs on ILAT and GKD
yielded no hits and Google had only 60 some). That is not to say that the
thinking behind it would be unfamiliar to many people working on "ICT4D" and
"digital divide" issues. Still, it may be a useful concept to add to the
repertoire for discussions of ICT & development, ICT & language, knowledge
generation in non-Western or indigenous communities, etc.

Here are a few references I ran across on this:
* An article, "Ethnocomputing a Multicultural View on Computer Science" by Matti
Tedre, Piet Kommers, Erkki Sutinen at
http://www.cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/articles/ethnocomputing_ICALT2002.pdf
* A M.S. thesis (2002) by Matti Tedre entitled "Ethnocomputing: A Multicultural
View on Computer Science" at
http://www.cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/articles/tedre_matti_ethnocomputing.pdf
* There was even a webpage www.ethnocomputing.org, though that apparently exists
now only in the Web Archives at:
http://web.archive.org/web/20030711043220/cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/

Part of the abstract from the Tedre's thesis (similar to one in the article) is
reproduced below.

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net


"The prevailing westernness of Computer Science is a major problem with the
Computer Science education in developing countries. The students not only face
a new subject, but also a fundamentally different philosophy and problem
solving methods. In this thesis, I shall present a new member to the family of
ethnosciences: ethnocomputing. Ethnocomputing challenges the prevailing way of
thinking that in order to keep up with the West, other cultures have to adapt
to
the western ways of thinking. Relying on constructivist theories, I argue that
the universal theories of computing take different forms in different cultures,
and that the European view on abstract ideas of computing is culturally bound,
too. Studying ethnocomputing~W i.e. the computational ideas within a culture ~W
may lead to new findings that can be used in both developing the western view
of Computer Science, and improving Computer Science education in non-western
cultures."


From CRANEM at MAIL.ECU.EDU  Mon Aug  2 14:35:27 2004
From: CRANEM at MAIL.ECU.EDU (Bizzaro, Resa Crane)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 10:35:27 -0400
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.103527.0400.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Hi, everyone.  Phil--will you share the address for the web site as soon as it's ready?  It sounds like a great resource.
 
Resa

	-----Original Message----- 
	From: Indigenous Languages and Technology on behalf of phil cash cash 
	Sent: Sun 8/1/2004 4:51 PM 
	To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
	Cc: 
	Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
	
	

	Dear ILAT,
	
	i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
	indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
	ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
	
	please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
	you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.
	
	thanks,
	phil cash cash
	UofA, ILAT
	
	~~~
	
	ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
	
	AZTLAN: Maya
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
	
	CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
	
	CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
	http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
	
	ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
	
	GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
	Greenland
	http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
	
	Indigenous Languages and Technology
	http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
	
	NAHUAT-L: The N?huatl Language of the Aztecs
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
	
	SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
	
	WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
	http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
	


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug  2 16:53:59 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 09:53:59 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language CD-ROMs
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.095359.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

ta'c 'alaxp (good day),

i am compiling a resource listing of indigenous language CD-ROMs.  the
resource listing will be made available on an ilat-based (indigenous
languages and technology) informational web site in progress.

if you know of any or have created a language CD=ROM please feel free to
send me information or post it to ILAT listserv.  what i will need is
the basic citation information, although that can be tricky in itself
because guidelines for citing a CD-ROM is not that precise.

here is an example of a recent language CD-ROM:

~~~
Author: GreyFox CE

Title: TSI' THUWATI'NIKUHLAL?KHWA KA'NIH^N?:SA
Where They Take Care of Them The Little Ones
An Interactive CD for Onieda Language Learning

Publication Medium: [CD-ROM]

Publisher: Onieda Nation Childcare, CCDF Pass Through Grant

Location & Date: 2003
~~~

feel free to forward this request to other listservs or informational
lists.

thanks,
phil cash cash (cayuse/nez perce)
UofA, ILAT
pasxapu at dakotacom.net
cashcash at u.arizona.edu


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug  2 17:08:33 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 10:08:33 -0700
Subject: Ethnocomputing
In-Reply-To: <1091429777.410de5918d25a@webmail.kabissa.org>
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.100833.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

nice Don!  i will add these references (as hyperlinks) to my resource
listing of research on indigenous languages and technology.

here are some interesting quotations from the article Ethnocomputing a
Multicultural View on Computer Science:

"ethnocomput-ing refers to a cultural perspective in the problem solving
methods, conceptual categories, structures, and models used to
represent data or other computational practices."

"Ethno represents particularity and computing universality, and a
combina-tion of particular and universal leads to computing activ-ity
that takes its place within a culture. The concepts of ethnocomputing
can manifest as direct applications in real-life situations, or objects
among cultural groups, and they reflect the traditional practices of a
culture ? whether or not technically advanced."

later,

phil cash cash
UofA, ILAT


> ----- Message from dzo at BISHARAT.NET ---------
>     Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 01:56:17 -0500
>     From: "Donald Z. Osborn" <dzo at BISHARAT.NET>
> Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology
<ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>  Subject: Ethnocomputing
>       To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>
> "Ethnocomputing" is one of those terms that sounds like I've heard it
> someplace,
> but in fact it is relatively new (searchs on ILAT and GKD
> yielded no hits and Google had only 60 some). That is not to say that
> the
> thinking behind it would be unfamiliar to many people working on
> "ICT4D" and
> "digital divide" issues. Still, it may be a useful concept to add to
> the
> repertoire for discussions of ICT & development, ICT & language,
> knowledge
> generation in non-Western or indigenous communities, etc.
>
> Here are a few references I ran across on this:
> * An article, "Ethnocomputing a Multicultural View on Computer
> Science" by Matti
> Tedre, Piet Kommers, Erkki Sutinen at
> http://www.cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/articles/ethnocomputing_ICALT2002.pdf
> * A M.S. thesis (2002) by Matti Tedre entitled "Ethnocomputing: A
> Multicultural
> View on Computer Science" at
>
http://www.cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/articles/tedre_matti_ethnocomputing.pdf
> * There was even a webpage www.ethnocomputing.org, though that
> apparently exists
> now only in the Web Archives at:
> http://web.archive.org/web/20030711043220/cs.joensuu.fi/~ethno/
>
> Part of the abstract from the Tedre's thesis (similar to one in the
> article) is
> reproduced below.
>
> Don Osborn
> Bisharat.net
>
>
> "The prevailing westernness of Computer Science is a major problem
> with the
> Computer Science education in developing countries. The students not
> only face
> a new subject, but also a fundamentally different philosophy and
> problem
> solving methods. In this thesis, I shall present a new member to the
> family of
> ethnosciences: ethnocomputing. Ethnocomputing challenges the
> prevailing way of
> thinking that in order to keep up with the West, other cultures have
> to adapt
> to
> the western ways of thinking. Relying on constructivist theories, I
> argue that
> the universal theories of computing take different forms in different
> cultures,
> and that the European view on abstract ideas of computing is
> culturally bound,
> too. Studying ethnocomputing? i.e. the computational ideas within a
> culture ?
> may lead to new findings that can be used in both developing the
> western view
> of Computer Science, and improving Computer Science education in
> non-western
> cultures."
>
>
> ----- End message from dzo at BISHARAT.NET -----


From iackerman at ROSETTASTONE.COM  Mon Aug  2 17:13:28 2004
From: iackerman at ROSETTASTONE.COM (Ilse Ackerman)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 13:13:28 -0400
Subject: Indigenous Language CD-ROMs
In-Reply-To: <1091465639.13cfe9e68f5e2@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.131328.0400.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Dear Phil,

Thanks very much for compiling the resource listing.  I have two 
CD-ROMs for listing.  These should be released early next year.


Author:                 NANA Corporation

Title:                          I?upiaq

Publication Medium:     [CD-ROM]

Publisher:                      Fairfield Language Technologies (makers of Rosetta Stone)

Location & Date:        expected release 2005



Author:                 Kanien'kehaka Onkwawenna Raotitiohkwa Cultural Center

Title:                          Kanien'k?ha [Mohawk]

Publication Medium:[CD-ROM]

Publisher:                      Fairfield Language Technologies (makers of Rosetta Stone)

Location & Date:        expected release 2005



Best regards,

ilse

_____________________________

Ilse Ackerman
Program Manager
Endangered Language Program
Fairfield Language Technologies
Harrisonburg, VA  22802 USA

Tel  1.800.788.0822 Ext. 3318
Tel  1.540.432.6166 Ext. 3318
Fax 1.540.432.0953

www.rosettastone.com/languagerescue
_______________________________

From langendt at U.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug  2 17:28:38 2004
From: langendt at U.ARIZONA.EDU (Terry Langendoen)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 10:28:38 -0700
Subject: NSF Documenting Endangered Languages
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.102838.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Documenting Endangered Languages

This partnership between the National Science Foundation and the
National Endowment for the Humanities supports projects to develop and
advance knowledge concerning endangered human languages and aims also to
exploit advances in information technology. Funding will support
fieldwork and other activities relevant to recording, documenting, and
archiving endangered languages, including the preparation of lexicons,
grammars, text samples, and databases. Funding is available for 6-10
project grants ranging from $12,000 to $150,000 per year for 1-3 years
and about 12 fellowships of either $40,000 (9-12 months) or $24,000 (6-8
months). Fellowships are not intended to support graduate course work or
a master's degree, but may contribute to the completion of a doctoral
dissertation. At least half the available funding will be awarded to
projects involving fieldwork.

DEADLINE: November 1, 2004

http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2004/nsf04605/nsf04605.htm


From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET  Mon Aug  2 17:56:44 2004
From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash)
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 2004 10:56:44 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <7F4FA3FB24EC7040825418FFCCA088FB43E296@ecufacstaf1.intra.ecu.edu>
Message-ID: <MON.2.AUG.2004.105644.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Resa, yes certainly.  i hope to have a site up soon, right now i am 
organizing content, that is, anything interesting relating to 
indigenous languages and technology.  so at the moment it is mostly 
informational oriented.  phil

On Aug 2, 2004, at 7:35 AM, Bizzaro, Resa Crane wrote:

> Hi, everyone.  Phil--will you share the address for the web site as 
> soon as it's ready?  It sounds like a great resource.
>
> Resa
>
>       -----Original Message-----
>       From: Indigenous Languages and Technology on behalf of phil cash cash
>       Sent: Sun 8/1/2004 4:51 PM
>       To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>       Cc:
>       Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
> 	
> 	
>
>       Dear ILAT,
> 	
>       i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
>       indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
>       ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
> 	
>       please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
>       you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.
> 	
>       thanks,
>       phil cash cash
>       UofA, ILAT
> 	
>       ~~~
> 	
>       ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
> 	
>       AZTLAN: Maya
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
> 	
>       CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
> 	
>       CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
>       http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
> 	
>       ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
> 	
>       GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
>       Greenland
>       http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
> 	
>       Indigenous Languages and Technology
>       http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
> 	
>       NAHUAT-L: The N?huatl Language of the Aztecs
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
> 	
>       SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
> 	
>       WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
>       http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
> 	
>


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Wed Aug  4 19:07:58 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Wed, 4 Aug 2004 12:07:58 -0700
Subject: Omushkigo Oral History Project (link)
Message-ID: <WED.4.AUG.2004.120758.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Omushkigo Oral History Project

The Omushkego Oral History Project has been devoted to the
transcription, digitization, and preservation on CD-ROMs of a large
portion of Louis Bird?s extensive collection of audiotapes documenting
Swampy Cree legends and oral history.

http://www.ourvoices.ca/

[note: this is an impressive site of narratives.  the intro page has a
flash w/audio intro so wait for it to play.  phil]


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Wed Aug  4 19:38:21 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Wed, 4 Aug 2004 12:38:21 -0700
Subject: Aboriginal Sans unicode font
Message-ID: <WED.4.AUG.2004.123821.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

just a quick note,

for those who think the unicode Aboriginal Serif font that came out
recently was a major step forward to creating language texts, now there
is an Aboriginal Sans version available.

i downloaded onto my Mac, typed in some Nez Perce and it looks great.

http://www.languagegeek.com/font/fontdownload.html

later,
phil
UofA, ILAT


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Thu Aug  5 06:22:00 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Thu, 5 Aug 2004 01:22:00 -0500
Subject: Fwd: Re: [A12n-forum] Aboriginal Unicode fonts
Message-ID: <THU.5.AUG.2004.012200.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Andrew Cunningham, in a reply to my posting news on this font to the "A12n"
lists, noted a small but not insignificant discrepancy in glyphs used for one
character, the capital "eng," in the 2 fonts. In the lower case it is
invariably an "n" with a longer right leg that curves leftward. The two
variants on the upper case are one that looks like the lower case but larger
("n-form"), and one that looks like the upper case with an added line curving
left from the right leg ("N-form"). The former is used in parts of Africa; the
latter in some northern European and Australian aboriginal languages.

As he notes (below), one font used the n-form capital, the other the N-form.

Don Osborn, Ph.D.         dzo at bisharat.net
*Bisharat! A language, technology & development initiative
*Bisharat! Initiative langues - technologie - d?veloppement
http://www.bisharat.net






----- Forwarded message from Andrew Cunningham -----

Donald Z. Osborn wrote:

> The Aboriginal Unicode fonts (ttf; serifed and now sans-serif in beta) seem
to
> have all the Latin character ranges, though the site's character map was
still
> under construction when I checked. It's free and should be useful for most
> African languages. Even though Africa was not the primary audience for the
font
> the version history indicates some attention to African needs.
>
> See http://www.languagegeek.com/font/fontdownload.html . (Pointer from the
ILAT
> list.)
>

Of the two families Aboriginal Sans and Aboriginal Serif

Aboriginal Sans uses the N-form of capital eng, while Aboriginal Serif uses the
n-form.

Andrew


--
Andrew Cunningham
e-Diversity and Content Infrastructure Solutions
Public Libraries Unit, Vicnet
State Library of Victoria
328 Swanston Street
Melbourne  VIC  3000
Australia

andrewc+AEA-vicnet.net.au

Ph. 3-8664-7430
Fax: 3-9639-2175

http://www.openroad.net.au/
http://www.libraries.vic.gov.au/
http://www.vicnet.net.au/


----- End forwarded message -----


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Thu Aug  5 06:32:47 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Thu, 5 Aug 2004 01:32:47 -0500
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <1091393476.ffa2985ff3c21@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <THU.5.AUG.2004.013247.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Phil, It may be of interest to include a link to a very short list of lists with
some or all traffic in one or another African language at
http://www.bisharat.net/links2.htm#11b . This needs an updating (any pointers
would be welcome). TIA...

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net



Quoting phil cash cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU>:

> Dear ILAT,
>
> i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
> indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
> ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
>
> please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
> you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.
>
> thanks,
> phil cash cash
> UofA, ILAT
>
> ~~~
>
> ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
>
> AZTLAN: Maya
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
> CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
> CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
> http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
>
> ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
>
> GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
> Greenland
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
>
> Indigenous Languages and Technology
> http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
>
> NAHUAT-L: The N??huatl Language of the Aztecs
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
>
> SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
>
> WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
>


From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG  Fri Aug  6 15:41:07 2004
From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 08:41:07 -0700
Subject: Finding Out About Natives
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.084107.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Need to find out something about Native California, or perhaps the rest
of Native America.  Find links @:
http://www.ncidc.org/links.htm

--


Andr? Cramblit: andre.p.cramblit.86 at alum.dartmouth.org is the Operations
Director Northern California Indian Development Council NCIDC
(http://www.ncidc.org) is a non-profit that meets the development needs
of American Indians

To subscribe to a news letter of interest to Natives send an email to:
IndigenousNewsNetwork-subscribe at topica.com or go to:
http://www.topica.com/lists/IndigenousNewsNetwork/subscribe/?location=listinfo


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Fri Aug  6 18:33:41 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 11:33:41 -0700
Subject: 60% of languages may go (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.113341.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

60% of languages may go

06/08/2004 07:09??-?(SA)?
http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1568950,00.html?

Leipzig - More than 60% of the world's 6 700 spoken languages and
dialects are threatened with eventual extinction due to the domination
of a few widely used languages, a linguist warned on Thursday.

Balthasar Bickel of Leipzig University said that in some cases there
were minority languages "spoken only by two or three old people."

He was speaking on the opening day of an international linguistic
congress here called Syntax of the World's Languages.

The meeting, ending on Sunday, is attended by about 200 specialists from
around the world who will consider the future of minority languages
such as Breton, the native Celtic language of Brittany in western
France, and Zulu, the Bantu tongue of South Africa.

Edited by Andrea Botha


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Fri Aug  6 18:36:06 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 11:36:06 -0700
Subject: SA languages boosted (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.113606.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

SA languages boosted

31/03/2004 08:49??-?(SA)??
http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0,6119,2-7-1442_1505745,00.html

Johannesburg - The South African government announced on Tuesday it is
about to embark on a project to bring indigenous languages into line
with current international norms.

This was the message from Minister of Minerals and Energy, Arts,
Culture, Science and Technology Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka when she
announced an innovative language scheme at the Durban Convention
Centre.

The minister said Africa as a whole had a woeful history as far as
honouring the languages of the people of the continent was concerned.

"African languages' biggest problem stems from the days of colonialism
and the ill-conceived idea that African languages were inferior to
colonial languages and unfit for any functional role in business or
politics," said the minister.

As part of a strategy to reverse this situation the minister announced
three initiatives - a bursary scheme, the establishment of language
research and development centres (LRDCs) and the launch of a human
language technologies (HLT) initiative.

"I would like to state that it is the government's goal to have all the
official languages of South Africa adequately developed in order to
serve the complex and diverse requirements of modern communication,"
she said.

"Developing a language requires the use of realistic strategies, and a
proper plan of action with clear goals and objectives. When one thinks
about developing languages one has to think about research, which
provides the backbone of all language development strategies.

Terminology, literature, research

"It is for this reason that we have decided to establish language
research and development centres and to link them with academic
institutions. The mandates of these centres are terminology
development, literature development and research, and language planning
research.

Mlambo-Ngcuka said the human language technologies unit would
co-ordinate the work that was done in terms of developing and managing
electronic language and speech resources in all the official languages
of South Africa.

Department spokesperson Xolile Mfaxa said the new technology could be
used in all sections of society such as universities, government and
the private sector in promoting the use of indigenous languages.

"We want to see capacity built along the lines of terminology so there
is no excuse for not using a particular language - for example not
using Zulu because it doesn't have certain technical terms."

Mfaxa said five bursaries worth R40?000 each, were awarded to
post-graduate students in the fields of translation and editing,
interpreting, terminology development, human language technologies and
language planning.

All of these initiatives follow the February 2003 adoption by government
of the National Language Policy Framework.

Edited by Tisha Steyn


From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG  Fri Aug  6 22:27:48 2004
From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 15:27:48 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <1091393476.ffa2985ff3c21@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.152748.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

    List Name   Karuk Language Restoration Issues (Karuk Language)
Purpose:        A place for those interested in the Karuk Language to discuse
items, events, learning strategies, ideas etc
Website URL:    http://www.ncidc.org
List Type:      Unmoderated discussion
Subscription:   Requires owner approval
Archive:        Readable by anyone
Created:        Mar 08, 2002
Owner:  andre cramblit
To Join:        Subscribe
<http://lists.topica.com/lists/KarukLanguage/subscribe/?location=listinfo>
here, or send an email to KarukLanguage-subscribe at topica.com
To Post:        Send mail to 'KarukLanguage at topica.com'
Stats:  39 subscribers / 2 messages per week
Categories:     Regional & Travel
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=182>  |  Countries
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=184>  |  United States
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=368>  |  Society & Culture
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=6897>  |  Cultures & Groups
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=7549>  |  Native American
<http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=2023>



phil cash cash wrote:

>Dear ILAT,
>
>i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
>indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
>ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
>
>please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
>you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.
>
>thanks,
>phil cash cash
>UofA, ILAT
>
>~~~
>
>ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
>
>AZTLAN: Maya
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
>CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
>CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
>http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
>
>ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
>
>GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
>Greenland
>http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
>
>Indigenous Languages and Technology
>http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
>
>NAHUAT-L: The N?huatl Language of the Aztecs
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
>
>SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
>
>WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
>http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
>
>
>

--


Andr? Cramblit: andre.p.cramblit.86 at alum.dartmouth.org is the Operations
Director Northern California Indian Development Council NCIDC
(http://www.ncidc.org) is a non-profit that meets the development needs
of American Indians

To subscribe to a news letter of interest to Natives send an email to:
IndigenousNewsNetwork-subscribe at topica.com or go to:
http://www.topica.com/lists/IndigenousNewsNetwork/subscribe/?location=listinfo


From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET  Fri Aug  6 23:01:37 2004
From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 16:01:37 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <411405E4.8080606@ncidc.org>
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.160137.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

cool!  thanks, Andre.  i will add to it my growing list.

phil
UofA, ILAT

On Aug 6, 2004, at 3:27 PM, Andre Cramblit wrote:

>    List Name   Karuk Language Restoration Issues (Karuk Language)
> Purpose:        A place for those interested in the Karuk Language to  
> discuse
> items, events, learning strategies, ideas etc
> Website URL:    http://www.ncidc.org
> List Type:      Unmoderated discussion
> Subscription:   Requires owner approval
> Archive:        Readable by anyone
> Created:        Mar 08, 2002
> Owner:  andre cramblit
> To Join:        Subscribe
> <http://lists.topica.com/lists/KarukLanguage/subscribe/? 
> location=listinfo>
> here, or send an email to KarukLanguage-subscribe at topica.com
> To Post:        Send mail to 'KarukLanguage at topica.com'
> Stats:  39 subscribers / 2 messages per week
> Categories:     Regional & Travel
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=182>  |  Countries
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=184>  |  United States
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=368>  |  Society & Culture
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=6897>  |  Cultures & Groups
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=7549>  |  Native American
> <http://lists.topica.com/dir/?cid=2023>
>
>
>
> phil cash cash wrote:
>
>> Dear ILAT,
>>
>> i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
>> indigenous languages.  a full listing will be made available on an
>> ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
>>
>> please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
>> you may know of.  enclosed below is my initial listing.
>>
>> thanks,
>> phil cash cash
>> UofA, ILAT
>>
>> ~~~
>>
>> ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
>>
>> AZTLAN: Maya
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>>
>> CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>>
>> CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
>> http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
>>
>> ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
>>
>> GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
>> Greenland
>> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
>>
>> Indigenous Languages and Technology
>> http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
>>
>> NAHUAT-L: The N?huatl Language of the Aztecs
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
>>
>> SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
>>
>> WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
>>
>>
>>
>
> --
>
>
> Andr? Cramblit: andre.p.cramblit.86 at alum.dartmouth.org is the  
> Operations
> Director Northern California Indian Development Council NCIDC
> (http://www.ncidc.org) is a non-profit that meets the development needs
> of American Indians
>
> To subscribe to a news letter of interest to Natives send an email to:
> IndigenousNewsNetwork-subscribe at topica.com or go to:
> http://www.topica.com/lists/IndigenousNewsNetwork/subscribe/? 
> location=listinfo
>


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Sat Aug  7 02:26:07 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 21:26:07 -0500
Subject: Study Guides & Strategies site
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.212607.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

If you're not already familiar with it, the Study Guides & Strategies site at
http://www.studygs.net/ is a great resource. What's more, the sites's creator,
Joe Landsberger of the University of St. Thomas (St. Paul, Minnesota), has
included translations into various languages and, as I understand it, is open
to adding more languages.

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net


From eduardo_rivail at YAHOO.COM  Sat Aug  7 03:37:17 2004
From: eduardo_rivail at YAHOO.COM (Eduardo Rivail Ribeiro)
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 20:37:17 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <1091393476.ffa2985ff3c21@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <FRI.6.AUG.2004.203717.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Dear Phil,

Hi. 'Etnoling??stica' is a discussion list on (lowland) South American indigenous languages.  It's located at the address below:

http://br.groups.yahoo.com/group/etnolinguistica/

Cordialmente,

Eduardo

phil cash cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU> wrote:
Dear ILAT,

i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
indigenous languages. a full listing will be made available on an
ilat-based informational website that is in progress.

please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
you may know of. enclosed below is my initial listing.

thanks,
phil cash cash
UofA, ILAT

~~~

ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html

AZTLAN: Maya
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html

CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree

ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html

GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
Greenland
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/

Indigenous Languages and Technology
http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html

NAHUAT-L: The N?huatl Language of the Aztecs
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html

SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html

WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html


----------------------------------
Eduardo Rivail Ribeiro
Museu Antropol?gico, Universidade Federal de Goi?s
Department of Linguistics, University of Chicago
http://www.etnolinguistica.org








---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages!
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040806/9e344045/attachment.htm>

From mikinakn at SHAW.CA  Sat Aug  7 05:26:03 2004
From: mikinakn at SHAW.CA (Rolland Nadjiwon)
Date: Sat, 7 Aug 2004 01:26:03 -0400
Subject: Study Guides & Strategies site
Message-ID: <SAT.7.AUG.2004.012603.0400.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Excellent suggestion...I have just emailed it to the students in my last
class...ENG 506 - Cultural Encounters. The semester is finished but they can
always use this resource. Megwetch

-------
wahjeh
rolland nadjiwon


----- Original Message -----
From: "Donald Z. Osborn" <dzo at BISHARAT.NET>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 06, 2004 10:26 PM
Subject: Study Guides & Strategies site


> If you're not already familiar with it, the Study Guides & Strategies site
at
> http://www.studygs.net/ is a great resource. What's more, the sites's
creator,
> Joe Landsberger of the University of St. Thomas (St. Paul, Minnesota), has
> included translations into various languages and, as I understand it, is
open
> to adding more languages.
>
> Don Osborn
> Bisharat.net
>


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Sat Aug  7 16:36:52 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Sat, 7 Aug 2004 09:36:52 -0700
Subject: Learning to connect (fwd)
Message-ID: <SAT.7.AUG.2004.093652.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Learning to connect
Language, culture classes help create pride in Navajo heritage

[photo inset - Matt Slocum/The Arizona Republic
Teacher Rachel Antonio of Phoenix will teach Navajo language at the
Phoenix Indian Center.]

Mikaela Crank
The Arizona Republic
Aug. 7, 2004 12:00 AM
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/northphoenix/articles/0807phx-navajolang0807Z3.html

Carolene Bitsui left the Navajo Reservation in 1997 to pursue her
education.

Over the years in the Valley, she obtained her degree in drafting and
began working as a draft technician at Wilson and Co. to support her
daughter and two younger sisters in Mesa.

But through her journey, she had to cope with her homesickness and the
cost of not living in a Navajo environment. She was neglecting her
language and losing her heritage.

That all changed in 2000 when she took a Navajo language and culture
class at the Phoenix Indian Center.

The classes resume Aug. 23, with an enhancement: Children's classes will
be offered for the first time.

Bitsui, 29, has already enrolled her 8-year-old daughter, RoeShae, in
the class. She wants her daughter to learn Navajo so she doesn't have
to go through what she went through.

"It was embarrassing when elders would ask me questions and I couldn't
respond," Bitsui said.

"I have been in the classes for three years now, and it has improved my
confidence. When I go home, I can speak to my family, and they are
proud that I am learning."

RoeShae already has taken cultural courses with Freddie Johnson and has
become prouder of her heritage, Bitsui said.

"She is more excited about her culture and she can say her clans in a
drop of a hat," Bitsui said. "Her friends would always ask questions
about her culture and she didn't know how to answer, but now she is
able to tell them about it."

The high volume of requests from parents helped initiate the
kindergarten through third-grade course, Navajo language instructor
Rachel Antonio said.

Since 2000, Antonio has been the primary language teacher and will be
teaching the children's class.

"A lot of Navajos don't learn their native language because they moved
to the city for jobs and school," Antonio said. "The classes really
help them learn the values and principles as a Navajo. We need to keep
the language alive down here (Phoenix)."

She also said she has seen the program grow tremendously.

In the beginning it was difficult for the Din? College teacher graduate
to create a curriculum and get the word out.

After the first year, the interest and demand increased. Antonio began
to teach beginning, intermediate and advanced adult language classes.

The curriculum contains regular assignments and exams of the basic
principles of the Navajo language. There are two classes a year,
limited to 30 people for each class.

Established in 1947, the Phoenix Indian Center has been a facility for
urban Native Americans to get job training and educational resources
and to interact with other tribal members.

It is a prominent tool in the Native American communities to experience
a successful city lifestyle but keep ties with their native roots.

"It's a great program," Bitsui said. "I want my family to be proud of
being Navajo."


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Sun Aug  8 17:18:09 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Sun, 8 Aug 2004 10:18:09 -0700
Subject: Indigenous Language listservs
In-Reply-To: <20040807033717.30617.qmail@web52905.mail.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <SUN.8.AUG.2004.101809.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Eduardo, thanks. i will add this listing to the list.

phil cash cash
UofA, ILAt




> ----- Message from eduardo_rivail at YAHOO.COM ---------
>     Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2004 20:37:17 -0700
>     From: Eduardo Rivail Ribeiro <eduardo_rivail at YAHOO.COM>
> Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology
<ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>  Subject: Re: Indigenous Language listservs
>       To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>
> Dear Phil,
>
> Hi. 'Etnoling??stica' is a discussion list on (lowland) South
> American indigenous languages.  It's located at the address below:
>
> http://br.groups.yahoo.com/group/etnolinguistica/
>
> Cordialmente,
>
> Eduardo
>
> phil cash cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU> wrote:
> Dear ILAT,
>
> i am presently compiling a resource listing of listservs devoted to
> indigenous languages. a full listing will be made available on an
> ilat-based informational website that is in progress.
>
> please direct me to or feel free to post any additional listings that
> you may know of. enclosed below is my initial listing.
>
> thanks,
> phil cash cash
> UofA, ILAT
>
> ~~~
>
> ATHLANG-L: Athabascan languages
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/athlang-l.html
>
> AZTLAN: Maya
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
> CHINOOK: The Chinook Studies List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/aztlan.html
>
> CREE: Cree language and culture discussion
> http://list.wayground.ca/mailman/listinfo/cree
>
> ENDANGERED-LANGUAGES-L: The Endangered Languages List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/endangered-languages-l.html
>
> GREENLANDIC: A list for all those interested in the language of
> Greenland
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/greenlandic/
>
> Indigenous Languages and Technology
> http://listserv.arizona.edu/archives/ilat.html
>
> NAHUAT-L: The N?huatl Language of the Aztecs
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nahuat-l.html
>
> SIOUAN: Siouan Languages
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/siouan.html
>
> WAKASHAN: Wakashan Linguistics List
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/wakashan.html
>
>
> ----------------------------------
> Eduardo Rivail Ribeiro
> Museu Antropol?gico, Universidade Federal de Goi?s
> Department of Linguistics, University of Chicago
> http://www.etnolinguistica.org
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> Do you Yahoo!?
> New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - Send 10MB messages!
>
> ----- End message from eduardo_rivail at YAHOO.COM -----


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug  9 15:41:03 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Mon, 9 Aug 2004 08:41:03 -0700
Subject: Action needed now to end abuse of =?iso-8859-1?b?d29ybGSScw==?=
 indigenous peoples =?iso-8859-1?b?lg==?= UN (fwd)
Message-ID: <MON.9.AUG.2004.084103.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Action needed now to end abuse of world?s indigenous peoples ? UN
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=11582&Cr=indigenous&Cr1=people#

9 August 2004 ? The United Nations today marked the International Day of
the World?s Indigenous People with calls to governments,
intergovernmental organizations and the international community
at-large for urgent action to end the gross human rights abuses,
discrimination and marginalization that all too often are still their
lot in society.

?For far too long, indigenous peoples? lands have been taken away, their
cultures denigrated or directly attacked, their languages and customs
suppressed, their wisdom and traditional knowledge overlooked or
exploited, and their sustainable ways of developing natural resources
dismissed,? Secretary-General Kofi Annan said.

?Some have even faced the threat of extinction,? he added in a message
observing the 10th anniversary of the Day, which also marks the closing
year of the International Decade of the World?s Indigenous People
proclaimed by the UN General Assembly to raise awareness about the
situation of indigenous people.

?Governments, intergovernmental organizations and civil society must
work to empower indigenous peoples and ensure their participation in
decisions that affect their lives,? he declared.

The Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation of indigenous
peoples of the UN Commission on Human Rights, Rodolfo Stavenhagen,
voiced deep concern over continuing reports of gross violations against
indigenous peoples worldwide.

?Despite the progress made over the past 10 years, at the national and
international levels, indigenous peoples the world over continue to be
among the most marginalized and dispossessed sectors of society, the
victims of perennial prejudice and discrimination,? he declared.

Mr. Stavenhagen noted the ?brutal killing? just last week of an
indigenous human rights activist in Colombia, Fredy Arias, allegedly by
a member of a paramilitary group, and called on the Colombian
Government to investigate this and other such violations and bring
those responsible to justice without delay.

?Indigenous peoples are also the victims of other types of violations,?
he added. ?In too many places they lack access to basic services and
continue to suffer multiple forms of discrimination elsewhere. I call
on Governments to make real progress on their commitment to improve the
living and human rights conditions of indigenous peoples. Rhetoric must
become a thing of the past; action is what is needed now.?


From anguksuar at YAHOO.COM  Mon Aug  9 16:25:34 2004
From: anguksuar at YAHOO.COM (Richard LaFortune)
Date: Mon, 9 Aug 2004 09:25:34 -0700
Subject: Laura Bush advocates Native language revitalization
In-Reply-To: <1091817366.6dd0f0a266f5f@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <MON.9.AUG.2004.092534.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

First Lady Laura Bush advocate of Native American
Language Revitalization

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/05/20030508-19.html

For Immediate Release
Office of Mrs. Bush
May 8, 2003

Remarks by Mrs. Bush at Reach Out and Read Event
&#150; Kayenta Indian Health Services

Ya'at'eeh. Thank you, Dana, Principal Baker,
Superintendent Allsbrook, and all of the students for
welcoming me to the home of the Mustangs. Thank you,
First Lady Shirley, Vice President and Mrs. Dayish for
welcoming me to Tohdenasshai. This is a beautiful and
blessed land which the Navajo proudly call home. My
name is Laura Bush and I'm from the small town of
Midland, Texas.

 I am so glad to be here to visit with all of you and
with my good friend, Linda White, who is the CEO of
the Kayenta Service Unit of the Navajo Indian Health
Services. Thank you, Linda, and all of the men and
women who work at the Kayenta Indian Health Services
for your dedication to the good health of Kayenta's
families and children. I applaud IHS for their
continued accreditation and for the work doctors and
nurses are doing here through Reach Out and Read.

Through Reach Out and Read, doctors and nurses
encourage parents and caregivers to read aloud to
their babies from their earliest days. Doctors and
nurses know that just as the human touch is necessary
for babies' physical and emotional growth, reading to
them is necessary for language development. During
clinic visits, doctors talk with parents and
caregivers about the importance of reading and they
give every child a new book to take home. I am happy
that Kayenta's Reach Out and Read clinic provides
children with books about Navajo poetry and language.

Educating and nurturing children is one of the
strongest traditions of the Navajo people. Another
strong tradition is serving in our military. The world
recognizes the Navajo Code Talkers who provided a
critical service to the United States during World War
II.

Thank you, Samuel Holiday, who is here with us today,
for your service and your courage. We continue to pray
for all who serve in our military and those in Iraq.
We also pray for their families and for those who have
lost loved ones. We pray especially for the family of
Lori Piestewa.

I know that the family is the core of the Navajo
culture, and I've learned that the four seasons
reflect on the importance of family, tradition and
education. As a five-fingered people, children are the
center of a family, where they are surrounded and
nurtured by parents and grandparents. One of the best
ways we can help nurture our children is through
education - and their education should begin before
they are even born.

The first sound a child hears is her mother's heart
beat. This sound carries a child through her entire
life and is repeated in the rhythm of traditional drum
songs. When a parent reads to a baby, the baby will
grow to love the sound of her parent's voice and of
hearing stories. Reading to children not only helps
them to develop, but it comforts them as well.
Children who are read to learn that reading and
stories are important - and that they are important.

We are entering the spring season, which is the
direction of the East. Spring is a time to focus on
young babies and the beginning of new life. As we wait
each year for the first thunder and for mother earth
to wake the world, parents can read to their children
to wake them to words, stories and learning. If we
talk to and listen to children, read with them, and
surround them with books - then we can help them
establish the skills and knowledge they need for
school and for life. And we keep alive the traditions
of storytelling and oral teachings, which are so
precious in every culture.

Many parents know the joy of reading to their
children, whether during cozy moments at bedtime or
breaks in a long day. Some of my happiest memories
from childhood are of the times my mother read to me.
And some of my favorite memories as a mother are of
reading to my own daughters. This is why Reach Out and
Read is so great. Pediatricians who prescribe reading
are not just helping children learn to read, but they
are helping parents as well.

I want to share a story with you about my friend, Dr.
Donna Bacchi, a pediatrician in Texas. She started a
reading program in her practice and gave her very
first reading prescription to a young boy with asthma.
She talked with the boy's mother about the importance
of reading and showed her how to hold her baby and a
book while reading. After a few minutes, the mom
leaned over and whispered in Dr. Bacchi's ear,
"Doctor, I do not know how to read." Fortunately, Dr.
Bacchi was prepared.

She connected the mother with a local family literacy
provider so she could learn how to read - so she could
read stories to her child, and maybe even more
important, the labels on her son's asthma medicine.
What an extraordinary opportunity to break the cycle
of illiteracy for one family and to enrich their lives
with reading and books. This is what Reach Out and
Read does for millions of children and their families.
And it is what education does for America.

I understand soon you will be entering the direction
of the South. With summer comes preparing children for
the future. The children here are in school right now.
But soon, as you grow and learn, you will go out into
the world to work or to college. Remember the words of
Chief Manuelito who said, "My grandchild, education is
the ladder." He encouraged his people to go to school
and to use their skills and education in their
communities.

There are ways you can give to the Navajo community.
Consider becoming a teacher here so Navajo children
will learn their language and culture in school. The
Kayenta Health Clinic needs Navajo doctors and nurses.
I understand that a new hospital will open here in a
few years. What a wonderful time to think about a
career in science or health care. Perhaps someday you
will talk to parents about the importance of reading
with their babies.

Whether you work here or go off to college, remember
that you are ambassadors of the Navajo nation.
Wherever you go, you can teach others about the
history and tradition of your people. That is what
Navajo poet Lucy Tapahonso does. Lucy visited the
White House last year during the second National Book
Festival. During this festival, we celebrate authors,
stories, and reading. Lucy spoke about the importance
of tradition and of sharing stories and language with
children.

Her words inspired everyone there, and today I hope
they will inspire all of us to continue to share the
joy of books, reading and education with children.
Lucy said, "To honor our children we must first honor
our ancestors. Let us walk then into the future, bound
by the hopeful words of all our grandparents. Let us
honor their wisdom and love of language which sustains
us all."

Education, reading and stories sustain us all and will
lead children home to Tohdenasshai - this land at the
end of the rainbow. Thank you and walk in beauty.




_______________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Express yourself with Y! Messenger! Free. Download now.
http://messenger.yahoo.com


From anguksuar at YAHOO.COM  Mon Aug  9 16:35:04 2004
From: anguksuar at YAHOO.COM (Richard LaFortune)
Date: Mon, 9 Aug 2004 09:35:04 -0700
Subject: Bush awardsNative language codetalkers
In-Reply-To: <20040809162534.79935.qmail@web11201.mail.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <MON.9.AUG.2004.093504.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Navajo Code Talkers Receive Congressional Gold Medal

Mr. CAMPBELL: Mr. President earlier today I was
honored to join President Bush, four of the five
surviving Navajo code talkers, their families, and the
families of all the Code Talkers in a ceremony in
which the President awarded the Code Talkers the
Congressional Gold Medal.

The ceremony also included other members of Congress,
Indian tribal leaders, and dignitaries from around the
nation.

For far too many Americans, bred on cynicism and
hopelessness, these men remind us what real American
heroes are all about.

It is unfortunate that we could not have recognized
these men and their contributions sooner than this.

Think of this ~W just 77 years before World War II, the
grandfathers of these heroes were forced at gunpoint
with 9,000 other Navajos from their homeland and
marched 300 miles through the burning desert. For four
long years the Navajo people were interned at the
Bosque Redondo.

For these men and their comrades to rise above that
injustice in American history and put their lives on
the line speaks of their character and their
patriotism.

Just as the Japanese were never able to break the
Navajo Code, it is also a mystery why it took so long
for our nation to recognize the critical role the Code
Talkers played in achieving victory in the Pacific.

The answer may lie in the secrecy of their mission.

The Navajo Code Talkers took part in every major
assault the U.S. Marines conducted in the Pacific from
1942 to 1945. It was their duty to transmit messages
in their native language (Dine Bizaad) ~W a code the
Japanese were never able to decipher.

Mr. Phillip Johnston, the son of a missionary to the
Navajos and one of the few non-Navajos who spoke the
Navajo language fluently, was the individual
responsible for recognizing the potential of the
Navajo people and language and the contributions they
could make to World War II.

A World War I veteran who knew the value of secure
communications, Johnston was reared on the Navajo
reservation, and recommended the Navajo language be
used for this purpose.

The Navajo language is complex because it has no
alphabet or symbols and fit the military's need for an
"undecipherable code".

Johnston staged tests under simulated combat
conditions with the commanding general of the
Amphibious Corps, Pacific Fleet.

The tests demonstrated that Navajos could encode,
transmit and decode a three-line message in 20
seconds. After the simulation the Navajo were
recommended to the Commandant of the Marine Corps to
serve as Code Talkers. It was recommended that the
Marines recruit 200 Navajos.

In May 1942, the first 29 of the 200 requested Navajo
recruits attended boot camp. During this time they
developed and memorized a dictionary and numerous
words for military terms.

After the successful completion of boot camp, the Code
Talkers were sent to a Marine unit deployed in the
Pacific theater. At this duty station it became the
primary job of the Code Talkers to transmit
information on tactics, troop movements, orders, and
other vital battlefield communications over telephones
and radios.

The Navajos were praised for their skill, speed and
accuracy in communications throughout the War.

At Iwo Jima, Major Howard Connor, 5th Marine Division
Signal officer, declared, "Were it not for the
Navajos, the Marines would never have taken Iwo Jima."
Connor had six Navajo Code Talkers who worked around
the clock during the first two days of the battle
sending and receiving over 800 messages --- all
without error.

The Japanese, who were skilled code breakers, were
confused by the Navajo language. The Japanese chief of
intelligence, Lieutenant General Seizo Arisue said
that while they were at times able to decipher the
codes used by the other armed forces, they never were
able to crack the code used by the Marines and
Navajos.

American Indians and their commitment to this nation
can be described in one quote from David E. Patterson,
of the 4th Marine Division, "When I was inducted into
the service, one of the commitments I made was that I
was willing to die for my country~Vthe U.S., the Navajo
Nation, and my family. My [native] language was my
weapon."

I would like to thank the Navajo code talkers who
served in World War II for their dedication and
bravery to our nation.

They believed in what they fought for and were willing
to sacrifice their lives to create a communication
system that was unbreakable.

Without these brave men and their knowledge of their
language, the success of our nation's military efforts
in the Pacific would not have been possible.

I urge all Americans to thank these brave men for
their uncommon valor and dedication to a cause higher
than themselves.

I thank the chair and yield the floor.

* * *




__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage!
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Wed Aug 11 19:09:11 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Wed, 11 Aug 2004 12:09:11 -0700
Subject: UNESCO to Publish Handbook on Language Preservation and
 Documentation (fwd)
Message-ID: <WED.11.AUG.2004.120911.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

UNESCO
http://www.unesco.org/
Francia
Educaci?n?>?Organizaciones @@
Noticia n?:?30621
Agencia emisora:?
mi? 11 Ago 2004

UNESCO to Publish Handbook on Language Preservation and Documentation

Aim?e Lahaussois, a Linguistic Expert in Nepalese languages, along with
several leading international experts in linguistic and language
revitalization, have been developing a Language Preservation Handbook.
This project is one of the activities carried out by UNESCO?s
Initiative B at bel which seeks to promote multilingualism in cyberspace
and preserve endangered languages.

Recently, Aim?e was in Nepal carrying out independent research on
endangered languages. She seized the opportunity to use the handbook
and field test its effectiveness.

The handbook, entitled ?Language Preservation and Documentation
Handbook: South Asia version?, provides a methodology for native
speakers of endangered languages to record their languages for
posterity. The project was inspired by requests from several members of
ethnic minorities in Nepal who were interested in self documenting
their languages. For many ethnic groups, assimilation and other
processes have lead to the decline of indigenous culture as well as
their languages and knowledge systems. UNESCO would like to see this
rich human heritage preserved.

The handbook guides the reader through the process of collecting
linguistic data on one?s endangered language in the absence of a
linguist, as well as stories which are an important part of the
heritage of the community. The document begins with a questionnaire
covering background information on the language community, followed by
advice on creating a writing system, and lists of key words. It then
guidelines them in recording and transcribing stories, and concludes
with material on various aspects of the grammar of the language,
through questionnaires and translation exercises. Oral recordings of
the languages are also an important part of this exercise.

Here are some of the impressions of Aim?e Lahaussois? first experience
with the handbook:

?Working with a young speaker of an endangered language reinforced for
me what documentation is all about, and why it is important to provide
tools so native speakers can carry out their own documentation: after
three weeks of excellent work with a very talented and enthusiastic
speaker, I tried to pay him as compensation for the time and energy he
put into our sessions, thinking this would be welcome, as life is
particularly difficult for students in a developing country. I was
moved when he refused the money, citing that it was I who deserved
compensation as I was doing his community the enormous favour of making
sure their language was recorded and preserved. Clearly there is a
great need for efforts such as this.?

It is hoped that the results will not only provide a record of the
language, as spoken by native speakers, but will also stimulate renewed
community-wide interest in the language, which may in turn reduce the
rate at which languages are being lost.

Indeed, a great many minority languages are disappearing around the
world and those which disappear without a trace represent a great loss
of cultural heritage. One critical reason is that they are not being
passed on to the younger generations. Some of the causes include
pressure on children to use national languages, unavailability of
education in the language spoken at home, migration away from the
homeland amongst others. Often, only older speakers are left and when
they disappear, so do these languages. In the case of languages with no
written form which have not been documented, no trace remains of what
was once a vibrant and unique language and culture.

A CD-ROM and print version of this handbook will be published by the end
of September.

11/08/2004


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Wed Aug 11 19:18:24 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Wed, 11 Aug 2004 12:18:24 -0700
Subject: UNESCO to Publish Handbook on Language Preservation and
 Documentation (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <1092251351.8e325630db546@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <WED.11.AUG.2004.121824.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

here is the news link...
http://www.noticias.info/Asp/aspComunicados.asp?nid=30621&src=0

> ----- Message from cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU ---------
>     Date: Wed, 11 Aug 2004 12:09:11 -0700
>     From: phil cash cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU>
> Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology
<ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>  Subject: UNESCO to Publish Handbook on Language Preservation and
Documentation (fwd)
>       To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>
> UNESCO
> http://www.unesco.org/
> Francia
> Educaci?n?>?Organizaciones @@
> Noticia n?:?30621
> Agencia emisora:?
> mi? 11 Ago 2004
>
> UNESCO to Publish Handbook on Language Preservation and Documentation
>
> Aim?e Lahaussois, a Linguistic Expert in Nepalese languages, along
> with
> several leading international experts in linguistic and language
> revitalization, have been developing a Language Preservation
> Handbook.
> This project is one of the activities carried out by UNESCO?s
> Initiative B at bel which seeks to promote multilingualism in cyberspace
> and preserve endangered languages.
>
> Recently, Aim?e was in Nepal carrying out independent research on
> endangered languages. She seized the opportunity to use the handbook
> and field test its effectiveness.
>
> The handbook, entitled ?Language Preservation and Documentation
> Handbook: South Asia version?, provides a methodology for native
> speakers of endangered languages to record their languages for
> posterity. The project was inspired by requests from several members
> of
> ethnic minorities in Nepal who were interested in self documenting
> their languages. For many ethnic groups, assimilation and other
> processes have lead to the decline of indigenous culture as well as
> their languages and knowledge systems. UNESCO would like to see this
> rich human heritage preserved.
>
> The handbook guides the reader through the process of collecting
> linguistic data on one?s endangered language in the absence of a
> linguist, as well as stories which are an important part of the
> heritage of the community. The document begins with a questionnaire
> covering background information on the language community, followed
> by
> advice on creating a writing system, and lists of key words. It then
> guidelines them in recording and transcribing stories, and concludes
> with material on various aspects of the grammar of the language,
> through questionnaires and translation exercises. Oral recordings of
> the languages are also an important part of this exercise.
>
> Here are some of the impressions of Aim?e Lahaussois? first
> experience
> with the handbook:
>
> ?Working with a young speaker of an endangered language reinforced
> for
> me what documentation is all about, and why it is important to
> provide
> tools so native speakers can carry out their own documentation: after
> three weeks of excellent work with a very talented and enthusiastic
> speaker, I tried to pay him as compensation for the time and energy
> he
> put into our sessions, thinking this would be welcome, as life is
> particularly difficult for students in a developing country. I was
> moved when he refused the money, citing that it was I who deserved
> compensation as I was doing his community the enormous favour of
> making
> sure their language was recorded and preserved. Clearly there is a
> great need for efforts such as this.?
>
> It is hoped that the results will not only provide a record of the
> language, as spoken by native speakers, but will also stimulate
> renewed
> community-wide interest in the language, which may in turn reduce the
> rate at which languages are being lost.
>
> Indeed, a great many minority languages are disappearing around the
> world and those which disappear without a trace represent a great
> loss
> of cultural heritage. One critical reason is that they are not being
> passed on to the younger generations. Some of the causes include
> pressure on children to use national languages, unavailability of
> education in the language spoken at home, migration away from the
> homeland amongst others. Often, only older speakers are left and when
> they disappear, so do these languages. In the case of languages with
> no
> written form which have not been documented, no trace remains of what
> was once a vibrant and unique language and culture.
>
> A CD-ROM and print version of this handbook will be published by the
> end
> of September.
>
> 11/08/2004
>
>
> ----- End message from cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU -----


From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG  Fri Aug 13 17:05:31 2004
From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit)
Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2004 10:05:31 -0700
Subject: Sacred Use Not Abuse
Message-ID: <FRI.13.AUG.2004.100531.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Some Fun Items For You

http://www.ncidc.org/tupe/trad.htm

Word Search!
Find the words hidden right to left, backwards, and diagonal! Can you
find them all?


Confidential Tobacco Survey-Please take a moment and fill out this
simple, short, and confidential survey! Your participation is very much
appreciated!!

Download posters and graphics! For non-commercial use only, please!


Tons of information also available @:
http://www.ncidc.org/tupe/tobaccolinks.htm


From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Mon Aug 16 16:52:11 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 10:52:11 -0600
Subject: Lipan Centennial, Elk Springs: Sept 4th & 5th
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.105211.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Nzu

The Lipan Apache People at Mescalero are having a Centennial Celebration commemorating their arrival in Mescalero on the Saturday and Sunday of Labor Day week-end, September 4th & 5th. All the Tribes are invited, and drum groups and dancers are encouraged to contact Lipan Elder Meredith Begay at 505.585.1258. 

Please call In the Afternoon, after 2 pm,  on Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays, or anytime during the day Tuesdays or Thursdays or on the week-ends. She has an answering machine, so leave a message if she isn't there and she will call you back. 

If people on this list are on other Native lists, can you please share the invitation? 

Thanks, 

Mia Kalish, 
Lipan Centennial Committee
for: Meredith Ma'iush Begay, Chairwoman


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/80c48c5e/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Ivy.gif
Type: image/gif
Size: 5665 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/80c48c5e/attachment.gif>

From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Mon Aug 16 17:01:35 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 11:01:35 -0600
Subject: No subject
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.110135.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Nzu

The Lipan Apache People at Mescalero are having a Centennial Celebration commemorating their arrival in Mescalero on the Saturday and Sunday of Labor Day week-end, September 4th & 5th. All the Tribes are invited, and drum groups and dancers are encouraged to contact Lipan Elder Meredith Begay at 505.585.1258. 

Please call In the Afternoon, after 2 pm,  on Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays, or anytime during the day Tuesdays or Thursdays or on the week-ends. She has an answering machine, so leave a message if she isn't there and she will call you back. 

If people on this list are on other Native lists, can you please share the invitation? 

Thanks, 

Mia Kalish, 
Lipan Centennial Committee
for: Meredith Ma'iush Begay, Chairwoman

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/907a350d/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Ivy.gif
Type: image/gif
Size: 5665 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/907a350d/attachment.gif>

From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Mon Aug 16 17:15:46 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 11:15:46 -0600
Subject: Lipan Centennial Web Site
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.111546.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Nzu. 

I forgot to mention that there is a website with all kinds of information for the Centennial, from directions to the site, where to get good car service and medical care, and local things to do. 

it is at: www.LearningForPeople.us/Lipan. 

best, 
Mia 

Sorry for the double posting. . . 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/9a10b1f1/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Ivy.gif
Type: image/gif
Size: 5665 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/9a10b1f1/attachment.gif>

From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug 16 17:41:40 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 10:41:40 -0700
Subject: United States considered the place `where languages come to die'
 (fwd)
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.104140.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Posted on Mon, Aug. 16, 2004

United States considered the place `where languages come to die'

BY GWENDOLYN DRISCOLL
The Orange County Register
http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/news/nation/9413651.htm

SANTA ANA, Calif. - (KRT) - To become one of the last living speakers of
the Acjachemen language, you first have to pass an unusual test.

Ka`chi Lobo Golden, the ceremonial teacher and "Revealer" of the San
Juan Capistrano, Calif.-based Acjachemen tribe, will sit on a hill near
her home and "release" your name into the wind. She will wait six days
for a response.

"If the wind says yes, I will teach."

For a tribe such as the Acjachemen, a scattered and as-yet federally
unrecognized group of approximately 3,000 Orange County American
Indians, such mysticism may seem a lackadaisical response to a pressing
dilemma: the extinction of their language.

Golden, however, is phlegmatic.

"I'm the last Mohican," she said, referring to her status as the last
living speaker of the Acjachemen language. "But I come from the
knowledge that nothing is ever lost. It just goes into the belly of
Earth Mother for a time."

Golden instructs a few students every year in the Acjachemen "spiritual"
language, a derivative of the Acjachemen common tongue that is used
mostly for ceremonial and spiritual purposes. Her efforts, and those of
a handful of others within and outside the tribe, may determine the
life or death of Orange County's first - and currently smallest -
language group.

It also illustrates the difficulty of preserving language in a nation
that linguists often grimly refer to as the "language cemetery."

"The United States is where languages come to die," said Rosemary Feal,
Executive Director of the Modern Language Association. "We often see
the first generation speaks (a language) but by the third generation
their children may know only a few words."

Different factors contribute to the loss of languages, including
migration, economics and the pressure to fit in, Feal said.

In the case of Acjachemen, racist attitudes in existence since the time
of first contact - the arrival of the Spanish in California in the 16th
century - are responsible for the steady erosion of native language,
according to Damien Shilo, chairman of the Acjachemen Nation Tribal
Council. In the mid-1800s a bounty encouraged white settlers to hunt
and kill American Indians, prompting many Acjachemen people to speak
Spanish and adopt Mexican names. California - once one of the most
linguistically diverse places in the world - lost up to 70 percent of
its native languages in the process.

"Your language and your culture had to be pushed underground, because to
openly admit that was a death sentence," Shilo said.

By the 1980s, as the last native speakers approached their 90s, many
tribes launched language revitalization programs to save what remained
of Navajo, Comanche, Creek and other native languages. California
tribes were aided by the discovery in the Smithsonian Institution of
notes and taped recordings of fluent speakers made in the 1930s by
famed linguist John Peabody Harrington. But the Acjachemen, embroiled
in a decades-long quest for federal recognition and riven by tribal
squabbles, say they do not have the resources to devote to learning
their mother tongue.

"So much energy is taken by this tribe trying to define themselves,"
said Micael Merrifield, a professor of anthropology at Saddleback
College who is writing a book about the tribe. "They don't have time to
organize a whole, structured language learning program."

A "dead" language may be a liability for the Acjachemen, who currently
stand second in line in the arduous process of federal recognition.
Some within the tribe say that the lack of a living language makes it
easier for the government to deny their existence. Others play down the
issue, noting that even federally recognized tribes are struggling to
preserve their languages.

In the meantime, well-meaning - if not always well-funded or organized -
volunteers try to fill the gap.

Ka`chi Golden teaches language through traditional song.

Kelina Lobo, a University of Arizona graduate student, conducted a
statistical comparison between the Acjachemen and the related Luiseno
language.

She drew on living dictionaries such as Marguerite Lobo, 89, who
remembers her mother speaking "Indian."

Her brother, Wick, 70, preserves a handwritten "Lobo Lexicon" compiled
in 1937 by his late sister, Viola, of 212 phonetically spelled
Acjachemen words.

"We need to find somebody who can speak it fluently and have classes,"
said Wick Lobo. "If we can reach a critical mass of speakers, it's
conceivable that in the next 20 years, our language will rise again."

---

? 2004, The Orange County Register (Santa Ana, Calif.).


From sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug 16 18:59:44 2004
From: sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Susan D Penfield)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 11:59:44 -0700
Subject: Fwd: Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy now posted on the
 web
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.115944.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>








----- Forwarded message from ssachs at iupui.edu -----
    Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2004 15:48:14 -0500
    From: "Stephen M. Sachs" <ssachs at iupui.edu>
Reply-To: "Stephen M. Sachs" <ssachs at iupui.edu>
 Subject: Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy now posted on the web
      Aho Kola!

The Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy, focusing on
international indigenous developments, is now posted on the web at
http://www.indigenouspolicy.org. The archive of  past issues of IPJ,
and its predecessor, Native American Policy, is being developed and
is partly available now (August 13).

We welcome articles, news, media information and announcements
relating to American Indian and international indigenous policy.

Walk in beauty.

Warmly,
Steve
Stephen Sachs
Coordinating Editor

----- End forwarded message -----
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040816/91eeeac0/attachment.htm>

From HeitshuS at U.LIBRARY.ARIZONA.EDU  Mon Aug 16 20:17:11 2004
From: HeitshuS at U.LIBRARY.ARIZONA.EDU (Heitshu, Sara)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2004 13:17:11 -0700
Subject: Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy now posted on the w
 eb
Message-ID: <MON.16.AUG.2004.131711.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Susan,
I am having this cataloged for the library, the periodical, I mean.  It
looks like fall 2003 is available online as well.  I hope it will continue
to appear online.

Sara

Sara C. Heitshu
Librarian, Social Science Team
American Indian Studies, Linguistics, Anthropology
heitshus at u.library.arizona.edu
520-621-2297
fax 520-621-9733
University of Arizona Main Library
PO Box 210055
Tucson, AZ 85721-0055

-----Original Message-----
From: Susan D Penfield [mailto:sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU]
Sent: Monday, August 16, 2004 12:00 PM
To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
Subject: Fwd: Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy now posted on the
web








----- Forwarded message from ssachs at iupui.edu -----
    Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2004 15:48:14 -0500
    From: "Stephen M. Sachs" <ssachs at iupui.edu>
Reply-To: "Stephen M. Sachs" <ssachs at iupui.edu>
 Subject: Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy now posted on the web
      Aho Kola!

The Special Summer Issue of Indigenous Policy, focusing on
international indigenous developments, is now posted on the web at
http://www.indigenouspolicy.org. The archive of  past issues of IPJ,
and its predecessor, Native American Policy, is being developed and
is partly available now (August 13).

We welcome articles, news, media information and announcements
relating to American Indian and international indigenous policy.

Walk in beauty.

Warmly,
Steve
Stephen Sachs
Coordinating Editor

----- End forwarded message -----


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Tue Aug 17 16:54:33 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Tue, 17 Aug 2004 09:54:33 -0700
Subject: Lyrical Indian Tongue Thrives in Paraguay (fwd)
Message-ID: <TUE.17.AUG.2004.095433.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Lyrical Indian Tongue Thrives in Paraguay
Mon Aug 16, 2004 10:24 AM ET

By Mary Milliken
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=ourWorldNews&storyID=5986825

ASUNCION, Paraguay (Reuters) - A ring in the Guarani language translates
literally as "a companion of the finger," while an airplane is "a bird
with hard wings that flies" and a telephone is "a line that permits one
to speak from afar."

Every phrase evokes the beauty of South America's jungles and plains and
the ways of the indigenous peoples that populated them. Some say it is
a language stuck in time warp, from an era when Guarani women wooed
Spanish colonizers with their sing-song tongue.

But Guarani is alive and kicking, changing and evolving. And that is
because it is the only Indian language in the Americas designated as an
official language.

In 1992, Paraguay reformed its Constitution to make Spanish and Guarani
the two official languages of the landlocked nation of 5.6 million
mostly mixed race people.

Now there is a new champion for the bilingual cause -- President Nicanor
Duarte Frutos, an avid Guarani speaker who is called "tendota" or
supreme chief in Guarani. He used it on the campaign trail in last
year's election to charm voters, appealing to their love of the "teta"
or fatherland.

But this newfound hope for Guarani has also fueled the debate over the
role of an indigenous language in a rapidly modernizing Latin America,
where English and other foreign languages are making inroads with
students anxious to participate in the world.

"Since it was officially recognized, the language has certainly
prospered," said Marta Lafuente, Paraguay's vice minister of education.

"But there has also been resistance. Some say the consolidation of
Guarani means we will end up just talking among ourselves."

The language survived a 35-year dictatorship under Gen. Alfredo
Stroessner, who banned Guarani and reinforced its reputation as the
tongue of country bumpkins. Parents would speak Guarani to each other,
but scolded their children when they tried to do the same.

Today nearly everyone in Paraguay speaks some Guarani, no matter the
social class or education level. It is the dominant language in rural
Paraguay, but its also can be heard on most every street corner in the
capital, Asuncion.

No indigenous language in the Americas can boast such a broad following.
Quechua in Peru or Mayan in Central America and Mexico are rarely
spoken by non-Indians, while languages of the Indian tribes in the
United States are increasingly limited to the elders.

TO LOVE AND TO SCOLD

Duarte Frutos was education minister in 1994 when Paraguay began its
reform to provide bilingual education. Ten years on, educators and
linguists express a certain frustration with the results.

They say the debate has centered too much around vocabulary, like what
to call objects of the modern age. The so-called purists insist on
creating words while the other school is more in favor of "borrowing"
words from Spanish.

Television is a case in point. Almost every language in the world has a
word that is like television, but in Guarani it is "the object that
moves."

"They want to invent Guarani all over again," said linguist and diplomat
Ruben Bareiro Saguier, a pioneer of bilingual Paraguay. "We need a
Guarani that is useful."

Educators also have to overcome a history of discrimination against
Guarani speakers. Many parents in Guarani-speaking homes oppose
schooling for their children in their mother tongue and want only
Spanish, the language they think will take their offspring out of
poverty and illiteracy.

The backers of bilingualism also say Paraguay has yet to put Guarani in
all instances of public service, for example on street signs, court
rooms or documents. Guarani-speakers need to know they can always have
a trial or receive advanced medical care in their first language.

But professionals from the middle and upper classes are increasingly
aware of the need to be fluent in Guarani and even foreigners working
in Paraguay feel compelled to learn.

"Guarani is the soul or spirit of Paraguay. If we don't understand
Guarani, we don't understand Paraguay or its people," said Yoshikazu
Furukawa, consul at the Japanese Embassy in Asuncion.

Indeed, Guarani is the basis of Paraguay's rich oral culture and is best
suited for romance, relationships, family life and community
integration.

"It is a language for loving and for scolding," said Lafuente.

It was love that allowed Guarani to survive after the Spanish
conquistadores came to this isolated and distant heart of South America
without women from home.

Unlike many mestizos in colonial times, the offspring of the Spanish
with the Guarani women earned special rights to hold public office. And
for these love children, it was the mother tongue that mattered.

(Additional reporting by Daniela Desantis)


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Tue Aug 17 18:31:46 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Tue, 17 Aug 2004 11:31:46 -0700
Subject: Lexique Pro 2.0 release (fwd announcement)
Message-ID: <TUE.17.AUG.2004.113146.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

fwd from the "Lexicographylist"...

From: "Richard Margetts" <richard_margetts at sil.org>
Date: August 17, 2004 7:47:23 AM MST
To: <lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com>
Subject: [Lexicog]  Lexique Pro - software for viewing/distributing
lexicon data
Reply-To: lexicographylist at yahoogroups.com

This is to announce the release of Lexique Pro 2.0.

Lexique Pro is an interactive lexicon viewer, with hyperlinks between
entries, category views, dictionary reversal, search and export tools.
It
can be configured to display your Toolbox/Shoebox database in a
user-friendly format so that you can distribute it to others.

It's available at www.lexiquepro.com. Here you can find a summary of
features, screenshots, as well as downloads.

You are free to use and distribute it with your lexicon data. It is
approved
as SIL experimental software and listed on the SIL software catalog
website.

Hope it can be useful.

-----
Richard Margetts
SIL Mali


From Rrlapier at AOL.COM  Tue Aug 17 22:11:10 2004
From: Rrlapier at AOL.COM (Rrlapier at AOL.COM)
Date: Tue, 17 Aug 2004 18:11:10 EDT
Subject: Blackfeet History Conference
Message-ID: <TUE.17.AUG.2004.181110.EDT.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Please Forward


Nitawahsin-nanni (Our Land) History Conference

The Piegan Institute will hold a one-day history conference Nitawahsin-nanni 
(Our Land) which will examine Blackfeet land use practices and the ancestral 
landscape on Friday, August 20, 2004 at the Nizipuhwahsin School in Browning 
from 10:00am to 4:00PM. The conference is free and open to the public.

The conference will be moderated by Darrell Robes Kipp, Executive Director of 
Piegan Institute, and feature presenters who will discuss land use practices, 
the ancestral landscape and places of significance to the Blackfeet in 
present day Alberta and Montana.

Narcisse Blood and Francis First Charger from the Kainai Studies Department 
at Red Crow College, Alberta will discuss their on-going project on Blackfeet 
place names and developing a map of the Blackfeet landscape. 

Gerald A. Oetelaar and Joy Oetelaar from the Department of Archaeology at the 
University of Calgary will discuss the lost landscape of the Blackfeet and 
understanding Blackfoot perceptions and uses of the landscape on the Northern 
Plains.

Glen Still Smoking, a graduate student in the Anthropology Department at the 
University of Montana will discuss Blackfeet uses of pisskan or buffalo jumps 
across ancestral Blackfeet territory.

Piegan Institute is a private not-for-profit organization with programs 
dedicated to researching, promoting and preserving the Blackfeet? language. This 
conference is co-sponsored by the O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West 
and the Native American Studies Department at the University of Montana. 

For more information on the conference or directions to Nizipuhwahsin please 
call Rosalyn LaPier at 406-338-3518 or rrlapier at pieganinstitute.org.





Rosalyn LaPier
Piegan Institute
www.pieganinstitute.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040817/99483792/attachment.htm>

From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Wed Aug 18 18:30:07 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Wed, 18 Aug 2004 11:30:07 -0700
Subject: Technology-Enhanced Language Revitalization
Message-ID: <WED.18.AUG.2004.113007.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

t??c hal?Xp!
(good day)

I am announcing a newly created website: Technology-Enhanced Language
Revitalization.

http://projects.ltc.arizona.edu/gates/TELR.html

The goal of Technology-Enhanced Language Revitalization (@ the
university of arizona) is to establish an informational resource for
community language specialists, advocates, and linguists centering on
the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) in language
revitalization.

Feel free to distribute this announcement!  We also ask for your kind
comments on the content and structure of this website as we continue to
update, improve, and add information.

qe?ciy?ewy?ew,
(thank you)

Phil Cash Cash (Cayuse/Nez Perce)
Ph.d in the Joint Program in Anthropology and Linguistics
University of Arizona, Tucson
mailto: cashcash at u.arizona.edu
http://www.u.arizona.edu/~cashcash

ps: thank you Bill and Melinda Gates.


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Thu Aug 19 15:53:58 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2004 08:53:58 -0700
Subject: Inuit researchers to give more information to Inuit (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.19.AUG.2004.085358.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

August 20, 2004

Inuit researchers to give more information to Inuit
Language, history and culture top Inuit Studies Conference agenda
http://www.nunatsiaq.com/news/nunavut/40820_10.html

NUNATSIAQ NEWS

How to communicate research results and information to Inuit: that's
what brought 100 or so academics, researchers and bureaucrats to the
14th International Inuit Studies Conference this week in Calgary.

The conference at the Arctic Institute of North America, which wrapped
us last week, focused on Bringing knowledge home: communicating
research to the Inuit.

Participants from Canada, the U.S., Greenland, Russia and France,
discussed how knowledge can cross from one culture to the next, the
ways Inuit and Qallunaat communicate and how to make sure the results
of community-based research reach communities.

Research papers presented at the conference included a look back at the
Watkins Gospel Selections, the first book published in Inuktitut
syllabics.

Iqaluit businessman, author and historian Kenn Harper spoke about the
missionaries' early efforts to develop literacy for missionary purposes
among Inuit.

Harper tells how the syllabic writing system invented for the Cree was
first introduced to the Inuit in 1855 by Rev. E.A. Watkins at Fort
George and Little Whale River on the James Bay and Hudson Bay coasts.

In that same year, Watkins prepared a small book of gospel selections in
syllabics and sent it to Rev. John Horden in Moose Factory who printed
it on his mission press.

This small book, says Harper, is one of the earliest items printed on
Horden's press and the only one that was printed in Inuktitut. Only one
copy is known to have survived.

The use of Inuktitut languages as a means of communication in today's
North was also on the conference's program, with Eva Aariak, Nunavut's
official languages commissioner, speaking about "How will Nunavut speak
to the future? Changes to Nunavut's Official Languages Act."

Several Greenlanders, including Carl "Puju" Olsen, were at the
conference to speak about Greenland's language policy review and the
need for more Greenlandic terminology, that is, more specialized,
modern words.

Bolatta Vahl from the Greenland Language Secretariat says Greenlandic
needs to develop more terminology because many Greenlanders, who study
in Danish, can "better express their knowledge of the subject in
Danish, even though they have Greenlandic as their mother tongue."

Representatives from ArcticNet, the new environmental ship-board
research project, the Nasivvik centre for environmental health and the
Nunavik Research Centre also told how they communicate information to
Inuit.

Several researchers highlighted their experience using the Internet and
new technology as communication tools for projects including "Healthy
living in Nunavut," a new on-line nutrition course for health workers
in Nunavut, an Alaskan CD-ROM called the "People Awakening Project,"
which encourages sobriety, and "When the weather is Uggianaqtuq," Shari
Fox Gearheard's CD-ROM that uses interactive, multimedia technology to
document and communicate Inuit knowledge about the environment in two
Nunavut communities.

Norman Cohn and Zacharias Kunuk from Igloolik Isuma Productions spoke
about the art of community-base filmmaking and its role in
communication.

"We create traditional artifacts, digital multimedia and
desperately-needed jobs in the same activity."

>From the Siberian Far East region of Kamchatka, Nina Belomestnova gave
an impassioned defence of how newspaper articles promote the culture,
language and well-being of the small indigenous population of Evenks.

How to get information from archives and bring this to the public was
also discussed, with several researchers interested in the history of
Panniqtuuq's former St. Luke's Hospital.


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Thu Aug 19 15:56:38 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2004 08:56:38 -0700
Subject: Africa's indigenous-language press is focus of new study (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.19.AUG.2004.085638.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Africa's indigenous-language press is focus of new study
Aug 19, 2004
http://www.ijnet.org/FE_Article/newsarticle.asp?UILang=1&CId=241571&CIdLang=1

African media academics and publishers are invited to submit research
papers on the current status and future potential of the continent's
indigenous-language press.

The University of Lagos project is designed to highlight the history of
indigenous-language newspapers and journals in Africa, beginning with
the earliest known indigenous-language newspaper in Nigeria, Iwe Irohin
Fun Awon Ara Egba ati Yoruba, first published in 1859.

The initiative will also chart possible growth strategies for the
indigenous-language press. They plan to explore the reasons behind the
phenomenal boom in isiZulu newspapers in South Africa over the past two
years.

Abiodun Salawu, a lecturer at the University of Lagos and the project's
coordinator, says scholars have neglected the study of Africa's
indigenous language press despite the fact that language is one of the
most characteristic elements of any culture.

Organizers are looking for papers on the following topics: the history
of specific indigenous language publications in Africa; editorial
content policies and strategies; advertisements, graphics and design;
language styles; use for development communication; readership; and
management. Interested researchers should send abstracts outlining
their proposed papers before submitting any finished work.

For more information, contact Salawu at salawuabiodun at yahoo.com or
telephone (+234-802) 345-1461.


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Thu Aug 19 22:47:17 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Thu, 19 Aug 2004 15:47:17 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.19.AUG.2004.154717.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.


From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US  Fri Aug 20 13:57:12 2004
From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 07:57:12 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.075712.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Once again, as with these kinds of studies, it's a deficit grammar
postulated ("primitive tribe unable to count because of their
language!").  To the degree which this study is accurate, (I'm always
amazed as to how often they turn out to not in fact be accurate), it is
simply showing a culture that has not found a compelling reason to
count, so, not surprisingly, adults are not good at it, and, not
surprisingly, the lexical items are absent in the language.  The article
notes that children in the tribe are able to learn to count, but does
not mention whether they are doing so in the tribe's native language or
Portuguese--that would be a useful detail.  At any rate, give these
people a compelling reason to count, and they will do so, in their own
language--they will borrow a number system from another language if one
is not created using native roots.  The lack of lexical items in the
language is explained by the lack of the tradition of counting, not the
other way around.

These kinds of articles are frequently cited by those who believe it's
useless to preserve indigenous languages--"their language prevents them
from COUNTING."  It seems that the battle to prove that indigenous
languages limit thinking never ends.

phil cash cash wrote:

>Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
>http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
>
>Contact: Diane Dobry
>dd173 at columbia.edu
>212-678-3979
>Teachers College, Columbia University
>
>Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
>perception
>
>Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
>(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
>contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
>During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
>theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
>But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
>simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
>
>No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
>Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
>Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
>the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
>fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
>beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
>to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
>connotation of singleness in other languages.
>
>What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
>that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
>said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
>another affects how an individual perceives reality."
>
>When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
>small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
>tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
>performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
>dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
>performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
>performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
>increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
>near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
>Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
>perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
>then match to corresponding groups.
>
>According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
>above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
>trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
>understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
>using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
>larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
>students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
>skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
>birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
>studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
>to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
>noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
>Piraha children did not.
>
>While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
>refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
>tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
>quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
>their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
>to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
>
>The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
>designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
>quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
>general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
>Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
>certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
>possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
>nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
>Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
>language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
>together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
>
>###
>
>
>Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
>the journal Science.
>
>Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
>nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
>is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
>World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
>graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
>please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
>
>
>


From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US  Fri Aug 20 14:02:33 2004
From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 08:02:33 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.080233.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.

I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...



phil cash cash wrote:

>Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
>http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
>
>Contact: Diane Dobry
>dd173 at columbia.edu
>212-678-3979
>Teachers College, Columbia University
>
>Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
>perception
>
>Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
>(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
>contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
>During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
>theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
>But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
>simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
>
>No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
>Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
>Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
>the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
>fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
>beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
>to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
>connotation of singleness in other languages.
>
>What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
>that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
>said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
>another affects how an individual perceives reality."
>
>When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
>small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
>tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
>performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
>dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
>performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
>performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
>increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
>near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
>Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
>perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
>then match to corresponding groups.
>
>According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
>above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
>trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
>understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
>using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
>larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
>students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
>skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
>birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
>studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
>to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
>noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
>Piraha children did not.
>
>While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
>refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
>tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
>quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
>their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
>to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
>
>The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
>designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
>quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
>general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
>Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
>certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
>possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
>nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
>Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
>language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
>together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
>
>###
>
>
>Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
>the journal Science.
>
>Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
>nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
>is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
>World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
>graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
>please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
>
>
>


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Fri Aug 20 16:48:07 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 09:48:07 -0700
Subject: Native Curriculum Makes Learning Relevant (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.094807.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Native Curriculum Makes Learning Relevant

By rob mcmahon
Publish Date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.straight.com/content.cfm?id=4486

[photo inset - Erin Bolton, a grade 9 student in Cameron Hill's class,
writes down notes about her chosen plant, skunk cabbage, in her field
notebook. Photo: Simone Westgarth]

The Gitga'at community of Hartley Bay is located 145 kilometres
southeast of Prince Rupert. The school there houses just 55 students
from kindergarten to Grade 12. Tiny and remote, with a close
relationship with the local Tsimshian band council, Hartley Bay is
perfectly suited for an experiment in a new style of teaching.

Instead of taking notes from a chalkboard, First Nations students at
Hartley Bay learn from their elders by visiting members of the
community to learn the traditional names and uses of plants. By
interviewing local authorities, the students discover how
blueberries--or smmaay, as they are known in the Tsimshian language,
Sm'algyax--can be eaten during feasts or used to dye clothes or treat
diabetes. Each fact is carefully recorded in a field notebook, which is
then used to create a summary of the plant that incorporates both
scientific and aboriginal-based knowledge.

"One year I went out with the kids as they interviewed elders," said
Judy Thompson, a First Nations instructor and curriculum developer
working at Hartley Bay school. "Some were scared and didn't feel like
it. Some found out their aunties and uncles and the elders knew a lot."

Thompson, who is Tahltan, created a series of six lesson plans on
traditional plant knowledge for students at Hartley Bay. In it, she
outlined a series of exercises that teach the youth to become
researchers. Each student was assigned a culturally important plant,
and then went into the community to learn about it. Along with the
traditional, botanical, and common names of each plant, they recorded
whether it was used for food, medicinal, material, or ceremonial
purposes, eventually creating a Gitga'at plant booklet. Results have
been encouraging. Thompson remembered one student who returned after
interviewing the chief's wife.

"It was first thing in the morning, and her eyes were so bright,"
Thompson said. "She said, 'I didn't know yew wood was so important.' "

Hartley Bay principal Ernie Hill, who is also a hereditary chief,
stressed the importance of such knowledge. "As First Nations people, we
have to know ourselves," Hill said. "If you do that, you can have a
better chance of success."

Although multicultural education in the past has attempted to do this,
some researchers are coming to the conclusion that it has not gone far
enough.

Statistics from B.C.'s Ministry of Education state that in the 2001-02
school year, more than four times as many nonaboriginal students passed
the mathematics 12 provincial exam compared with aboriginal students.

First Nations curriculum developer Veronica Ignas said that this is
partly because aboriginal and nonaboriginal students see the world
differently. Classes like mathematics and science, as they are usually
taught, focus on abstract concepts that are divorced from daily
experience. This approach can be difficult for aboriginal people, who
often have a world-view that is more connected to concrete
manifestations of nature.

"Students are motivated and do best if the information they're taught is
relevant," Ignas said.

Rather than look at this difference in perception, Ignas said,
multicultural education typically focuses on the "four Ds": diet,
dress, dance, and dialect. What is needed, she argued, is a more
fundamental acceptance of alternative ways of knowing.

"Research says that meaningful differences go beyond just infusing
content [with the four D's]," she said. "We need to say there's a
different way of thinking about the land and the people's relationship
with it."

Now, a handful of schools in rural towns like Hartley Bay and Gitxaa_a
are working with researchers from UVic and UBC to integrate traditional
ecological knowledge (TEK) into their curriculum.

UBC anthropologist Charles Menzies has been working four-and-a-half
years with Ignas, Thompson, and other academics and First Nations
representatives on Forests for the Future, a project that collects TEK
for use in both resource management and education. Menzies's project
stems from recent attempts by researchers to give something back to the
communities they study.

Traditionally, anthropologists visited a community, extracted the
information they needed, and left. This expropriation of knowledge is
now recognized by some as being just as problematic as the removal of
gold and other physical resources during the colonial era.

Now, researchers such as Menzies are trying to change this process by
returning the information they collect in the form of educational
resources such as those developed by Ignas and Thompson.

"People are trying to be more responsive to the community they work
with," Ignas said. "[They also] want to make sure the information
collected doesn't sit in a static filing cabinet somewhere, but [as]
curriculum goes back into the community."

Menzies is supervising the creation of seven unit plans by Ignas,
Thompson, and others to be used as learning resources for teachers.

Simply put, traditional ecological knowledge is an ever-evolving body of
knowledge about the environment and its relationship with human beings
that is passed down through generations.

In a typical class, community elders teach the children about the ways
of living that have been passed down in the community for centuries.
Within the Tsimshian world, humans have social relationships with
plants and animals.

"It's a different way of making sense of the natural world," Ignas said.
"You need to cross the bridge between abstract understanding and their
more 'hands-on' learning."

For example, in math class students learn the different Tsimshian ways
of counting (people, long objects, people inside a canoe, size of
animal catches, and general). As well as learning their Latin names and
scientific characteristics, students discover traditional names and
medical and ritual uses of plants.

Some critics argue about the validity of TEK, because it is inherently
different than western science. Being based on oral testimony and
holistic in nature, it has also faced opposition from scientists.

Today, TEK is becoming more widespread in fields such as
natural-resource management. Starting in the 1980s, it began to be used
in fisheries management as a complementary source of knowledge to that
gathered by western-trained biologists.

Part of this process is due to a realization that science does not have
all the answers, at least with respect to managing natural resources.

"Past practices have proven that science is not the be all and end all,"
said John Lewis, chief treaty negotiator for the Gitxaa_a First Nation.
Lewis has been trying to incorporate TEK within local resource
management since 2001. "At the end of the day, you have to look at what
science-based management has done to our resources since [European]
contact."

For example, in B.C. federal fisheries management makes predictions of
how many salmon will arrive every year, forecasts that are based on
empirical evidence collected by biologists. However, the actual returns
often don't match these predictions.

In the 1980s and '90s, that system started to change.

"Fisheries began listening to what local-level fishermen were saying
[and finding] it was as good as or better than what the managers were
saying," Menzies said.

When applying TEK, a fisherman would watch a particular fishing spot for
years, observing when the salmon arrive and then acting on his
observations. By accumulating this observational evidence over decades,
and sometimes generations, a body of traditional ecological knowledge
is formed and can be used to predict the levels and activities of fish
in a given area. Variables such as shifting weather patterns or other
environmental changes are observed by the fisherman and noted with
regards to their effect on the fish population. By using such
long-range data, the TEK can sometimes be more effective in predicting
salmon stocks than biological data, which is often collected during
intermittent field research trips over a short period of time.

Even though scientists were skeptical of the storytelling format of TEK,
when collected and distilled into a form of data that can be
manipulated in the same way scientific field data is, it became easier
for them to use.

"When you incorporate and mesh science-based managerial systems with
local and traditional knowledge...it gives you more tools to manage the
resources," Lewis said.

TEK has also gained popularity due to an increased desire on the part of
government to include First Nations groups in the decision-making
processes that affect their lives.

"[First Nations people] see TEK as a validation of what they know,"
Menzies said. "But it's also something they can take to the table in
negotiations...TEK demonstrates their ability to manage their own
resources."

Now that some scientists are validating the claims made by TEK, it is
being used more commonly and has found its way into schools like
Hartley Bay.

All of the TEK-based curriculum is designed to fit into the mainstream
school system. In order to do this, each lesson plan is designed to fit
with the province's "prescribed learning outcomes".

For example, Ignas's unit Two Ways of Knowing: Traditional Ecological
Knowledge and Scientific Knowledge fits the province's prescribed
learning outcome "describe how scientific principles are applied in
technology." To assist teachers, each lesson plan includes a list of
its corresponding learning outcomes.

However, even with relatively simple integration within the provincial
system, it is up to the judgment of individual teachers to actually use
the material. The Ministry of Education currently allows educational
professionals to select their own learning resources, as long as the
material passes a formal evaluation process at the provincial or the
district level and fits within the learning outcomes set by the
province. This system, which has been in place since 1989, is designed
to allow schools more autonomy to choose resources that meet their
individual needs.

Since there are relatively few First Nations teachers, the more
nonaboriginal teachers who attempt to integrate the curriculum, the
better.

Yet it can be hard for western-trained teachers to impart indigenous
knowledge, both politically and conceptually. They must be taught to
look at the world in a new way, which can be difficult, so alternative
learning sources often sit on the shelves, unused.

Peter Freeman is a nonaboriginal teacher who integrated TEK curriculum
in his science classes at Charles Hays secondary school in Prince
Rupert. Although he felt the material was more applicable to
communities such as Hartley Bay that have more direct access to the
environment, he said it was still useful. Freeman's classes held
discussions on the pros and cons of traditional knowledge, and students
were generally interested in the material.

"Some of the students may know and understand a lot more than I do, and
they enlighten all of us," Freeman said.

A big part of incorporating TEK into the classroom is gaining the
acceptance and respect of the community--something that can be
difficult for an outsider.

"You have to prove to the people that you know and understand and are
empathetic to traditional education," Hill said. "If you get elder
approval, it'll be okay...That's the way it should be."

As well as gaining acceptance from the community, teachers are often
afraid to use First Nations material because of concerns over political
correctness. However, Menzies said that feeling bad about the effects
of colonization should not be an issue.

"I don't know how making me feel guilty will make the world a better
place," he said. By using a prepackaged learning resource, Menzies
said, the worry is gone. "[A teacher] would just grab it, open it up,
and work with it," he said, adding that mainstream society has much to
learn from incorporating this kind of material into regular schools. "I
want to see beyond First Nations," he said.

For example, when studying Canadian history, students focus on the story
of the nation from a strictly European point of view. There is a
profound lack of any sense of the past as seen by the country's First
Nations, Menzies said.

"The lack of awareness in society is really strong."

By sharing ways of perceiving the world, Hill said he thought that
education could help these groups reconcile what has been, at times, a
difficult relationship.

"Maybe these little courses give a little bit of understanding, rather
than the stereotypical view that seems to exist out there."


From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Fri Aug 20 17:18:50 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 10:18:50 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <41260479.1000707@luna.cc.nm.us>
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.101850.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

the deficit view, whether intentional or not, really does a deservice to
humanity in general as smaller minds grasp for understanding.

"Brazil Tribe Has Great Excuse for Poor Math Skills"
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=570&ncid=753&e=6&u=/nm/20040819/sc_nm/science_counting_dc

phil
UofA

> ----- Message from mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US ---------
>     Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 08:02:33 -0600
>     From: Matthew Ward <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
> Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology
<ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how
language affects perception (fwd)
>       To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>
> I particularly like this sentence:
>
> "What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."
>
> The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is
> seen as evidence that some people just don't have the right
> stuff--gotta get those Portuguese-speakers in there to right the
> situation.
>
> I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
> showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate
> as Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
>
>
>
> phil cash cash wrote:
>
> >Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
> >http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
> >
> >Contact: Diane Dobry
> >dd173 at columbia.edu
> >212-678-3979
> >Teachers College, Columbia University
> >
> >Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
> affects
> >perception
> >
> >Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
> >(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose
> language
> >contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
> >During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
> >theory that language can determine the nature and content of
> thought.
> >But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
> >simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
> >
> >No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new
> findings by
> >Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
> >Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has
> spent
> >the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe
> of
> >fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
> >beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one"
> appears
> >to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the
> exact
> >connotation of singleness in other languages.
> >
> >What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> >right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
> >that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
> >said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
> >another affects how an individual perceives reality."
> >
> >When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to
> match
> >small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of
> the
> >tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
> >performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
> >dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to
> this
> >performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here,
> the
> >performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
> >increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance
> was
> >near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
> >Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
> >perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they
> could
> >then match to corresponding groups.
> >
> >According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set
> sizes
> >above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were
> actually
> >trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
> >understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
> >using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
> >larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as
> college
> >students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
> >skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants,
> monkeys,
> >birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
> >studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that
> seems
> >to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly,
> Gordon
> >noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
> >Piraha children did not.
> >
> >While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
> >refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of
> the
> >tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
> >quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition
> to
> >their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was
> found
> >to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
> >
> >The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
> >designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
> >quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist.
> In
> >general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to
> many
> >Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
> >certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
> >possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
> >nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
> >Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
> >language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
> >together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
> >
> >###
> >
> >
> >Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue
> of
> >the journal Science.
> >
> >Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
> >nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but
> it
> >is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
> >World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
> >graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
> >please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
> >
> >
> >
>
>
> ----- End message from mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US -----


From mshawaway at WSTRIBES.ORG  Fri Aug 20 19:25:45 2004
From: mshawaway at WSTRIBES.ORG (Myra Shawaway)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 12:25:45 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.122545.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


> I particularly like this sentence:
>
> "What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."
>
> The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
>
> I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
>
>
>
> phil cash cash wrote:
>
> >Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
> >http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
> >
> >Contact: Diane Dobry
> >dd173 at columbia.edu
> >212-678-3979
> >Teachers College, Columbia University
> >
> >Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
> >perception
> >
> >Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
> >(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
> >contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
> >During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
> >theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
> >But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
> >simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
> >
> >No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
> >Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
> >Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
> >the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
> >fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
> >beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
> >to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
> >connotation of singleness in other languages.
> >
> >What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> >right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
> >that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
> >said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
> >another affects how an individual perceives reality."
> >
> >When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
> >small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
> >tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
> >performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
> >dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
> >performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
> >performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
> >increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
> >near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
> >Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
> >perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
> >then match to corresponding groups.
> >
> >According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
> >above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
> >trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
> >understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
> >using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
> >larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
> >students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
> >skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
> >birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
> >studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
> >to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
> >noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
> >Piraha children did not.
> >
> >While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
> >refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
> >tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
> >quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
> >their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
> >to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
> >
> >The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
> >designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
> >quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
> >general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
> >Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
> >certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
> >possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
> >nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
> >Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
> >language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
> >together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
> >
> >###
> >
> >
> >Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
> >the journal Science.
> >
> >Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
> >nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
> >is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
> >World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
> >graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
> >please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
> >
> >
> >


From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US  Fri Aug 20 23:31:15 2004
From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 17:31:15 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.173115.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use
them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of
communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well
in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found
in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some
things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a
treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but
the past as well.

What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the
human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe
that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that
their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people
are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article
states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and
will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing,
which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.

The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive
quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of
research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of
language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't
possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.
 If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial
language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any
language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a
"primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined
to discover one.

Myra Shawaway wrote:

>Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
>a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
>languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
>concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
>environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
>have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
>grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
>natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
>of science and the outcomes.
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
>To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
>Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
>affects perception (fwd)
>
>
>
>
>>I particularly like this sentence:
>>
>>"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
>>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."
>>
>>The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
>>
>>
>evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
>Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
>
>
>>I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
>>
>>
>showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
>Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
>
>
>>
>>phil cash cash wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>>Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
>>>http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
>>>
>>>Contact: Diane Dobry
>>>dd173 at columbia.edu
>>>212-678-3979
>>>Teachers College, Columbia University
>>>
>>>Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
>>>perception
>>>
>>>Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
>>>(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
>>>contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
>>>During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
>>>theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
>>>But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
>>>simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
>>>
>>>No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
>>>Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
>>>Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
>>>the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
>>>fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
>>>beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
>>>to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
>>>connotation of singleness in other languages.
>>>
>>>What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
>>>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
>>>that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
>>>said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
>>>another affects how an individual perceives reality."
>>>
>>>When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
>>>small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
>>>tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
>>>performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
>>>dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
>>>performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
>>>performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
>>>increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
>>>near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
>>>Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
>>>perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
>>>then match to corresponding groups.
>>>
>>>According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
>>>above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
>>>trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
>>>understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
>>>using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
>>>larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
>>>students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
>>>skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
>>>birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
>>>studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
>>>to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
>>>noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
>>>Piraha children did not.
>>>
>>>While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
>>>refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
>>>tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
>>>quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
>>>their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
>>>to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
>>>
>>>The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
>>>designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
>>>quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
>>>general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
>>>Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
>>>certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
>>>possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
>>>nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
>>>Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
>>>language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
>>>together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
>>>
>>>###
>>>
>>>
>>>Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
>>>the journal Science.
>>>
>>>Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
>>>nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
>>>is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
>>>World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
>>>graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
>>>please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>
>
>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040820/e3d863ec/attachment.htm>

From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Sat Aug 21 02:51:23 2004
From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash)
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 19:51:23 -0700
Subject: ILAT news...
Message-ID: <FRI.20.AUG.2004.195123.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

hi all,

there will be no news items in the coming week as i will be away from my
desk and on a distant shore.

take care and continue your discussions,

phil cash cash
UofA, ILAT list manager


From sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU  Sat Aug 21 14:29:57 2004
From: sdp at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (Susan D Penfield)
Date: Sat, 21 Aug 2004 07:29:57 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <412689C3.1070400@luna.cc.nm.us>
Message-ID: <SAT.21.AUG.2004.072957.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Matthew, Myra and all,
Thanks for this discussion...it is a good reminder of how flexible and adaptable
human language is. The communities I work with are busy developing new
vocabulary to meet the demands of science and technology -- new words for
computers, cameras, digital anything, etc. It is an effort to 'own' the present
time in the unique language/cultural environments represented by indigenous
communities. The language will follow the people's needs to the extent that the
people choose to use it for that purpose. Hebrew is a great example and one we
should revisit from time to time. The struggle to save indigenous languages
rests, it seems to me, on making them as much a part of the present as the
past...simply another version of language shift. Much depends on how a given
group envisions the language being used.

Here is a real aside, but maybe still a good example:
  The Pope's Latinist recently revised all the ATMs within Vatican City--all
screen options are written in Latin.... (just food for thought!)


Susan

Susan D. Penfield, Ph.D.
Department of English
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721


Quoting Matthew Ward <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>:

> No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use
> them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of
> communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well
> in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found
> in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some
> things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a
> treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but
> the past as well.
>
> What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the
> human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe
> that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that
> their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people
> are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article
> states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and
> will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing,
> which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.
>
> The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive
> quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of
> research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of
> language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't
> possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.
>  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial
> language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any
> language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a
> "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined
> to discover one.
>
> Myra Shawaway wrote:
>
> >Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
> >a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
> >languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
> >concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
> >environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
> >have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
> >grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
> >natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
> >of science and the outcomes.
> >
> >----- Original Message -----
> >From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
> >To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
> >Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
> >Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
> >affects perception (fwd)
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >>I particularly like this sentence:
> >>
> >>"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> >>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."
> >>
> >>The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
> >>
> >>
> >evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
> >Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
> >
> >
> >>I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
> >>
> >>
> >showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
> >Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
> >
> >
> >>
> >>phil cash cash wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>>Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
> >>>http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php
> >>>
> >>>Contact: Diane Dobry
> >>>dd173 at columbia.edu
> >>>212-678-3979
> >>>Teachers College, Columbia University
> >>>
> >>>Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
> >>>perception
> >>>
> >>>Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
> >>>(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
> >>>contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
> >>>During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
> >>>theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
> >>>But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
> >>>simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?
> >>>
> >>>No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
> >>>Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
> >>>Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
> >>>the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
> >>>fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
> >>>beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
> >>>to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
> >>>connotation of singleness in other languages.
> >>>
> >>>What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
> >>>right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
> >>>that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
> >>>said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
> >>>another affects how an individual perceives reality."
> >>>
> >>>When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
> >>>small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
> >>>tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
> >>>performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
> >>>dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
> >>>performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
> >>>performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
> >>>increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
> >>>near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
> >>>Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
> >>>perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
> >>>then match to corresponding groups.
> >>>
> >>>According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
> >>>above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
> >>>trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
> >>>understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
> >>>using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
> >>>larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
> >>>students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
> >>>skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
> >>>birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
> >>>studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
> >>>to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
> >>>noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
> >>>Piraha children did not.
> >>>
> >>>While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
> >>>refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
> >>>tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
> >>>quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
> >>>their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
> >>>to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.
> >>>
> >>>The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
> >>>designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
> >>>quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
> >>>general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
> >>>Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
> >>>certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
> >>>possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
> >>>nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
> >>>Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
> >>>language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
> >>>together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."
> >>>
> >>>###
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
> >>>the journal Science.
> >>>
> >>>Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
> >>>nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
> >>>is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
> >>>World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
> >>>graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
> >>>please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >
> >
> >
>
>


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Sun Aug 22 00:33:21 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Sat, 21 Aug 2004 19:33:21 -0500
Subject: Fwd: He was beaten when he spoke his native language
Message-ID: <SAT.21.AUG.2004.193321.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

[reposted from multied-l at usc.edu]


"He was beaten when he spoke his native language instead of English,
sometimes with a broken conveyor belt, in a cycle of abuse that continued until
he left at 17."


http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20040817/CBASCHOOLS17/TPNational/TopStories
Lawyers praised for support of native survivors
By KIM LUNMAN
Tuesday, August 17, 2004 - Page A5

Ray Mason had never taken a bus until one mysteriously pulled up at his door on
the Peguis First Nation at dawn to collect the frightened seven-year-old. He
still remembers watching his Manitoba reserve disappear in the distance through
the rear-view mirror. "My mother was crying and saying, 'I hope he comes back.'
The Indian agent said, 'Don't worry; he'll be back.' " Mr. Mason, who is among
thousands of survivors of residential schools seeking compensation from the
federal government, spent the next 10 years of his life bouncing from one
school to another. He was beaten when he spoke his native language instead of
English, sometimes with a broken conveyor belt, in a cycle of abuse that
continued until he left at 17.

"It's a horrible thing," said Mr. Mason, chairman of the Spirit Wind Association
representing about 5,000 residential school survivors in Manitoba. "We suffered
psychological and mental torture." He commended the Canadian Bar Association
yesterday for passing a resolution at its annual meeting in Winnipeg calling on
the federal government to compensate all surviving victims of residential
schools. As many as 90,000 of the survivors are estimated to be still alive.
"The government should realize we were all in it together," said Mr. Mason, 57.
"Why does the Canadian government have to take us to court to see what they've
done to us?"

"We're saying that's not fair," said Darcy Merkur, one of the lawyers
representing survivors in a national class action lawsuit involving 19 law
firms. "This was institutional child abuse. They were basically scarred for
life." Mr. Merkur said former students should be entitled to compensation
packages in the range of $20,000 to $40,000. Ottawa apologized six years ago
for abuses in the residential schools, which were owned by the government but
run by churches. Few claims have been settled, however.

The government's $1.7-billion dispute settlement plan, which is designed to
compensate an estimated 15 per cent of all residential school survivors, has
been criticized by native leaders, victims and their lawyers. The plan aims to
settle over 12,000 lawsuits launched by former students. So far, more than
1,250 settlements have been reached, at a cost of $71-million to the federal
government.

Eric Pelletier, a spokesman for the Office of Indian Residential Schools
Resolution, said the current program is addressing a sad chapter in Canada's
history as best it can. "We have been looking at different responses  and still
think our current program is the best response," he said. The federal plan puts
cases before adjudicators, with Ottawa covering 70 per cent of proven damages
for physical and sexual abuse. But plaintiffs must sign away their future right
to sue for language and cultural losses. The remainder of the settlement must
be collected from churches that ran the schools.

Churches ran residential schools in partnership with Ottawa until most were
closed in the 1970s. The last school shut its doors in 1996. In February,
Ottawa announced it was appealing to the Supreme Court to overturn a B.C.
ruling that held the federal government 100-per-cent liable for native
residential school settlements in that province. The B.C. Court of Appeal last
year overturned a 1998 ruling that made the United Church partly liable for
abuse at a former residential school in Port Alberni.

Mr. Mason's painful memories followed him on a recent visit to one of his former
schools. "It was like a horrible dream," he said. "I thought 'My God, I lived
in this box for how many years? Just standing there. It was so gray looking.
Dead."

----- End forwarded message -----

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040821/37a7b778/attachment.htm>

From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Wed Aug 25 05:08:38 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 2004 00:08:38 -0500
Subject: ILAT news...
In-Reply-To: <1093056683.c839677380eae@www.email.arizona.edu>
Message-ID: <WED.25.AUG.2004.000838.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

While Phil's away you may want to check out a new web source for language news,
"The Language Feed" (announcement appended below). Not to suggest that this
gets at the same range of stories that Phil has so helpfully provided us, but
it is interesting...

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net



Quoting phil cash cash <cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU>:

> hi all,
>
> there will be no news items in the coming week as i will be away from my
> desk and on a distant shore.
>
> take care and continue your discussions,
>
> phil cash cash
> UofA, ILAT list manager
>

[reposted from the Linguist list]

Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 20:02:35 -0400 (EDT)
From: Sally Morrison <smorris2 at gmu.edu>
Subject: The Language Feed

A new website that provides links to language news stories found
around the web. Updated every Friday. A free weekly email service is
also offered.

http://mason.gmu.edu/~smorris2/feed


From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Thu Aug 26 14:12:00 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 08:12:00 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.081200.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

I'm not sure that this is a true statement "As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages." in that I don't believe that our "ability" is tied to "oral tradition". Instead, I believe that our failure is based on the refusal to understand the basic nature of words. First, they are references. They are not the referent. Secondly, on the primary or basic level, nouns and verbs are different from each other. They are processed in different parts of the brain, are accompanied by different cognitive processes and different kinesthetic responses. Thirdly, within a language, collections words are processed into different levels of abstraction. And abstractions are culture dependent. I believe that it is right here, at issues of abstraction, that language-anything, preservation, revitalization, and understanding, all fail. 

People jumped all over the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, without thinking it through. The mere fact that the deficit view exists vis a vis language is a clear indication that people are still engaged in wrong-making. 

I am going to hazard the hypothesis that the penalties for wrong-making are experienced and lived by its makers, for as time passes, native technology speakers emerge. These tech languages serve their function, and have their own meanings as do other human languages. But they do not run away and hide as do some of the native languages. Instead, they exist, and continue to thrive, and the penalties are exclusion. Wrong-making excludes those who do it from understanding the nature of the languages, and we are seeing all around us the failure of tech-language immigrants to be successful at understanding and applying the new technologies developed by the tech natives. 

Daniel Wildcat said, in a presentation at New Mexico State, that "the problem with Indian education is the problem  with education". I believe that this same principle applies: The problem with Indian language learning and revitalization is the problem with language learning and revitalization (including the tech languages)." 

Mia

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Matthew Ward 
  To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
  Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 5:31 PM
  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


  No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but the past as well.  

  What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing, which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.  

  The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined to discover one.  

  Myra Shawaway wrote:

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


  I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
    evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
  I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
    showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
  
phil cash cash wrote:

    Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.



      
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/a20f721c/attachment.htm>

From mshawaway at WSTRIBES.ORG  Thu Aug 26 16:03:37 2004
From: mshawaway at WSTRIBES.ORG (Myra Shawaway)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 09:03:37 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.090337.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic', 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent speakers today.  This is great conversation.  
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: MiaKalish - LFP 
  To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
  Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 7:12 AM
  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


  I'm not sure that this is a true statement "As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages." in that I don't believe that our "ability" is tied to "oral tradition". Instead, I believe that our failure is based on the refusal to understand the basic nature of words. First, they are references. They are not the referent. Secondly, on the primary or basic level, nouns and verbs are different from each other. They are processed in different parts of the brain, are accompanied by different cognitive processes and different kinesthetic responses. Thirdly, within a language, collections words are processed into different levels of abstraction. And abstractions are culture dependent. I believe that it is right here, at issues of abstraction, that language-anything, preservation, revitalization, and understanding, all fail. 

  People jumped all over the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, without thinking it through. The mere fact that the deficit view exists vis a vis language is a clear indication that people are still engaged in wrong-making. 

  I am going to hazard the hypothesis that the penalties for wrong-making are experienced and lived by its makers, for as time passes, native technology speakers emerge. These tech languages serve their function, and have their own meanings as do other human languages. But they do not run away and hide as do some of the native languages. Instead, they exist, and continue to thrive, and the penalties are exclusion. Wrong-making excludes those who do it from understanding the nature of the languages, and we are seeing all around us the failure of tech-language immigrants to be successful at understanding and applying the new technologies developed by the tech natives. 

  Daniel Wildcat said, in a presentation at New Mexico State, that "the problem with Indian education is the problem  with education". I believe that this same principle applies: The problem with Indian language learning and revitalization is the problem with language learning and revitalization (including the tech languages)." 

  Mia

    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: Matthew Ward 
    To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
    Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 5:31 PM
    Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


    No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but the past as well.  

    What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing, which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.  

    The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined to discover one.  

    Myra Shawaway wrote:

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


  I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
    evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
  I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
    showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
  phil cash cash wrote:

    Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.



      
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/8a91afb3/attachment.htm>

From phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET  Thu Aug 26 18:04:36 2004
From: phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET (jess tauber)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 14:04:36 -0400
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.140436.0400.PHONOSEMANTICS@EARTHLINK.NET>

Dan Everett, whose work was ultimately the basis for this report, posted this (see below my contribution) a few days ago on LINGUIST- I suggest that readers take a look particularly at the paper link on his website:   Cultural constraints on grammar(http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/cultgram.pdf)

My own take is that the Piraha~ situation is symptomatic only of its morphosyntactic/phonological status, which prevents deep hierarchicalization- in its syntax, in its morphology, in its phonology, and in parallel with cultural knowledge organization (complexity of tools, depth of generational knowledge of kin, myth, etc.). This status may in fact be a normal fact of life in the morphosyntactic cycle when heavily polysythetic languages with a lot of morphological fusion break down towards the isolating/analytical type again. One sees in various parts of this phase of the cycle languages with low numerical specification, tendency towards borrowing pronouns (either from external sources or from internal ones such as distance demonstratives), lack of syntactic embedding, perhaps a trend towards serialization, and ultimately monosyllabification, which helps to re-complexify the phonology and also may give rise to tonal and/or vocalic register, and in extreme cases, clicks.

Grammatical complexity in such languages is completely overshadowed by complexity in the pragmatic side of the coin, and possibly also in dominance of prototypically right-brain processes over left-, prosody over segmentality phonologically, and so on.

Piraha~ is in the early-mid stages of such breakdown, if my hypothesis is correct. Information in such a language is radically distributed over the entire discourse, and also not limited mostly to the speech channel, and thus one would expect a great deal of paralinguistic effect to accompany it. Nothing in Everett's paper (and see also the story text:   http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/panther.pdf) really seems to contradict such an analysis.

One symptom to look for in languages in this part of the cycle (grossly) is a strong tendency towards phonological monosegmentality of morphology, as well as incorporation of adverbial and higher level materials into it (the residue of former polysynthesis).

Jess Tauber


Message 1: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture
Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 10:09:10 -0400 (EDT)
From: Daniel Everett <dan.everett at man.ac.uk>
Subject: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture

Many readers of this list may have seen today's CNN report on the
Science article which was published yesterday on Piraha
(http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/08/19/science.counting.reut/index.html).
The Science article reports on research carried out by Peter Gordon,
along with me and my wife, Keren, several years ago to test my view
that Piraha had no counting. Gordon confirmed that indeed Pirahas have
no concept of counting and further refined my original ideas on the
matter.

Gordon's conclusion in Science is that Piraha offers support for the
Whorf hypothesis. While I believe that this is plausible, my own view
is that the lack of counting must be seen in the larger cultural
context and that when thus viewed in conjunction with the lack of
color words, the lack of embedding, the simplest kinship system ever
documented, and various other characteristics, a different,
non-Whorfian picture emerges. The basic conclusion I reach is that
culture constrains grammar in ways many of us have not previously
imagined. I take this to be an argument against, for example,
Universal Grammar, at least the more widely-accepted versions of it.

Anyone interested in reading on this further (and the Piraha case does
seem to be getting a lot of attention from various countries, based on
my email folder this morning), my paper "Cultural Constraints on
Grammar in Piraha", currently under review, is available from my
University of Manchester website: at
http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/DEHome.html


From coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU  Thu Aug 26 18:28:45 2004
From: coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU (David Lewis)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 11:28:45 -0700
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <1660720.1093543477911.JavaMail.root@donald.psp.pas.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.112845.0700.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Translation please.
Excuse me, for those native people on the list who are working on issues 
of their own language survival, what does the below article mean, in 
non-cryptic english please? This is a significant issue in the areas of 
anthropology and linguistics, the lack of pratical applicability of the 
theoretical notions of scientists to issues of native language survival 
within native communities. I think there needs to be a supreme attempt 
to explain these theories and other notions at the community level so 
that we all can benefit. Otherwise the critiques of Vine Deloria Jr. are 
proven true (big heads talking with each other). I also think this is a 
significant issue that needs discussion on this listserve as technology 
and the application of technology within the struggle for native 
language survival, should be at some level accessible to the native 
communities who are at the forefront of this struggle. Not that Jess in 
particular is unaware of this issue, but simply a wakeup call for him 
and other linguists on the listserve.
Thanks,
David Lewis
University of Oregon
Department of Anthropology

jess tauber wrote:

>Dan Everett, whose work was ultimately the basis for this report, posted this (see below my contribution) a few days ago on LINGUIST- I suggest that readers take a look particularly at the paper link on his website:   Cultural constraints on grammar(http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/cultgram.pdf)
>
>My own take is that the Piraha~ situation is symptomatic only of its morphosyntactic/phonological status, which prevents deep hierarchicalization- in its syntax, in its morphology, in its phonology, and in parallel with cultural knowledge organization (complexity of tools, depth of generational knowledge of kin, myth, etc.). This status may in fact be a normal fact of life in the morphosyntactic cycle when heavily polysythetic languages with a lot of morphological fusion break down towards the isolating/analytical type again. One sees in various parts of this phase of the cycle languages with low numerical specification, tendency towards borrowing pronouns (either from external sources or from internal ones such as distance demonstratives), lack of syntactic embedding, perhaps a trend towards serialization, and ultimately monosyllabification, which helps to re-complexify the phonology and also may give rise to tonal and/or vocalic register, and in extreme cases, clicks.
>
>Grammatical complexity in such languages is completely overshadowed by complexity in the pragmatic side of the coin, and possibly also in dominance of prototypically right-brain processes over left-, prosody over segmentality phonologically, and so on.
>
>Piraha~ is in the early-mid stages of such breakdown, if my hypothesis is correct. Information in such a language is radically distributed over the entire discourse, and also not limited mostly to the speech channel, and thus one would expect a great deal of paralinguistic effect to accompany it. Nothing in Everett's paper (and see also the story text:   http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/panther.pdf) really seems to contradict such an analysis.
>
>One symptom to look for in languages in this part of the cycle (grossly) is a strong tendency towards phonological monosegmentality of morphology, as well as incorporation of adverbial and higher level materials into it (the residue of former polysynthesis).
>
>Jess Tauber
>
>
>Message 1: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture
>Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 10:09:10 -0400 (EDT)
>From: Daniel Everett <dan.everett at man.ac.uk>
>Subject: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture
>
>Many readers of this list may have seen today's CNN report on the
>Science article which was published yesterday on Piraha
>(http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/08/19/science.counting.reut/index.html).
>The Science article reports on research carried out by Peter Gordon,
>along with me and my wife, Keren, several years ago to test my view
>that Piraha had no counting. Gordon confirmed that indeed Pirahas have
>no concept of counting and further refined my original ideas on the
>matter.
>
>Gordon's conclusion in Science is that Piraha offers support for the
>Whorf hypothesis. While I believe that this is plausible, my own view
>is that the lack of counting must be seen in the larger cultural
>context and that when thus viewed in conjunction with the lack of
>color words, the lack of embedding, the simplest kinship system ever
>documented, and various other characteristics, a different,
>non-Whorfian picture emerges. The basic conclusion I reach is that
>culture constrains grammar in ways many of us have not previously
>imagined. I take this to be an argument against, for example,
>Universal Grammar, at least the more widely-accepted versions of it.
>
>Anyone interested in reading on this further (and the Piraha case does
>seem to be getting a lot of attention from various countries, based on
>my email folder this morning), my paper "Cultural Constraints on
>Grammar in Piraha", currently under review, is available from my
>University of Manchester website: at
>http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/DEHome.html
>
>  
>


From jtucker at STARBAND.NET  Thu Aug 26 18:48:24 2004
From: jtucker at STARBAND.NET (Jan Tucker)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 14:48:24 -0400
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.144824.0400.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

I read the previous highly technical descriptive linguistic explanation of
Piraha language, and had the same reaction to the article. It would be
extreemly helpful to any readers unfamiliar with descriptive linguistics
jargon to have a translation of this into language that other academics can
understand as well. I've been following the dialogue and would very much
like to understand the explanation in non-jargon terms. I haven't yet looked
at the articles you provided. Thanks

Jan Tucker
Applied Cultural Anthropologist

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Lewis" <coyotez at DARKWING.UOREGON.EDU>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 2:28 PM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


Translation please.
Excuse me, for those native people on the list who are working on issues
of their own language survival, what does the below article mean, in
non-cryptic english please? This is a significant issue in the areas of
anthropology and linguistics, the lack of pratical applicability of the
theoretical notions of scientists to issues of native language survival
within native communities. I think there needs to be a supreme attempt
to explain these theories and other notions at the community level so
that we all can benefit. Otherwise the critiques of Vine Deloria Jr. are
proven true (big heads talking with each other). I also think this is a
significant issue that needs discussion on this listserve as technology
and the application of technology within the struggle for native
language survival, should be at some level accessible to the native
communities who are at the forefront of this struggle. Not that Jess in
particular is unaware of this issue, but simply a wakeup call for him
and other linguists on the listserve.
Thanks,
David Lewis
University of Oregon
Department of Anthropology

jess tauber wrote:

>Dan Everett, whose work was ultimately the basis for this report, posted
this (see below my contribution) a few days ago on LINGUIST- I suggest that
readers take a look particularly at the paper link on his website:
Cultural constraints on
grammar(http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/cultgram.pdf)
>
>My own take is that the Piraha~ situation is symptomatic only of its
morphosyntactic/phonological status, which prevents deep
hierarchicalization- in its syntax, in its morphology, in its phonology, and
in parallel with cultural knowledge organization (complexity of tools, depth
of generational knowledge of kin, myth, etc.). This status may in fact be a
normal fact of life in the morphosyntactic cycle when heavily polysythetic
languages with a lot of morphological fusion break down towards the
isolating/analytical type again. One sees in various parts of this phase of
the cycle languages with low numerical specification, tendency towards
borrowing pronouns (either from external sources or from internal ones such
as distance demonstratives), lack of syntactic embedding, perhaps a trend
towards serialization, and ultimately monosyllabification, which helps to
re-complexify the phonology and also may give rise to tonal and/or vocalic
register, and in extreme cases, clicks.
>
>Grammatical complexity in such languages is completely overshadowed by
complexity in the pragmatic side of the coin, and possibly also in dominance
of prototypically right-brain processes over left-, prosody over
segmentality phonologically, and so on.
>
>Piraha~ is in the early-mid stages of such breakdown, if my hypothesis is
correct. Information in such a language is radically distributed over the
entire discourse, and also not limited mostly to the speech channel, and
thus one would expect a great deal of paralinguistic effect to accompany it.
Nothing in Everett's paper (and see also the story text:
http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/panther.pdf) really seems to contradict
such an analysis.
>
>One symptom to look for in languages in this part of the cycle (grossly) is
a strong tendency towards phonological monosegmentality of morphology, as
well as incorporation of adverbial and higher level materials into it (the
residue of former polysynthesis).
>
>Jess Tauber
>
>
>Message 1: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture
>Date: Fri, 20 Aug 2004 10:09:10 -0400 (EDT)
>From: Daniel Everett <dan.everett at man.ac.uk>
>Subject: Piraha numbers, counting, and culture
>
>Many readers of this list may have seen today's CNN report on the
>Science article which was published yesterday on Piraha
>(http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/08/19/science.counting.reut/index.htm
l).
>The Science article reports on research carried out by Peter Gordon,
>along with me and my wife, Keren, several years ago to test my view
>that Piraha had no counting. Gordon confirmed that indeed Pirahas have
>no concept of counting and further refined my original ideas on the
>matter.
>
>Gordon's conclusion in Science is that Piraha offers support for the
>Whorf hypothesis. While I believe that this is plausible, my own view
>is that the lack of counting must be seen in the larger cultural
>context and that when thus viewed in conjunction with the lack of
>color words, the lack of embedding, the simplest kinship system ever
>documented, and various other characteristics, a different,
>non-Whorfian picture emerges. The basic conclusion I reach is that
>culture constrains grammar in ways many of us have not previously
>imagined. I take this to be an argument against, for example,
>Universal Grammar, at least the more widely-accepted versions of it.
>
>Anyone interested in reading on this further (and the Piraha case does
>seem to be getting a lot of attention from various countries, based on
>my email folder this morning), my paper "Cultural Constraints on
>Grammar in Piraha", currently under review, is available from my
>University of Manchester website: at
>http://ling.man.ac.uk/info/staff/DE/DEHome.html
>
>
>


From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US  Thu Aug 26 19:28:53 2004
From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 13:28:53 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.132853.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

I would suspect that if such words exist in tribal languages, they were
recently coined or borrowed--after all, many of them are relatively new
concepts even in the cultures which they originated in.  Words for these
terms exist in all the languages that I speak, but many are relatively
recent coinaged created to deal with new concepts.  The important thing
is that both languages and cultures are flexible, and can accomodate new
concepts as needed.

Myra Shawaway wrote:

> The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do
> not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any
> more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and
> hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the
> connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the
> changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward
> with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing
> our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I
> continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic',
> 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are
> parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an
> understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent
> speakers today.  This is great conversation.
>
>     ----- Original Message -----
>     From: MiaKalish - LFP <mailto:MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US>
>     To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU <mailto:ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
>     Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 7:12 AM
>     Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how
>     language affects perception (fwd)
>


Myra Shawaway wrote:

> The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do
> not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any
> more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and
> hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the
> connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the
> changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward
> with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing
> our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I
> continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic',
> 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are
> parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an
> understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent
> speakers today.  This is great conversation.
>
>     ---
>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/c6c1bd5b/attachment.htm>

From jtucker at STARBAND.NET  Thu Aug 26 20:56:27 2004
From: jtucker at STARBAND.NET (Jan Tucker)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 16:56:27 -0400
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.165627.0400.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Myra, I was wondering myself what the definiton of "tech-language' is and who are the 'native technology speakers'? I like the way you think when you ask the practical question of "...how do we create an understanding of those words ["kinesthetic, hypothesis, abstraction, tech-language, nouns, verbs"]? Even teaching English speakers the meanings of these words isn't an easy task. Would it be helpful to look for examples of the words as they are applied to real life situations. Take kinesthetic for example. First I'd define the word. A quick look-up defines the word as part of kinetic energy,  or energy of motion. Certainly within linguistics there will be a different definiton. I did find this intersting information though in the context of learning styles. 

 http://www.mkircus.lunarpages.com/Tutorials/MaxLrnWS/Maximizing%20Learning.ppt
Tactile/Kinesthetic Learners Need:
hands-on activities. 
role-playing or acting-out activities.
to manipulate materials.
to incorporate physical activity and feelings into activities. 
to move among centers.
be given opportunities to move during lessons. 

Jan
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Myra Shawaway 
  To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
  Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 12:03 PM
  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


  The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic', 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent speakers today.  This is great conversation.  
    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: MiaKalish - LFP 
    To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
    Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 7:12 AM
    Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


    I'm not sure that this is a true statement "As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages." in that I don't believe that our "ability" is tied to "oral tradition". Instead, I believe that our failure is based on the refusal to understand the basic nature of words. First, they are references. They are not the referent. Secondly, on the primary or basic level, nouns and verbs are different from each other. They are processed in different parts of the brain, are accompanied by different cognitive processes and different kinesthetic responses. Thirdly, within a language, collections words are processed into different levels of abstraction. And abstractions are culture dependent. I believe that it is right here, at issues of abstraction, that language-anything, preservation, revitalization, and understanding, all fail. 

    People jumped all over the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, without thinking it through. The mere fact that the deficit view exists vis a vis language is a clear indication that people are still engaged in wrong-making. 

    I am going to hazard the hypothesis that the penalties for wrong-making are experienced and lived by its makers, for as time passes, native technology speakers emerge. These tech languages serve their function, and have their own meanings as do other human languages. But they do not run away and hide as do some of the native languages. Instead, they exist, and continue to thrive, and the penalties are exclusion. Wrong-making excludes those who do it from understanding the nature of the languages, and we are seeing all around us the failure of tech-language immigrants to be successful at understanding and applying the new technologies developed by the tech natives. 

    Daniel Wildcat said, in a presentation at New Mexico State, that "the problem with Indian education is the problem  with education". I believe that this same principle applies: The problem with Indian language learning and revitalization is the problem with language learning and revitalization (including the tech languages)." 

    Mia

      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: Matthew Ward 
      To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
      Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 5:31 PM
      Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


      No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but the past as well.  

      What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing, which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.  

      The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined to discover one.  

      Myra Shawaway wrote:

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


  I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
    evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
  I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
    showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
  phil cash cash wrote:

    Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.



      
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/52720846/attachment.htm>

From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Thu Aug 26 23:38:11 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 18:38:11 -0500
Subject: Khoisan Language Student Scholarship Scheme
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.183811.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

FYI, from Pambazuka News #171 (26 Aug. 04)...

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net


KHOISAN LANGUAGE STUDENT SCHOLARSHIP SCHEME
http://www.casas.co.za/khoisan_language.htm
In order to create a cadre of Khoisan linguists capable of facilitating the
preservation and development of the Khoisan languages of Southern Africa,
Centre for Advanced Study of African Societies (CASAS) administers a
scholarship scheme for University linguistic studies in Cape Town, at the
undergraduate level with possibilities of advancement  to post-graduate studies
thereafter. The KLSSS is supported by Brot fur die Welt, Stuttgart, Germany.
The scholarship scheme started with the first cohort in the academic year
starting in January 2002. Scholars are Khoisan mother-tongue speakers, with
good academic achievements to date at Grade 12 or matric level, from any
country in Southern Africa.


From dzo at BISHARAT.NET  Fri Aug 27 00:23:51 2004
From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 19:23:51 -0500
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <412E39F5.4040306@luna.cc.nm.us>
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.192351.0500.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

I'm not sure what the late Senegalese scholar Cheick Anta Diop would do with
regard to language were he were alive today, but a half-century ago he made a
point of translating an explanation of the theory of relativity as well as
several literary passages from European languages into Wolof (published in
Pr?sence Africaine in 1955). I don't speak that language, but as I understand
it he was not relying on borrowed words but rather using terms existing in
Wolof. Still an interesting example and point of reference when discussions
such as this come up.

Don Osborn
Bisharat.net



Quoting Matthew Ward <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>:

> I would suspect that if such words exist in tribal languages, they were
> recently coined or borrowed--after all, many of them are relatively new
> concepts even in the cultures which they originated in.  Words for these
> terms exist in all the languages that I speak, but many are relatively
> recent coinaged created to deal with new concepts.  The important thing
> is that both languages and cultures are flexible, and can accomodate new
> concepts as needed.
>
[ . . . ]


From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Fri Aug 27 05:11:32 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 23:11:32 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.231132.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Native technology  speakers are those people who were born when computers were already present in their life space. They are considered "native speakers of technology" because technology has its own language (bit, byte, Gig, object, avatar, core dump, dumping, blue screen, transaction, memory leak, to name but a few "words"). People who learned the language of technology early speak it as well (or sometimes better than) conversational languages. However, what is noticeable is that people who are native technology speakers have a fluency with technology that the "immigrants" don't have. 

This is becoming important as technology becomes more pervasive. Being "computer literate" is no longer the same thing. Now, "computer literate" people can turn on the box, suft the web, send some email. Native speakers push the envelope of multi-media fusions, evidenced by the Flash movies showing up everywhere, and things like voice and picture recognition, sophisticated compression algorigthms, and even a small bit of cool software that can be used for revitalization. 

Mia

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Myra Shawaway 
  To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
  Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 10:03 AM
  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


  The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic', 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent speakers today.  This is great conversation.  
    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: MiaKalish - LFP 
    To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
    Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 7:12 AM
    Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


    I'm not sure that this is a true statement "As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages." in that I don't believe that our "ability" is tied to "oral tradition". Instead, I believe that our failure is based on the refusal to understand the basic nature of words. First, they are references. They are not the referent. Secondly, on the primary or basic level, nouns and verbs are different from each other. They are processed in different parts of the brain, are accompanied by different cognitive processes and different kinesthetic responses. Thirdly, within a language, collections words are processed into different levels of abstraction. And abstractions are culture dependent. I believe that it is right here, at issues of abstraction, that language-anything, preservation, revitalization, and understanding, all fail. 

    People jumped all over the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, without thinking it through. The mere fact that the deficit view exists vis a vis language is a clear indication that people are still engaged in wrong-making. 

    I am going to hazard the hypothesis that the penalties for wrong-making are experienced and lived by its makers, for as time passes, native technology speakers emerge. These tech languages serve their function, and have their own meanings as do other human languages. But they do not run away and hide as do some of the native languages. Instead, they exist, and continue to thrive, and the penalties are exclusion. Wrong-making excludes those who do it from understanding the nature of the languages, and we are seeing all around us the failure of tech-language immigrants to be successful at understanding and applying the new technologies developed by the tech natives. 

    Daniel Wildcat said, in a presentation at New Mexico State, that "the problem with Indian education is the problem  with education". I believe that this same principle applies: The problem with Indian language learning and revitalization is the problem with language learning and revitalization (including the tech languages)." 

    Mia

      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: Matthew Ward 
      To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
      Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 5:31 PM
      Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


      No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but the past as well.  

      What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing, which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.  

      The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined to discover one.  

      Myra Shawaway wrote:

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


  I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
    evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
  I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
    showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
  phil cash cash wrote:

    Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.



      
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/5822ef65/attachment.htm>

From MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US  Fri Aug 27 05:16:44 2004
From: MiaKalish at LEARNINGFORPEOPLE.US (MiaKalish - LFP)
Date: Thu, 26 Aug 2004 23:16:44 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <THU.26.AUG.2004.231644.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

"Native languages run away and hide" is about how people refuse to speak their languages when they are not English. There is a whole psychological complex around this, a kind of passive-aggressive "look what you did to me now I'll punish you by not saying anything". (Yes, I do know. I live it almost daily). Technology languages are things like COBOL, C, C++, FORTRAN, PHP, SQL, ORACLE, CGI, LISP, UNIX, LINUX, WINDOWS, XP, MAC, (this last bunch being operating systems with their own languages and grammatical rues, different from the simple transactional languages). 

Once I used to wonder how to include things like "kinesthetic", "cognitive", that sort of thing. Now, I wonder how not to lose things like for example the numbers after ashdlai (5). 

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Jan Tucker 
  To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
  Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 2:56 PM
  Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


  Myra, I was wondering myself what the definiton of "tech-language' is and who are the 'native technology speakers'? I like the way you think when you ask the practical question of "...how do we create an understanding of those words ["kinesthetic, hypothesis, abstraction, tech-language, nouns, verbs"]? Even teaching English speakers the meanings of these words isn't an easy task. Would it be helpful to look for examples of the words as they are applied to real life situations. Take kinesthetic for example. First I'd define the word. A quick look-up defines the word as part of kinetic energy,  or energy of motion. Certainly within linguistics there will be a different definiton. I did find this intersting information though in the context of learning styles. 

   http://www.mkircus.lunarpages.com/Tutorials/MaxLrnWS/Maximizing%20Learning.ppt
  Tactile/Kinesthetic Learners Need:
  hands-on activities. 
  role-playing or acting-out activities.
  to manipulate materials.
  to incorporate physical activity and feelings into activities. 
  to move among centers.
  be given opportunities to move during lessons. 

  Jan
    ----- Original Message ----- 
    From: Myra Shawaway 
    To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
    Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 12:03 PM
    Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


    The thoughts projected have only left me further in the dark.  I do not understand the definition of 'native technology speakers'. any more than I understand what is meant by 'native languages run away and hide'.  What I do know  is our people of this community understand the connectivity of language and ancestoral cultural as it was and how the changes that are brought on have to be adjusted to and move forward with the new.  We know that part of the difficulities of continuing our languages is the history of how we lost the languages.  So, I continually wonder if  words such as 'cognitive', 'kinesthetic', 'hypothesis', 'abstraction', 'tech-language', 'nouns', 'verbs' are parts of any tribal languages and if not, how do we create an understanding of those words and apply to teachings done by fluent speakers today.  This is great conversation.  
      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: MiaKalish - LFP 
      To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
      Sent: Thursday, August 26, 2004 7:12 AM
      Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


      I'm not sure that this is a true statement "As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages." in that I don't believe that our "ability" is tied to "oral tradition". Instead, I believe that our failure is based on the refusal to understand the basic nature of words. First, they are references. They are not the referent. Secondly, on the primary or basic level, nouns and verbs are different from each other. They are processed in different parts of the brain, are accompanied by different cognitive processes and different kinesthetic responses. Thirdly, within a language, collections words are processed into different levels of abstraction. And abstractions are culture dependent. I believe that it is right here, at issues of abstraction, that language-anything, preservation, revitalization, and understanding, all fail. 

      People jumped all over the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, without thinking it through. The mere fact that the deficit view exists vis a vis language is a clear indication that people are still engaged in wrong-making. 

      I am going to hazard the hypothesis that the penalties for wrong-making are experienced and lived by its makers, for as time passes, native technology speakers emerge. These tech languages serve their function, and have their own meanings as do other human languages. But they do not run away and hide as do some of the native languages. Instead, they exist, and continue to thrive, and the penalties are exclusion. Wrong-making excludes those who do it from understanding the nature of the languages, and we are seeing all around us the failure of tech-language immigrants to be successful at understanding and applying the new technologies developed by the tech natives. 

      Daniel Wildcat said, in a presentation at New Mexico State, that "the problem with Indian education is the problem  with education". I believe that this same principle applies: The problem with Indian language learning and revitalization is the problem with language learning and revitalization (including the tech languages)." 

      Mia

        ----- Original Message ----- 
        From: Matthew Ward 
        To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU 
        Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 5:31 PM
        Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects perception (fwd)


        No doubt, languages reflects the world view of the cultures that use them.  However, all languages must also function as practical means of communication and survival--and all languages do in fact serve very well in this way, in the context of the culture that the language is found in.  As cultures change, languages change with them, and although some things are always lost, the fact remains that all languages represent a treasure trove of shared cultural history--of not only the present, but the past as well.  

        What a lot of people fail to grasp is the amazing adaptability of the human language.  As I said before, it's not difficult for me to believe that some cultures have little need to do extensive counting, and that their languages reflect this.  What I DON'T believe is that these people are imprisoned by their languages--that their languages, as the article states lack the "right" linguistic resources.  Those resources can and will be developed as needed, even if it involves linguistic borrowing, which is a perfectly natural and legitimate form of language evolution.  

        The deficit view, which depends partially on denying the adaptive quality of human language, and which is refuted by the vast majority of research on language, in my experience is one of the biggest enemies of language preservation.  "They are all right in the bush, but you can't possibly expect them to deal with the modern world."  Nonsense, I say.  If the Israelis can take Hebrew from being a nearly dead ceremonial language to the lingua franca of a fairly high-tech society, any language community can do the same.  There is no such thing as a "primitive" language, no matter how dearly some people seem determined to discover one.  

        Myra Shawaway wrote:

Interesting?  the idea of having an exacting concept to numbers and time in
a scientific sense, has created difficulties in preservation of our
languages.  As I work with our speakers of languages, I believe that the
concept of numbers is a seen thing, or sense of duty to cultural
environment,  as is the sense of time when spoken about in past events that
have occured.  As our oral traditions are diminishing, so is the ability to
grasp the skills needed for passing on our languages.  We are moving from a
natural way of understanding needs and environment, to enjoying the comforts
of science and the outcomes.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Matthew Ward" <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Sent: Friday, August 20, 2004 7:02 AM
Subject: Re: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
affects perception (fwd)


  I particularly like this sentence:

"What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality."

The "right" lingustic resources, eh?  I suppose that this study is seen as
    evidence that some people just don't have the right stuff--gotta get those
Portuguese-speakers in there to right the situation.
  I'm curious to see if, in 20 years, we are going to read an article
    showing that the claims made about this tribe are about as accurate as
Whorf's claim that Hopi had no words for time...
  phil cash cash wrote:

    Public release date: 19-Aug-2004
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-08/tccu-soo081804.php

Contact: Diane Dobry
dd173 at columbia.edu
212-678-3979
Teachers College, Columbia University

Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language affects
perception

Controversial linguistic hypothesis is supported by Teachers College
(Columbia University) professor's observation of tribe whose language
contains no words for numbers beyond 'one,' 'two' and 'many.'
During the late 1930s, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf posed the
theory that language can determine the nature and content of thought.
But are there concepts in one culture that people of another culture
simply cannot understand because their language has no words for it?

No one has ever definitively answered that question, but new findings by
Dr. Peter Gordon, a bio-behavioral scientist at Teachers College,
Columbia University, strongly support a "yes" answer. Gordon has spent
the past several years studying the Pirah?, an isolated Amazon tribe of
fewer than 200 people, whose language contains no words for numbers
beyond "one," "two" and "many." Even the Piraha word for "one" appears
to refer to "roughly one" or a small quantity, as opposed to the exact
connotation of singleness in other languages.

What these experiments show, according to Gordon, is how having the
right linguistic resources can carve out one's reality. "Whorf says
that language divides the world into different categories," Gordon
said. "Whether one language chooses to distinguish one thing versus
another affects how an individual perceives reality."

When given numerical tasks by Gordon in which they were asked to match
small sets of objects in varying configurations, adult members of the
tribe responded accurately with up to two or three items, but their
performance declined when challenged with eight to 10 items, and
dropped to zero with larger sets of objects. The only exception to this
performance was with tasks involving unevenly spaced objects. Here, the
performance of participants deteriorated as the number of items
increased to 6 items. Yet for sets of 7 to 10 objects, performance was
near perfect. Though these tasks were designed to be more difficult,
Gordon hypothesizes that the uneven spacing allowed subjects to
perceive the items as smaller "chunks" of 2 or 3 items that they could
then match to corresponding groups.

According to the study, performance by the Piraha was poor for set sizes
above 2 or 3, but it was not random. "Pirah? participants were actually
trying very hard to get the answers correct, and they clearly
understood the tasks," Gordon said. Participants showed evidence of
using methods of estimation and chunking to guess at quantities in
larger set sizes. On average, they performed about as well as college
students engaged in more complex numerical estimation tasks. Their
skill levels were similar to those in pre-linguistic infants, monkeys,
birds and rodents, and appeared to correlate to recent brain imaging
studies indicating a different sort of numerical competence that seems
to be immune to numerical language deprivation. Interestingly, Gordon
noted, while Pirah? adults had difficulty learning larger numbers,
Piraha children did not.

While the Pirah? words for "one" and "two" do not necessarily always
refer to those specific amounts, Gordon also found that members of the
tribe never used those words in combination to denote larger
quantities. In the study, they also used their fingers in addition to
their verbal statement of quantity, but this practice, too, was found
to be highly inaccurate even for small numbers less than five.

The Pirah? language has no word for "number," and pronouns do not
designate number--"he" and "they" are the same word. Most standard
quantifiers like "more," "several," "all," and "each" do not exist. In
general, while containing a very complex verb structure common to many
Native American languages, the Pirah? language does not allow for
certain kinds of comparative constructions. For example, it was not
possible to ask participants whether one group of objects "has more
nuts than the other" because of the lack of that construction in the
Pirah? grammar. Yet, the word they use for "many," which in that
language was derived from a form ob the verb meaning "to bring
together," is distinct from a word that means something like "much."

###


Details of the study will appear in the Thursday, August 19, issue of
the journal Science.

Teachers College is the largest graduate school of education in the
nation. Teachers College is affiliated with Columbia University, but it
is legally and financially independent. The editors of U.S. News and
World Report have ranked Teachers College as one of the leading
graduate schools of education in the country. For more information,
please visit the college's Web site at www.tc.columbia.edu.



      
  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040826/1472f364/attachment.htm>

From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US  Fri Aug 27 17:54:25 2004
From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward)
Date: Fri, 27 Aug 2004 11:54:25 -0600
Subject: Study of obscure Amazon tribe sheds new light on how language
 affects perception (fwd)
Message-ID: <FRI.27.AUG.2004.115425.0600.ILAT@LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>

Good point, Don.  I was reading an article by a linguist studying
Australian Aboriginal languages who referred to a textbook on nuclear
physics, if I remember correctly, that had been translated into a
certain Aboriginal language.  For many indigenous languages, the
resources, will, or perceived need to do such translations is lacking,
but that doesn't mean that these translations cannot be done.

People tend to get very hung-up on lexicon when they get the idea that
you somehow cannot express certain thoughts in certain languages.  The
problem is, most of the pretty much infinite number of ideas that the
human brain is capable of thinking up don't have vocabulary items to go
along with them.  For every concept that has a specific term, there are
many that are expressed by combinations of words.  In other words, most
of the meaning that we make with language is not expressed by single
words, but by putting words together.  What I am writing here is a good
example:  there is not a single word for the idea I am expressing, but
that doesn't stop me from expressing it.    This is one reason why human
language is so flexible:  when a vocabularly item is lacking, one can
paraphrase or otherwise explain.

Of course, there are concepts that are difficult to understand because
of people's cultural backgrounds, but it's not a case of people being
unable to think certain thoughts because their languages lack the "right
resources," as the original article unfortunately put it.



Donald Z. Osborn wrote:

>I'm not sure what the late Senegalese scholar Cheick Anta Diop would do with
>regard to language were he were alive today, but a half-century ago he made a
>point of translating an explanation of the theory of relativity as well as
>several literary passages from European languages into Wolof (published in
>Pr?sence Africaine in 1955). I don't speak that language, but as I understand
>it he was not relying on borrowed words but rather using terms existing in
>Wolof. Still an interesting example and point of reference when discussions
>such as this come up.
>
>Don Osborn
>Bisharat.net
>
>
>
>Quoting Matthew Ward <mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US>:
>
>
>
>>I would suspect that if such words exist in tribal languages, they were
>>recently coined or borrowed--after all, many of them are relatively new
>>concepts even in the cultures which they originated in.  Words for these
>>terms exist in all the languages that I speak, but many are relatively
>>recent coinaged created to deal with new concepts.  The important thing
>>is that both languages and cultures are flexible, and can accomodate new
>>concepts as needed.
>>
>>
>>
>[ . . . ]
>
>
>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ilat/attachments/20040827/c027db93/attachment.htm>