From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Tue May 4 16:33:54 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 4 May 2004 09:33:54 -0700 Subject: Executive Order: American Indian and Alaska Native Education (fwd) Message-ID: For Immediate Release Office of the Press Secretary April 30, 2004 Executive Order American Indian and Alaska Native Education By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and to recognize the unique educational and culturally related academic needs of American Indian and Alaska Native students consistent with the unique political and legal relationship of the Federal Government with tribal governments, it is hereby ordered as follows: Section 1. Purpose. The United States has a unique legal relationship with Indian tribes and a special relationship with Alaska Native entities as provided in the Constitution of the United States, treaties, and Federal statutes. This Administration is committed to continuing to work with these Federally recognized tribal governments on a government-to-government basis, and supports tribal sovereignty and self-determination. It is the purpose of this order to assist American Indian and Alaska Native students in meeting the challenging student academic standards of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (Public Law 107-110) in a manner that is consistent with tribal traditions, languages, and cultures. This order builds on the innovations, reforms, and high standards of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, including: stronger accountability for results; greater flexibility in the use of Federal funds; more choices for parents; and an emphasis on research-based instruction that works. Sec. 2. Interagency Working Group. There is established an Interagency Working Group on American Indian and Alaska Native Education (Working Group) to oversee the implementation of this order. (a) The Working Group's members shall consist exclusively of the heads of the executive branch departments, agencies, or offices listed below: (i) the Department of Education; (ii) the Department of the Interior; (iii) the Department of Health and Human Services; (iv) the Department of Agriculture; (v) the Department of Justice; (vi) the Department of Labor; and (vii) such other executive branch departments, agencies, or offices as the Co-Chairs of the Working Group may designate. A member of the Working Group may designate, to perform the Working Group functions of the member, an employee of the member's department, agency, or office who is either an officer of the United States appointed by the President, or a full-time employee serving in a position with pay equal to or greater than the minimum rate payable for GS-15 of the General Schedule. The Working Group shall be led by the Secretaries of Education and the Interior, or their designees under this section, who shall serve as Co-Chairs. (b) The function of the Working Group is to oversee the implementation of this order. The Working Group shall, within 90 days of the date of this order, develop a Federal interagency plan that recommends initiatives, strategies, and ideas for future interagency actions that promote the purpose, as stated in section 1, of this order. In carrying out its activities under this order, the Working Group may consult with repre-sentatives of American Indian and Alaska Native tribes and organizations, in conformity with Executive Order 13175 of November 6, 2000, and with the National Advisory Council on Indian Education (NACIE). Any such consultations shall be for the purpose of obtaining information and advice concerning American Indian and Alaska Native education and shall be conducted in a manner that seeks individual advice and does not involve collective judgment or consensus advice or deliberation. Sec. 3. Study and Report. The Secretary of Education, in coordination with the Working Group, shall conduct a multi-year study of American Indian and Alaska Native education with the purpose of improving American Indian and Alaska Native students' ability to meet the challenging student academic standards of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. (a) The study shall include, but not be limited to: (i) the compilation of comprehensive data on the academic achievement and progress of American Indian and Alaska Native students toward meeting the challenging student academic standards of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001; (ii) identification and dissemination of research-based practices and proven methods in raising academic achievement and, in particular, reading achievement, of American Indian and Alaska Native students; (iii) assessment of the impact and role of native language and culture on the development of educational strategies to improve academic achievement; (iv) development of methods to strengthen early childhood education so that American Indian and Alaska Native students enter school ready to learn; and (v) development of methods to increase the high school graduation rate and develop pathways to college and the workplace for American Indian and Alaska Native students. The Secretary of Education shall develop an agenda, including proposed timelines and ongoing activities, for the conduct of the study, and shall make that agenda available to the public on the Internet. (b) The Secretary of Education, in coordination with the Working Group, shall issue a report to the President that shall: (i) provide the latest data available from the study; (ii) comprehensively describe the educational status and progress of American Indian and Alaska Native students with respect to meeting the goals outlined in the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and any other student achievement goals the Secretary of Education or the Secretary of the Interior may deem necessary; (iii) report on proven methods for improving American Indian and Alaska Native student academic achievement; and (iv) update the Federal interagency plan outlined in section 2(b) of this order. Sec. 4. Enhancement of Research Capabilities of Tribal-Level Educational Institutions. The Secretary of Education and the Secretary of the Interior shall consult with the entities set forth in section 2(a) of this order and tribally controlled colleges and universities to seek ways to develop and enhance the capacity of tribal governments, tribal universities and colleges, and schools and educational programs serving American Indian and Alaska Native students and communities to carry out, disseminate, and implement education research, as well as to develop related partnerships or collaborations with non-tribal universities, colleges, and research organizations. Sec. 5. National Conference. The Secretary of Education and the Secretary of the Interior, in collaboration with the Working Group and Federal, State, tribal, and local government representatives, shall jointly convene a forum on the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 to identify means to enhance communica-tion, collaboration, and cooperative strategies to improve the education of American Indian and Alaska Native students attending Federal, State, tribal, and local schools. Sec. 6. Administration. The Department of Education shall provide appropriate administrative services and staff support to the Working Group. With the consent of the Department of Education, other participating agencies may provide admini-stra-tive support to the Working Group, to the extent permitted by law and consistent with their statutory authority. Sec. 7. Termination. The Working Group established under section 2 of this order shall terminate not later than 5 years from the date of this order, unless extended by the President. Sec. 8. Consultation. The Secretary of Education and Secretary of the Interior shall consult the Attorney General as appropriate on the implementation of this order, to ensure that such implementation affords the equal protection of the laws required by the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution. Sec. 9. General Provisions. (a) This order is intended only to improve the internal management of the executive branch and is not intended to, and does not, create any right, benefit, or trust responsibility, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or equity, by a party against the United States, its agencies or instrumen-talities, its officers or employees, or any other person. (b) Executive Order 13096 of August 6, 1998, is revoked. GEORGE W. BUSH THE WHITE HOUSE, April 30, 2004. # # # Return to this article at: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/04/20040430-10.html From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US Tue May 4 19:19:22 2004 From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward) Date: Tue, 4 May 2004 13:19:22 -0600 Subject: Linguapax speakers urge protection for minority languages (fwd) Message-ID: I noticed that this article mentions the issue of Navajo immersion programs being threatened by Arizona's English-only law. On that subject, I recently recieved the following e-mail from the ACLU of Arizona: Hi Matthew - we are in receipt of your 3/4/04 complaint to the ACLU of Arizona re: the Attorney General's absurd opinion that public schools on the reservations. We are VERY interested in this issue and I will be calling the Superintendent of Window Rock Schools, Deborah Jackson-Dennison, to see if they need our assistance. The AG's office is misconstruing the law. The English Only requirement of Prop 203 was struck down by the Arizona Supreme Court in 1998. Thanks for bringing this issue to our attention. -Angie Polizzi, Staff attorney This makes it seem like the ACLU is indeed a good resource in any situation in which native-language immersion programs are being threatened by various barbaric English-only laws. phil cash cash wrote: >Linguapax speakers urge protection for minority languages >http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/newse/20040427wob2.htm > >Cristoph Mark Daily Yomiuri Staff Writer > >Languages of minority political and cultural groups must be protected to >avoid being lost in favor of more dominant languages, Felix Marti >warned at the inaugural Linguapax Asia conference, held in Tokyo on >April 17. > >"A lot of the problems in our world are provoked by the lack of >attention to cultural and political minorities. If you protect >linguistic minorities all over the world, you work for peace," said >Marti, Linguapax Institute President and human rights activist. > >Governments, multinational corporations and the mass media are among the >agents of globalization that promote the move toward dominant languages >and away from minority languages, he said. > >The daylong conference was held at United Nations University in Tokyo, >and covered a range of issues, from the perseverance and decline of >Slovene linguistic communities in Italy, Austria and Hungary, to the >struggle to offer bilingual education for children in California and >Arizona in the face of public opposition. > >Lectures were presented by experts from Japan, Austria, Hungary and the >United States, and were given in English, Japanese and German. The >proceedings were moderated by two of the organizers, Frances >Fister-Stoga and Jelisava Sethna. > >"A lot of linguistic communities have decided to maintain their >linguistic identity. That has been a change in the last 20 years, >probably because a lot of communities until now were declining >linguistic communities," Marti said. "Simultaneously, we observe some >linguistic communities that are losing their linguistic practices and >are now changing into 'important' languages." > >Many minority languages and cultures exist in Europe, and to protect >them, an independent union called the Federal Union of European >Nationalities was established, according to Kolomon Brenner, Assistant >Professor of Eotvos-Lorand University in Budhapest. > >In Thailand, according to Donald Smith, linguistics expert and professor >at Notre Dame Seishin University, many areas of the country have >several levels of language, with locals speaking their local and >regional languages, as well as standard Thai, among others. About 80 >different languages are spoken in Thailand. > >"Today, the 80 languages...are all vital, and there is apparently no >danger of language extinction, there is no phenomena of language death >in Thailand," Smith explained. "People are multilingual--not >bilingual--often trilingual and quadrilingual. They just speak whatever >language is appropriate wherever they are." > >Another example of language that could be said to be thriving is that of >Palau. The island nation was colonized by Spain, Japan and eventually >the United States, which took the country as a protectorate following >World War II. Over the years, according to Yoko Okayama, associate >professor at Ibaraki University, English began to virtually wipe out >the local language, with children learning less and less Palau as they >went through school. > >To avoid the complete attrition of their native language, the tiny South >Pacific nation has made Palau a part of the educational curriculum, >spending a portion of each day teaching children to speak, read and >write it. In many cases, parents end up learning new words from their >children, Okayama said. > >Still, many of the world's minority languages face decay and potential >extinction. > >In Italy, Slovene is facing extinction in the Friuli-Venezia Giulia >region. Slovene speakers are a minority within the Friulian-speaking >community, itself a minority Italian dialect. While use of the Friulian >dialect actually expanded during the 20th century, Slovene in the area >has been abandoned as a language, and most of its native speakers can >no longer speak the language, said Shinji Yamamoto, senior lecturer of >Italian Linguistics at Tokyo University. > >In the United States, bilingual education is facing a less natural, more >oppressive problem on a number of fronts, according to Melvin Andrade, >English professor at Sophia Junior College, and Cary Duval, associate >professor in the Faculty of International Studies at Bunkyo University. > >In California, despite an extremely large number of residents who speak >a language other than English at home, there is much opposition to >bilingual education. Previously, children were expected to spend about >four years in English as a second language (ESL) classes so they could >obtain functional fluency, from which point they would enter regular >classes. > >"The hope is that once ELL (ESL) students are fairly proficient in >English, they can continue their education in classes with their >English-speaking peers. This is nothing about preserving heritage >languages though--it's to get them to use English," Andrade pointed >out. > >However, as a backlash against a wave of immigration--particularly from >south of the border--a successful ballot initiative put forward by >anti-bilingual millionaire Ron Unz introduced a "sheltered English" ESL >program, which reduced special instruction to one year, only allowing >English to be used in classes, Andrade said. > >California, though, has a legal loophole, making it possible for local >governments to provide such families and children with information in >their primary language, and to offer linguistic assistance, thereby >helping the students to participate in their own education, Duval >stressed. > >However, he pointed out that Arizona has done away with any loopholes >that would allow for such education, which is greatly affecting the >Navajo tribes in the area. Many Native American languages have already >become extinct. The Navajo nation is 250,000 strong, and if their >language cannot survive, none of the other Native American languages >have a chance, Duval warned. > >There is opposition--again an Unz-backed initiative--to Navajo bilingual >education. The initiative aims to make English the only language to be >used in an official capacity, such as teaching. > >In some cases, teachers have been sued for using languages other than >English in their instruction. > >Although greater language maintenance and signs of revival have been >seen in recent years, there is clearly an uphill battle to be fought to >preserve the world's linguistic heritage and protect the rights of >frequently displaced minorities. > > > From phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET Tue May 4 20:50:21 2004 From: phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET (jess tauber) Date: Tue, 4 May 2004 16:50:21 -0400 Subject: Yahgan language discussion list at Yahoo groups Message-ID: Hi. I'm new to the list. Hello out there to the lurkers who know me! Usually I read through earlier postings from lists I join- I noticed early on you folks heard about the Linguistic Discovery report by Lindsey Whaley and Lenore Grenoble "What does Yahgan have to do with digital technology?". While throwing materials together for an endangered grant application a month ago I started thinking that a discussion list would be a good "clearinghouse" for information on Yahgan, which I've been working on for a number of years, at least until a permanent scholarly home could be found (and pages will be going up at Dartmouth, thanks to Prof. Whaley). In just a few days we already have a set of serious discussions going on about phonology, spelling conventions, dialects, and the beginings of syntax. In addition to the academic people we also now count in our number the granddaughter of one of the last speakers, Cristina Zarraga, who has been doing what she can back in Ukika, in Tierra del Fuego, to try to help revitalize the language. There is a lot to do. Even though there is a mass of information about the language, much of it has been tucked away in obscure corners, unavailable to most scholars as well as to the people who need it most. I hope the list and the web pages will help to get around these problems. And there has been a major discovery in Yahgan linguistics- a copy of the "lost" grammar of Thomas Bridges was located serendipitously in the Library of Congress this past summer- I've been re-editing it and it will be one of the documents that will serve as a base for revitalization. The unusable published dictionary (which should get the "worst" award for dictionaries edited by people with doctorates) is being completely reworked, from original manuscripts as well as many other materials that will be added to it. I'm hoping to get an interactive version up and running within the next year at the Dartmouth site. Terry Langendoen has offered to help (you still out there? I can be a bit uncommunicative during the winter!). In addition to published texts in the language (Bridges' translations of the Acts of the Apostles as well as the Gospels of John and Luke- which were in Yahgan only and are being back-translated morpheme-by-morpheme into English and Spanish) there are also new recordings- some done for documentaries over the past 15 or so years (I'm trying to get the unedited footage as these contain conversations as well as speech of people now gone), and more recently those done on site by the OMORA bioconservancy group. I'm hoping also to get down there myself soon to gather missing information on prosody, complex predicational structure, and pragmatics. If you read the piece on Linguistic Discovery mentioned at the top, you may have noticed the sound file of Furlong cylinder excerpts. I was just in contact with a scientist at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory who has new technology which allows scanning and digitization of information off old wax recordings without doing them any damage, and which allows the data to be cleaned up to remove distortions from cracks, wax degradation, etc. I'm hoping to be able to take at least the linguistically salient cylinders to the lab for scan. It would be wonderful to be able to clearly hear Yahgan recorded in 1908, which not only is the earliest known, but the only such for the next three quarters of a century. It would be great to be able to find funds (which I know is not easy) to help provide teaching aids for the small Yahgan community in Ukika (about 70 people, half the known ethnically Yahgan population alive today, out of an estimated 10000 in 1800) beyond the usual pen and paper. The technologies available today which allow interactive learning environments, fast desktop publication, etc., could be invaluable to the revitalization of the language, now spoken by one (maybe two) fluent elders. And without the conveniences offered by the modern computer I don't know where my own efforts would be today. Anyway, that's my say about Yahgan and technology (for now). The online discussion (if any of you care to visit- the post archives are public, though if you join you get to look at the great links, including a link to an online streaming video version of one of the documentaries I mentioned - 60 minutes long where you can hear quite a bit of spoken Yahgan) is at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/waata_chis ("Old News/Stories" in Yahgan). I look forward to interaction with folks here on the list. Best regards to all, Jess Tauber phonosemantics at earthlink.net From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 6 17:03:52 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 6 May 2004 10:03:52 -0700 Subject: S 2382 Native American Connectivity Act Message-ID: S 2382 IS http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?c108:1:./temp/~c108bdKvf6:: 108th CONGRESS 2d Session S. 2382 To establish grant programs for the development of telecommunications capacities in Indian country. IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES May 4, 2004 Mr. INOUYE introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Indian Affairs A BILL To establish grant programs for the development of telecommunications capacities in Indian country. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. This Act may be cited as the `Native American Connectivity Act'. SEC. 2. FINDINGS. Congress finds that-- (1)(A) disparities exist in the areas of education, health care, workforce training, commerce, and economic activity of Indians due to the rural nature of most Indian reservations; and (B) access to basic and advanced telecommunications infrastructure is critical in eliminating those disparities; (2) currently, only 67.9 percent of Indian homes have telephone service, compared with the national average of 95.1 percent; (3) the telephone service penetration rate on some reservations is as low as 39 percent; (4) even on reservations and trust land, non-Indian homes are more likely to have telephone service than Indian homes; (5) only 10 percent of Indian households on tribal land have Internet access; (6) only 17 percent of Indian tribes have developed comprehensive technology plans; (7) training and technical assistance have been identified as the most significant needs for the development and effective use of telecommunications and information technology in Indian country; (8) funding for telecommunications and information technology projects in Indian country remains inadequate to address the needs of Indian communities; (9) many Indian tribes are located on or adjacent to Indian land in which unemployment rates exceed 50 percent; (10) the lack of telecommunications infrastructure and low telephone and Internet penetration rates adversely affects the ability of Indian tribes to pursue economic development opportunities; and (11) health care, disease prevention education, and cultural preservation are greatly enhanced with access to and use of telecommunications technology and electronic information. SEC. 3. PURPOSES. The purposes of this Act are-- (1) to promote affordable and universal access among Indian tribal governments, tribal entities, and Indian households to telecommunications and information technology in Indian country; (2) to encourage and promote tribal economic development, self-sufficiency, and strong tribal governments; (3) to enhance the health of Indian tribal members through the availability and use of telemedicine and telehealth; and (4) to assist in the retention and preservation of native languages and cultural traditions. SEC. 4. DEFINITIONS. In this Act: (1) BLOCK GRANT- The term `block grant' means a grant provided under section 5. (2) ELIGIBLE ACTIVITY- The term `eligible activity' means an activity carried out-- (A) to acquire or lease real property (including licensed spectrum, water rights, dark fiber, exchanges, and other related interests) to provide telecommunications services, facilities, and improvements; (B) to acquire, construct, reconstruct, or install telecommunications facilities, sites, or improvements (including design features), or utilities; (C) to retain any real property acquired under this Act for tribal communications purposes; (D) to pay the non-Federal share required by a Federal grant program undertaken as part of activities funded under this Act; (E) to carry out activities necessary-- (i) to develop a comprehensive telecommunications development plan; and (ii) to develop a policy, planning, and management capacity so that an eligible entity may more rationally and effectively-- (I) determine the needs of the entity; (II) set long term and short term goals; (III) devise programs and activities to meet the goals of the entity, including, if appropriate, telehealth; (IV) evaluate the progress of the programs and activities in meeting the goals; and (V) carry out management, coordination, and monitoring of activities necessary for effective planning implementation; (F) to pay reasonable administrative costs and carrying charges relating to the planning and execution of telecommunications development activities, including the provision of information and resources about the planning and execution of the activities to residents of areas in which telecommunications development activities are to be concentrated; (G) to increase the capacity of an eligible entity to carry out telecommunications activities; (H) to provide assistance to institutions of higher education that have a demonstrated capacity to carry out eligible activities; (I) to enable an eligible entity to facilitate telecommunications development by-- (i) providing technical assistance, advice, and business support services (including services for developing business plans, securing funding, and conducting marketing); and (ii) providing general support (including peer support programs and mentoring programs) to Indian tribes in developing telecommunications projects; (J) to evaluate eligible activities to ascertain and promote effective telecommunications and information technology deployment practices and usages among Indian tribes; or (K) to provide research, analysis, data collection, data organization, and dissemination of information relevant to telecommunications and information technology in Indian country for the purpose of promoting effective telecommunications and information technology deployment practices and usages among tribes. (3) ELIGIBLE ENTITY- The term `eligible entity' means-- (A) an Indian tribe; (B) an Indian organization; (C) a tribal college or university; (D) an intertribal organization; or (E) a private or public institution of higher education acting jointly with an Indian tribe. (4) INDIAN TRIBE- The term `Indian tribe' has the meaning given the term in section 4 of the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act (25 U.S.C. 450b). (5) SECRETARY- The term `Secretary' means the Secretary of Commerce. (6) TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE- The term `technical assistance' means the facilitation of skills and knowledge in planning, developing, assessing, and administering eligible activities. (7) TRAINING AND TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE GRANT- The term `training and technical assistance grant' means a grant provided under section 6. (8) TRIBAL COLLEGE OR UNIVERSITY- The term `tribal college or university' has the meaning given the term `tribally controlled college or university' in section 2 of the Tribally Controlled Community College Assistance Act of 1978 (25 U.S.C. 1801), except that the term also includes an institution listed in the Equity in Educational Land-Grant Status Act of 1994 (7 U.S.C. 301 note). (9) TELEHEALTH- The term `telehealth' means the use of electronic information and telecommunications technologies to support long-distance clinical health care, patient and professional health-related education, public health, and health administration. SEC. 5. BLOCK GRANT PROGRAM. (a) ESTABLISHMENT- There is established within the National Telecommunications and Information Administration a Native American telecommunications block grant program to provide grants on a competitive basis to eligible entities to carry out eligible activities under subsection (c). (b) BLOCK GRANTS- The Secretary may provide a block grant to an eligible entity that submits a block grant application to the Secretary for approval. (c) ELIGIBLE ACTIVITIES- A grant under this section may only be used for an eligible activity. (d) REGULATIONS- Not later than 180 days after the date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary shall promulgate regulations establishing specific criteria for the competition conducted to select eligible entities to receive grants under this section for each fiscal year. SEC. 6. TRAINING AND TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE GRANTS. (a) NOTIFICATION AND CRITERIA- The Secretary-- (1) shall provide notice of the availability of training and technical assistance grants; and (2) publish criteria for selecting recipients. (b) GRANTS- The Secretary may provide training and technical assistance grants to eligible entities with a demonstrated capacity to carry out eligible activities. (c) USE OF FUNDS- A training and technical assistance grant shall be used-- (1) to develop a training program for telecommunications employees; or (2) to provide assistance to students who-- (A) participate in telecommunications or information technology work study programs; and (B) are enrolled in a full-time graduate or undergraduate program in telecommunications-related education, development, planning, or management. (d) SETASIDE- (1) IN GENERAL- For each fiscal year, the Secretary shall set aside $2,000,000 of the amount made available under section 12 for training and technical assistance grants, to remain available until expended. (2) TREATMENT- A training and technical assistance grant to an entity shall be in addition to any block grant provided to the entity. (e) PROVISION OF TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE BY THE SECRETARY- The Secretary may provide technical assistance, directly or through contracts, to-- (1) tribal governments; and (2) persons or entities that assist tribal governments. SEC. 7. COMPLIANCE. (a) AUDIT BY THE COMPTROLLER GENERAL- (1) IN GENERAL- The Comptroller General of the United States may audit any financial transaction involving grant funds that is carried out by a block grant recipient or training and technical assistance grant recipient. (2) SCOPE OF AUTHORITY- In conducting an audit under paragraph (1), the Comptroller General shall have access to all books, accounts, records, reports, files, and other papers, things, or property belonging to or in use by the grant recipient that relate to the financial transaction and are necessary to facilitate the audit. (3) REGULATIONS- The Comptroller General shall promulgate regulations to carry out this subsection. (b) ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION- (1) IN GENERAL- After consultation with Indian tribes, the Secretary may promulgate regulations to carry out this subsection that-- (A) ensure that the policies of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.), and other laws that further the purposes of that Act (as specified by the regulations), are most effectively implemented in connection with the expenditure of funds under this Act; and (B) assure the public of undiminished protection of the environment. (2) SUBSTITUTE MEASURES- Subject to paragraph (3), the Secretary may provide for the release of funds under this Act for eligible activities to grant recipients that assume all of the responsibilities for environmental review, decisionmaking, and related action under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.), and other laws that further the purposes of that Act (as specified by the regulations promulgated under paragraph (1)), that would apply to the Secretary if the Secretary carried out the eligible activities as Federal projects. (3) RELEASE- (A) IN GENERAL- The Secretary shall approve the release of funds under paragraph (2) only if, at least 15 days prior to approval, the grant recipient submits to the Secretary a request for release accompanied by a certification that meets the requirements of paragraph (4). (B) APPROVAL- The approval by the Secretary of a certification shall be deemed to satisfy the responsibilities of the Secretary under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.) and the laws specified by the regulations promulgated under paragraph (1), to the extent that those responsibilities relate to the release of funds for projects described in the certification. (4) CERTIFICATION- A certification shall-- (A) be in a form acceptable to the Secretary; (B) be executed by the tribal government; (C) specify that the grant recipient has fully assumed the responsibilities described in paragraph (2); and (D) specify that the tribal officer-- (i) assumes the status of a responsible Federal official under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.) and each law specified by the regulations promulgated under paragraph (1), to the extent that the provisions of that Act or law apply; and (ii) is authorized to consent, and consents, on behalf of the grant recipient and on behalf of the tribal officer to accept the jurisdiction of the Federal courts for enforcement of the responsibilities of the tribal officer as a responsible Federal official. SEC. 8. REMEDIES FOR NONCOMPLIANCE. (a) FAILURE TO COMPLY- If the Secretary finds, on the record after opportunity for an agency hearing, that a block grant recipient or training and technical assistance grant recipient has failed to comply substantially with any provision of this Act, the Secretary, until satisfied that there is no longer a failure to comply, shall-- (1) terminate payments to the grant recipient; (2) reduce payments to the grant recipient by an amount equal to the amount of payments that were not expended in accordance with this Act; (3) limit the availability of payments under this Act to programs, projects, or activities not affected by the failure to comply; or (4) refer the matter to the Attorney General with a recommendation that the Attorney General bring an appropriate civil action. (b) ACTION BY THE ATTORNEY GENERAL- After a referral by the Secretary under subsection (a)(4), the Attorney General may bring a civil action in United States district court for appropriate relief (including mandatory relief, injunctive relief, and recovery of the amount of the assistance provided under this Act that was not expended in accordance with this Act). SEC. 9. REPORTING REQUIREMENTS. (a) ANNUAL REPORT TO CONGRESS- Not later than 180 days after the end of each fiscal year in which assistance under this Act is provided, the Secretary shall submit to Congress a report that includes-- (1) a description of the progress made in accomplishing the objectives of this Act; (2) a summary of the use of funds under this Act during the preceding fiscal year; and (3) an evaluation of the status of telephone, Internet, and personal computer penetration rates, by type of technology, among Indian households throughout Indian country on a tribe-by-tribe basis. (b) REPORTS TO SECRETARY- The Secretary may require grant recipients under this Act to submit reports and other information necessary for the Secretary to prepare the report under subsection (a). SEC. 10. CONSULTATION. In carrying out this Act, the Secretary shall consult with other Federal agencies administering Federal grant programs. SEC. 11. HISTORIC PRESERVATION REQUIREMENTS. A telecommunications project funded under this Act shall comply with the National Historic Preservation Act (16 U.S.C. 470 et seq.). SEC. 12. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS. (a) IN GENERAL- There are authorized to be appropriated to carry out this Act-- (1) $20,000,000 for fiscal year 2005; and (2) such sums as are necessary for each subsequent fiscal year. (b) AVAILABILITY- Funds made available under subsection (a) shall remain available until expended. END From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 6 17:57:11 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 6 May 2004 10:57:11 -0700 Subject: New money found for 'language nests' (fwd) Message-ID: New money found for 'language nests' WebPosted May 5 2004 02:42 PM CDT http://north.cbc.ca/regional/servlet/EmailStory?filename=nwt-langnest05052004®ion=North YELLOWKNIFE A program to introduce aboriginal children to their language and culture in the N.W.T. is getting a new lease on life. The territorial government has announced it has found $900,000 to keep the "nests" program alive. It started as a pilot project three years ago, but ran out of money in March. The preschool immersion program features "language nests" modelled on a program that successfully revitalized the Maori language in New Zealand. Young children learn their language and traditional skills with teachers and elders in their community. On Tuesday education minister Charles Dent announced the new spending, saying it would continue into the future. He says funding is scarce in the territory right now, but the government can't afford to let go of this program. "It may help to save some of the aboriginal languages but the primary function is to make sure that young people are comfortable in their own culture and heritage," he says. "Because knowing oneself is important to be successful in the learning setting." Members of the legislative assembly unanimously supported a reinstatement of the project. Cate Sills, executive director of the N.W.T. Literacy Council, says the council was disappointed when the government didn't renew the program this year. She's glad to see it back so soon. "The link between language and culture is… you can't distinguish between the two, language is culture," she says. "So it's really important that there be some public investment so the communities can build capacity to try to reclaim their language." The money will be used to hire and train teachers and buy learning aids. The program will be available in 18 Northwest Territories communities. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed May 12 05:00:02 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 11 May 2004 22:00:02 -0700 Subject: Language Fair strives to save dying languages (fwd) Message-ID: Language Fair strives to save dying languages Efforts to support traditional speakers http://www.nativetimes.com/index.asp?action=displayarticle&article_id=4421 SANTE FE NM 5/11/2004 On May 15, the Fifth Native Youth Language Fair and Poster Contest will honor living languages and the young people who are keeping them alive. The Youth Language Fair will begin at 10 a.m. in the gymnasium of the Santa Fe Indian School and will feature young people performing, singing or conversing in their original Tribal languages. Additionally, children and teens will draw posters and comic strips to illustrate this year’s theme, “Learning from Our Elders.” The fair is the brainchild of the Santa Fe-based Indigenous Language Institute (ILI), which serves as a national center that supports Tribes around the country in preserving original languages. Of the 300 languages that existed when Columbus came to the Americas, it’s estimated that only 175 survive, with only 50 being learned by children. If the situation does not change in the next 50 years, only 20 languages could survive. The Youth Language Fair recognizes young people who are helping to preserve their original language and culture. It is open for children preschool to 19 years of age. Back for the fifth time as master of ceremonies will be actor Wes Studi, a Cherokee speaker and star of PBS’ hit mysteries, “Thief of Time” and “Skinwalkers.” The language fair started small with just a handful of children participating and grew to more than 200 children taking part in language presentations in 2002, and some 450 participating in the language fair, poster contest and powwow. However, as donations to nonprofits dried up around the country, the ILI had to halt the language fair in 2003 because it had no money to stage the popular event, said director Inee Yang Slaughter. “Those were tough times,” Slaughter said. “But we have a renewed vision and solid seed money to put on the fair, so we are back stronger than ever.” The language fair has attracted participants from as far away as North Carolina, and also has given birth to language fairs in other parts of the country, including the Oneida and Comanche nations. From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Wed May 12 05:32:50 2004 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn) Date: Wed, 12 May 2004 00:32:50 -0500 Subject: Fwd: Washington Post: Learning in Their Native Tongue Message-ID: FYI... Note among other things mention of use of computers in Otomi. Don Osborn Bisharat.net ----- Forwarded message from Ryan Monroe ----- Date: Tue, 11 May 2004 21:19:00 -0400 From: Ryan Monroe Reply-To: "multied-l at usc.edu" Subject: Washington Post: Learning in Their Native Tongue To: "multied-l at usc.edu" Learning in Their Native Tongue Mexican Cities Join Experiment in Bilingual Education By Mary Jordan Washington Post Foreign Service Tuesday, May 11, 2004; Page A10 MEXICO CITY -- Jose Roberto Cleofas depends on red lights to make a living. As soon as cars brake for the stoplight in front of the Pizza Hut on Insurgentes Avenue, Cleofas, 14, moves in on dirty windshields and starts wiping. "How else can I eat?" said the fifth-grader, one of the hundreds of thousands of indigenous people who have migrated to Mexican cities in search of work as agriculture has failed in their dying villages. The federal government is struggling to educate migrant children here and in other Mexican cities. The Education Ministry has opened more than 2,000 bilingual schools for speakers of 62 indigenous languages in the past 10 years. In part, the initiative is a response to the armed Zapatista movement in southern Mexico in the 1990s, which embarrassed the government by bringing worldwide attention to its neglect of indigenous people. Most of the new schools are in rural areas where indigenous children are in the majority. Now, the challenge is to accommodate their growing numbers in cities where they are a minority. Like 300,000 other Mexicans, Cleofas's first language is Otomi. There are 10 million indigenous Mexicans in a population of 103 million. During the Spanish conquest 500 years ago, indigenous people fled to remote desert and mountain areas and remain among Mexico's poorest, marginalized by racial prejudice and inferior schooling. Cleofas attends the Alfredo Correo school, a two-story brick schoolhouse, where about 100 of the 124 students are indigenous, according to the principal. The school was chosen last year to be one of 76 city schools in a vanguard bicultural project, because nearly all students speak the same language and are from Santiago Mexquititlan, a farming village 100 miles north of Mexico City. The schools' computers are programmed in both Spanish and Otomi, and teachers are required to learn Otomi so they can communicate more easily with students who are not proficient in Spanish. The national anthem is even sung in Otomi. Cleofas, who began speaking Spanish five years ago at age 9, said he no longer feels bad in class for not knowing a certain word in Spanish. Rather, he said, he enjoys helping others pronounce Otomi words. Science concepts are clearer when explained in his native language, he said, and when he sings the Mexican national anthem in Otomi "it rings with more meaning." Cleofas has already attended school longer than many indigenous students, who typically don't finish primary school. He said no one in his family had ever finished fifth grade. He said he had moved to Mexico City last year, aspiring only to earn money cleaning windshields. But he now likes school, especially math. The soaring number of indigenous children in urban Mexico is being compared by education officials to the situation in the United States. In both countries, the influx of migrant children is prompting schools to introduce native languages in the classroom. And in both countries, multicultural education is facing some resistance. "Yes, there are parents who don't like it," said Nancy Miranda, head of the parents association at the Alfredo Correo school. She said some parents believe assimilation and speaking Spanish are the way to get ahead in Mexico. Some parents said the cost of training teachers in indigenous languages and creating special bilingual textbooks was a wasteful expenditure for an already thin education budget. Rather than have their children learn Otomi, some parents interviewed said they would prefer their children learn English or French, the languages wealthier Mexicans study. Sylvia Schmelkes, coordinator of bilingual and intercultural education for the Education Ministry, said some of the opposition is based on discrimination against indigenous people. "Racism is very profound in Mexico," she said. "You can ask any Mexican whether he or she is a racist, and they'll say, 'Of course, not.' . . . Nevertheless, in direct interaction, it exists." Miranda, the parent association head, said some parents object to the growing number of indigenous children in their neighborhood school. She said some parents unfairly complain that the newcomers "are slower to learn, don't know how to speak, are lower class." Miranda, who is not indigenous, said she feels it is "neither positive nor negative" that her son Donovan, 9, comes home singing songs in Otomi. But she said there are practical benefits for him to be part of this experiment: The school receives additional funds, computers, and attention. President Vicente Fox visited recently to see the new program, considered a blueprint for integrating indigenous languages and customs in additional urban schools next year. Students in the program receive scholarships of a few hundred dollars a year to make up for the cash that children might earn if they dropped out of school. As Miranda spoke, the recess bell rang in the tidy school in the upper middle-class Roma neighborhood. Boys and girls wearing the school's blue uniform ran onto the concrete playground, some laughing and telling jokes in Otomi. Most of the indigenous children at Alfredo Correo live in shacks haphazardly built in alleyways in a neighborhood of ornate homes and expensive apartments. Life is harder for them, said school principal Juan Valente Garcia Lopez. Nearly all are so poor they quality for subsidized lunches of oranges, bananas, peanuts and milk, which were stacked in boxes outside his office. Garcia said his job was to create an environment that raises self-esteem: "School represents a place where they are treated equally, where they aren't discriminated against, where they are happy." When classes end for the day, Cleofas walks two blocks to the busy street corner where he earns, on a good evening, about $6 for eight hours washing windshields. Nearly all his classmates also work after school. Most of them sell handmade dolls from their village, or gum and candies. "Usually their mom is working in one spot, but they are off on their own," said Rosalba Esquivel Fernandez, a first-grade teacher. She said most of her students, who are as young as 6, work on the streets until after midnight. The migration of indigenous families to such major cities as Tijuana, Monterrey and Mexico City is more visible every year, in large part because of the women and small children it is bringing to urban street corners. The mothers commonly wear colorful traditional dresses and carry a baby strapped to their back. Children knock on car windows selling homemade handicrafts for the equivalent of $1. It is a business born of desperation. "All that is left is a ghost town," said Domingo Gonzalez, a town official in Santiago Mexquititlan, Cleofas's village. So many people have left, he said in a telephone interview, because there is "no food, no jobs, nothing here." The price of Mexican corn, the staple many indigenous people have grown on small plots for generations, has been undercut by less expensive U.S. corn that has flooded the Mexican market in the 10 years since the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement. Alejandro Lopez, director of Mexico City's office of indigenous affairs, estimated that as many as 40 percent of Mexico's indigenous people now live in urban areas, compared with 20 percent 15 years ago. He said there has been nearly a four-fold increase in Mexico City since 1990, with about 500,000 indigenous people now living in the capital. In the northern city of Monterrey, public school officials are struggling with how to help thousands of new indigenous students who speak dozens of languages. Regina Martinez Casas, an academic researcher, said the rapid growth of the indigenous population in Guadalajara is generating culture clashes. She said an indigenous girl, who by custom would be married by age 13, is now exposed to other 13-year-olds who are studying and "putting rings in their belly button and having fun." Cleofas sat at a computer in his school's new media lab, toggling between Spanish and Otomi during a lesson on the human nervous system. A shy boy with black wavy hair, Cleofas said that his mother died last year and that he survived on a little corn and the edible parts of cactus plants until he left his village for Mexico City. "There is nothing left at home. It's better here," he said, wearing new tennis shoes and sport clothes he bought with his earnings from washing windshields. He now lives with his sisters, who had previously migrated to Mexico City. Cleofas said school has given him goals and that he is now thinking about studying medicine, because, "I'd like to help others." Just maybe, he said, "I'll be a doctor one day." © 2004 The Washington Post Company _________________________________________________________________ Stop worrying about overloading your inbox - get MSN Hotmail Extra Storage! http://join.msn.com/?pgmarket=en-us&page=hotmail/es2&ST=1/go/onm00200362ave/direct/01/ ----- End forwarded message ----- From anguksuar at YAHOO.COM Wed May 12 13:36:05 2004 From: anguksuar at YAHOO.COM (Richard LaFortune) Date: Wed, 12 May 2004 06:36:05 -0700 Subject: MN Native languages in State Senate In-Reply-To: <1083863032.5d55405a99325@www.email.arizona.edu> Message-ID: this is due for floor vote sometime in the next couple of hours,we are advised (8:30 AM/CST) http://www.senate.leg.state.mn.us/committee/2003-2004/Finance_Early/update04.htm Early Childhood Policy and Budget Division Update Update: April 21, 2004 2:40 p.m. Updates are listed in reverse order with the most recent at the top. Native languages discussed The cultural and educational importance of the Dakota and Ojibwe languages provided the focal point for discussion at the Tues., Apr. 20, meeting of the Early Childhood Policy and Budget Division. The panel, chaired by Sen. John Hottinger (DFL-St. Peter), heard extensive testimony on a resolution urging state agencies to work in concert with American Indian communities to bring existing policies and procedures into compliance in order to support the revitalization of the Dakota and Ojibwe languages and to promote educational achievement for American Indian students. John Poupart, speaking on behalf of the Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance, said there are many native language initiatives across Minnesota and the nation, but all are united in the effort to preserve our native languages. "Native language is the crucible of our culture and our heritage," Poupart said. Poupart then introduced elders to speak on their experiences with American Indian languages. "The elders are the real libraries of our communities," Poupart said. Members also heard young children demonstrate their growing competence in the use of their native languages. Gabriella Strong, a professor at the University of Minnesota, said there is a strong link between native language fluency and educational achievement. In addition, the panel heard from several individuals who experienced the boarding school era that removed American Indian children from their families and prohibited the use of native languages. Several other groups, including tribal leaders, a representative of the Army's World War II code talkers and additional scholars, spoke before the panel. All speakers emphasized the importance of native languages as a basic medium for the transmission and survival of American Indian heritage, cultures, oral histories, spirituality and cultural values. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Movies - Buy advance tickets for 'Shrek 2' http://movies.yahoo.com/showtimes/movie?mid=1808405861 From CRUZ471 at AOL.COM Wed May 12 15:44:00 2004 From: CRUZ471 at AOL.COM (CRUZ471 at AOL.COM) Date: Wed, 12 May 2004 11:44:00 EDT Subject: Otomi language on computer Message-ID: To whomever sent the Washington Post article about Cleofa and his use of the computer in Mexico to study Otomi and Spanish at school. How can anyone get access to the studies Cleofa is using? Who wrote it? Is it online? Does one have to contact the Instituto National de Indigenista headquarters to get more information on the language studies? Where in Mexico is Otomi taught and in which other communities are the other indigenous languages taught? What is their contact number? I thank you in advance for any information you may provide. Robert. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 13 15:37:22 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 13 May 2004 08:37:22 -0700 Subject: Signs spell out tribe's passion to revitalize native language (fwd link) Message-ID: Signs spell out tribe's passion to revitalize native language By Jon Ostendorff, Staff Writer May 12, 2004 10:17 p.m CHEROKEE - Henry Welch tightened the bolts on the bottom of a green street sign with Council House Circle on top and the same words printed in Cherokee on the bottom. http://cgi.citizen-times.com/cgi-bin/story/regional/54741 From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 13 15:56:35 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 13 May 2004 08:56:35 -0700 Subject: Northwest Education: Native Students (fwd links) Message-ID: Northwest Education: Native Students Balancing Two Worlds Spring 2004 Volume 9 Number 3 ISSN: 1546-5020 http://www.nwrel.org/nwedu/09-03/index.php In the Language of Our Ancestors Programs in Montana and Washington Give Voice to Disappearing Words http://www.nwrel.org/nwedu/09-03/language.php Charter School Keeps Native Language Alive Determined teachers enhance students' cultural identity http://www.nwrel.org/nwedu/09-03/charter.php From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri May 14 00:52:46 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 13 May 2004 17:52:46 -0700 Subject: =?iso-8859-1?b?RGlu6Q==?= Language and Culture Program Summer Institute (fwd) Message-ID: Diné Language and Culture Program Summer Institute What: Diné Language and Culture Program Summer Institute When: June 1st – June 30th, 2004 Where: Phoenix Indian Center, 2601 N. 3rd Street, Navajo Language Classroom Suite 201-B Have you ever wondered what being Diné was all about? Would you like to know what our clans represent and how we can use our clans to survive in the Society we live in today? Have you wondered about who you really are? What Diné really means? If you answered “yes” to any of the above questions, this is for you! The classes will be held Monday – Thursday of each week. There will be only one session in the morning. The sessions will be 2 hours (10:00am-12:00pm). There is a limit of 25 students due to limited classroom space. If more than 25 people sign up, there will be two sessions (an afternoon session will be added.) There will be guest speakers that will present on Motivation, Discipline, Self Identity, and Self Awareness. No H.S. credit will be given for this Summer Institute. If interested in this Summer Institute, please contact Freddie Johnson for more information at (602) 264-6655 or email: johnson at phxindcenter.org. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sun May 16 16:46:00 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Sun, 16 May 2004 09:46:00 -0700 Subject: Regina woman seeks to save language (fwd) Message-ID: Regina woman seeks to save language Pamela Cowan Regina Leader-Post Saturday, May 15, 2004 http://www.canada.com/ottawa/ottawacitizen/features/onlineextras/story.html?id=50657340-e16a-4e79-b8f4-338fbbfc3f37 REGINA -- Lindsay Weichel left for Guatemala this week to help preserve an endangered Mayan language and way of life. "The preservation of Indian languages is vitally important," said Weichel. "If you lose the language, then the culture dies, too. You lose an entire way of thinking. You don’t just lose grammar; you lose an entire way of describing the world around you." Now that she’s completed the first year of her master’s degree in linguistics at the First Nations University of Canada, Weichel is enthused about exploring Pokomchi, a Mayan language she will learn from native speakers in San Cristobal. "There’s never been work done on this language in English," she said. "I will be writing a description of the language’s grammar. The only data available to me in Canada about Pokomchi was this old grammar written 70 years ago by a priest who didn’t really know anything about linguistics, so he kind of compared it to Latin and it’s not alike at all." Documenting Pokomchi grammar will form the basis for Weichel’s master’s thesis. She speaks Spanish, so she will look for an interpreter bilingual in Spanish and Pokomchi and enlist his help in interviewing two or three native speakers. She’ll begin by learning culturally significant words that have one meaning - such as man, woman, corn or water. "You start with words so that you can get all the sounds, all the consonants and vowels that make up the language and then, after that, we’ll go on to phrases," she said. Guatemala’s high level of illiteracy poses some challenges. "If you’re illiterate, it changes the way you view language - it changes the way you view sounds and spellings," she said. The 22-year-old received a $17,500 grant from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and $4,000 from the University of Regina. A portion of the money will be used to pay each speaker $10 a day, the standard rate of pay for speakers. English-speaking missionaries working in Guatemala helped arrange accommodations for Weichel with a local family. Prior to leaving for Guatemala earlier this week, she tried to prepare for culture shock. "I’m a really conservative dresser, but I had to buy a whole new wardrobe because I’m not conservative enough," she said. "All my clothes must be below the knee so, out of respect, I bought a bunch of new skirts and capri pants." Once Weichel completes her master’s thesis, she plans to return to Guatemala. "I want to do my PhD on the same language - they need a dictionary so, hopefully, I’ll get to work on that. You can’t write a dictionary until you understand the grammar." © Regina Leader-Post 2004 From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Mon May 17 18:20:32 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 11:20:32 -0700 Subject: Minority Languages Face Extinction (fwd) Message-ID: Minority Languages Face Extinction http://allafrica.com/stories/200405170590.html The Herald (Harare) NEWS May 17, 2004 Posted to the web May 17, 2004 By Sifelani Tsiko Harare "OUR languages are the cornerstone of who we are as a people," one renowned author once wrote. And now, minority languages are fast vanishing throughout the world as their last speakers die, or as dominant languages like English, Shona and Ndebele in the case of Zimbabwe push them out of common usage. In Zimbabwe, linguists say there are up to 16 African languages or dialects spoken in the country of which ChiShona and IsiNdebele are the dominant ones. There are up to 14 minority dialects in the country, which include Kalanga spoken in Bulilimamangwe district in Matabeleland South, Hwesa in the Nyanga district, Sotho in Gwanda South, Shangani in Chiredzi, Chitoko-Tonga (Mudzi Tonga) in Mudzi district, Venda in Beitbridge and Tonga in the Binga, Omay and Nyaminyami districts. Other minority languages include Chikunda and Doma spoken in Lower Guruve and Muzarabani districts, Chewa and Nyanja in various parts of the country, Khoisan or Tshwawo in Tsholotsho, Barwe in Nyamaropa and Nyakomba districts in Nyanga, Tswana in Bulilimamangwe and Fingo or Xhosa in Mbembesi. Nambya is widely spoken in Hwange district and Sena in various parts of the country. Shona and Ndebele are the only recognised official languages apart from English. Government documents, signs and television programmes are still being produced in English, Shona and Ndebele with some little or none in the other minority languages. Now, there is growing pressure to promote the use of more than a dozen other unofficial languages as well. "Government has shown some commitment, but lack of funds and the snail's pace process in the implementation of minority language policies is worrying and a cause for concern," says a language expert at the University of Zimbabwe. "There is no specific budget for minority language policies," he says. "It's difficult to see how these languages will survive, especially now that our youth are being bombarded daily with everything English and American." But the Minister of Education, Sport and Culture, Cde Aeneas Chigwedere, argues differently. "In the language, culture is embedded," he says. "I know the value of language. The Tonga were the first people to come into Zimbabwe. I know this and we are building up (minority language education)." A number of minority dialects in Zimbabwe have neither books nor documents to ensure their survival and rely on the spoken word for their continuity. These include Hwesa, Shangani, Venda, Chikunda, Doma, Barwe, Tshwawo and Nambya. Simooya Hachipola, a linguistic expert, wrote in "Survey of the Minority Languages in Zimbabwe" (1998) that most of the material identified in the study was either old (pre-1965) or too advanced to be used in primary and secondary schools. "Much work still needs to be done in the area of language description, particularly for those languages without orthography and have not been committed to writing," he wrote. What is lacking, he says, are descriptive grammars, dictionaries and literary books in minority languages, something which has curtailed the full growth of these marginalised languages. Some minority languages like Hwesa, Tshwawo and Barwe, the study found out, had no known published books and prospects for teaching are none or limited. The Government has shown its willingness to address the concerns of minority language speakers by taking steps to promote the use of the country's dozen minority languages at primary school level. "We are building up now. In the past, minority languages could only be taught up to Grade Three, but now we have extended this to Grade Seven," the minister says. "Minority language communities have been clamouring for the teaching of their languages. They have been against the idea of marginalising their languages. "We are only responding to their call. Books are not there, teachers are not there and this exercise is not something that can be done overnight, but certainly we are building up." Moves are underway to amend the Education Act to ensure that all schools implement the teaching of indigenous languages and that they be accorded the same time allotted the country's three main languages. Last year, the Zimbabwe Indigenous Languages Promotion Association (Zilpa) commended Cde Chigwedere for taking steps to promote indigenous languages in the country. The Ministry of Education sourced funds for the publication of books in indigenous languages and a printing machine to facilitate their publication last year. Zimbabwe's efforts, though small, have won the praise of linguists, anthropologists and others interested in the preservation of cultural diversity. Linguists say the use of any language in daily life is the only way to ensure that it continues to survive and thrive. Across the world, minority languages are under threat from larger, dominant languages and cultures and linguistic experts estimate that by the end of this century 50 percent of the world's languages will have disappeared. In Australia, it is reported that 95 percent of the indigenous Aboriginal languages are not being learnt by children and many are already extinct or down to the last few speakers. "Issues of linguistic diversity and the need for language planning are peripheral in America and almost non-existent in Europe," says Matthew Johnson in "Journal on Language Planning in Africa". He says European colonial powers ordered that their colonies adopt a single national language as the nations in Europe itself did, resulting in the marginalisation or extinction of countless dialects in Africa. Africa is one continent with the world's most linguistically diverse people. For instance, the Central African Republic has 68 distinct language groups in a population of just 3,4 million people. Others include Cameroon with 279 language groups, the Democratic Republic of Congo 221, Tanzania 131, Chad 127, while Africa's most populous nation, Nigeria, has over 400 language groups, according to a 1998 study by Robinson and Varley. "People see many languages as a sin and say, 'No, we must have one language.' I think it is necessary for Africans to accept the reality of multilingual societies," writes Ngugi WaThiong'o in "African Visions". Linguistic experts say language diversity and planning are the most critical and often overlooked issue on the continent. They say governments, minority language communities and the media should begin linguistic and cultural revival programmes to reclaim the traditions and heritage of these minority languages, which are fast becoming extinct. "Nothing stays longer in our souls than the language we inherit," one writer put it. And a budget, books, official recognition and media coverage for minority languages will help entrench language not only in the soul, but also in the heart and mind as well. From anguksuar at YAHOO.COM Mon May 17 19:50:55 2004 From: anguksuar at YAHOO.COM (Richard LaFortune) Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 12:50:55 -0700 Subject: MN Native languages legislative victory In-Reply-To: <1084818032.356c731ee2d23@www.email.arizona.edu> Message-ID: May 17, 2004 PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE MINNESOTA LEGISLATURE PASSES RESOLUTION SUPPORTING OJIBWE AND DAKOTA LANGUAGE REVITALIZATION For more information contact: Richard LaFortune, 612-871-0731 or 612-267-1682 (cell) Native American language researcher, writer, linguist consultant At the height of spring, as the rain blessed the plants of Minnesota, the Senate and the House of Representatives of the Minnesota Legislature formally adopted a concurrent resolution to support the revitalization of the Dakota and Ojibwe languages that are native to this state, but are on the verge of extinction. Native languages are recognized a pathway to learning excellence for Native American students across the country. The Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance is poised to make this accomplishment one of many in the long road to revitalization of the Dakota and Ojibwe languages. The language alliance will be working with elders and communities around the state through the summer. With less than 30 fully fluent Dakota speakers living in Minnesota and few fully fluent speakers left on each of the seven Ojibwe Reservations in Minnesota, there isn't a moment to lose. Legislative co-chair Richard LaFortune says, "This is a bright spot in state relations amidst so many other differences that arose this past year." The Language Revitalization Alliance is a gathering of elders; fluent Dakota and Ojibwe speakers, early childhood and childcare providers, members from all eleven tribes in Minnesota, educators, school achievement, and education advocates, and community members. This Alliance has been meeting since June, 2003 to examine the existing barriers and opportunities to language revitalization, convening people who are concerned about the loss of language, supporting each others work, and building awareness at the state and local levels of language revitalization and immersion programs. For Alliance members, language is important to fully understand the cultures and traditions of the Dakota and Ojibwe people. Because the Ojibwe and Dakota languages were forcefully and often violently taken away thorough the boarding schools, many people see language revitalization as an important step in reclaiming cultures, educational achievement, and a positive image of one's self. Experts see a connection to many of the difficulties in the Native American community as an outgrowth of the historical trauma and unresolved grief from so much loss as well as continuing injustices toward Native people. John Poupart, facilitator for the Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance, says, "Connecting to our inner identity is a corner stone of where we must go, language is part of that cornerstone." There have been many strategies to increase the success of Native children many designed by the mainstream culture that does not recognize the ways of thinking and being of the Native American community. Research is now showing that students in a language immersion experience have greater success in school and had consistent measurable improvement on local and national measures of achievements. (Bringing Thunder by Janine Pease Pretty on Top, Tribal College Journal of American Indian Higher Education). Native Hawaiian children in immersion experience outperform the average for Native Hawaiian children. The Maori tribes in New Zealand went from a 5%-15% pass rate in school to a soaring 75% when students were involved in language immersion. Similar statistics are found at the Piegan Institute in Montana with Blackfeet language and other immersion schools around the United States. Language immersion is shown to have a multiplier effect for young Native American children. Language Immersion with children has developed 'intensive language acquisition' which benefits in communication. Learning one's native language reveals and teaches tribal philosophies is a link between the past and future of Native American tribal nations. Darrell Kipp of the Piegan Institute has documented the precious bond created between the children and elders. "Knowledge of the Native language gives tribal members a unique tool for analy zing and synthesizing the world, and the incorporating the knowledge and values of the tribal nation into the world at large."(Crawford) As Minnesota's first languages, Dakota and Ojibwe are important assets to Minnesota and to the world's linguistic resources. The complexity and unique aspects of Ojibwe and Dakota languages provide important worldviews and concepts that can enrich all Minnesotans. Richard LaFortune says, "Native American languages represent some of the richest and most sophisticated languages on earth. Language revitalization presents an outstanding opportunity of our young people to maintain heritage and increase education success. The Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance will be sharing their stories, visions and dreams for a Minnesota where the Dakota and Ojibwe languages are revitalized, where members of the Dakota and Ojibwe communities hear their language every day, reclaim their positive self identity, and unlock their great potential for educational achievements. "We look forward to hearing Governor Pawlenty's response, as well as his commissioners of education and health and human services," noted LaFortune. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? SBC Yahoo! - Internet access at a great low price. http://promo.yahoo.com/sbc/ From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Mon May 17 20:00:46 2004 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 13:00:46 -0700 Subject: Language Diversity Message-ID: Please find the complete programme of the Congress on Language Diversity, Sustainability and Peace that is to be held in Barcelona (20-23 May) at the following link : http://www.linguapax.org/ From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Mon May 17 21:05:49 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 14:05:49 -0700 Subject: MN Native languages legislative victory In-Reply-To: <20040517195055.36659.qmail@web11207.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Great news Richard! phil cash cash UofA > ----- Message from anguksuar at YAHOO.COM --------- > Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 12:50:55 -0700 > From: Richard LaFortune > Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology > Subject: MN Native languages legislative victory > To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU > > May 17, 2004 > PRESS RELEASE > FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE > > > MINNESOTA LEGISLATURE PASSES RESOLUTION SUPPORTING > OJIBWE AND DAKOTA LANGUAGE > REVITALIZATION > > For more information contact: > Richard LaFortune, 612-871-0731 or 612-267-1682 (cell) > Native American language researcher, writer, linguist > consultant > > At the height of spring, as the rain blessed the > plants of Minnesota, the > Senate and the House of Representatives of the > Minnesota Legislature formally > adopted a concurrent resolution to support the > revitalization of the Dakota and > Ojibwe languages that are native to this state, but > are on the > verge of extinction. Native languages are recognized a > pathway to learning > excellence for Native American students across the > country. > > The Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance is > poised to make this > accomplishment one of many in the long road to > revitalization of the Dakota and > Ojibwe languages. The language alliance will be > working with elders and > communities around the state through the summer. With > less than 30 fully fluent > Dakota speakers living in Minnesota and few fully > fluent speakers left on each of > the seven Ojibwe Reservations in Minnesota, there > isn't a moment to lose. > Legislative co-chair Richard LaFortune says, "This is > a bright spot in state > relations amidst so many other differences that arose > this past year." > > The Language Revitalization Alliance is a gathering of > elders; fluent Dakota > and Ojibwe speakers, early childhood and childcare > providers, members from all > eleven tribes in Minnesota, educators, school > achievement, and education > advocates, and community members. This Alliance has > been meeting since June, 2003 > to examine the existing barriers and opportunities to > language revitalization, > convening people who are concerned about the loss of > language, supporting > each others work, and building awareness at the state > and local levels of > language revitalization and immersion programs. > > For Alliance members, language is important to fully > understand the cultures > and traditions of the Dakota and Ojibwe people. > Because the Ojibwe and > Dakota languages were forcefully and often violently > taken away thorough the > boarding schools, many people see language > revitalization as an important step in > reclaiming cultures, educational achievement, and a > positive image of one's > self. > > Experts see a connection to many of the difficulties > in the Native American > community as an outgrowth of the historical trauma and > unresolved grief from so > much loss as well as continuing injustices toward > Native people. John > Poupart, facilitator for the Dakota Ojibwe Language > Revitalization Alliance, says, > "Connecting to our inner identity is a corner stone of > where we must go, > language is part of that cornerstone." > > There have been many strategies to increase the > success of Native children > many designed by the mainstream culture that does not > recognize the ways of > thinking and being of the Native American community. > Research is now showing > that students in a language immersion experience have > greater success in school > and had consistent measurable improvement on local and > national measures of > achievements. (Bringing Thunder by Janine Pease Pretty > on Top, Tribal College > Journal of American Indian Higher Education). Native > Hawaiian children in > immersion experience outperform the average for Native > Hawaiian children. The Maori > tribes in New Zealand went from a 5%-15% pass rate in > school to a soaring 75% > when students were involved in language immersion. > Similar statistics are > found at the Piegan Institute in Montana with > Blackfeet language and other > immersion schools around the United States. > > Language immersion is shown to have a multiplier > effect for young Native > American children. Language Immersion with children > has developed 'intensive > language acquisition' which benefits in communication. > Learning one's native > language reveals and teaches tribal philosophies is a > link between the past and > future of Native American tribal nations. Darrell Kipp > of the Piegan Institute > has documented the precious bond created between the > children and elders. > "Knowledge of the Native language gives tribal members > a unique tool for analy > zing and synthesizing the world, and the incorporating > the knowledge and values > of the tribal nation into the world at > large."(Crawford) > > As Minnesota's first languages, Dakota and Ojibwe are > important assets to > Minnesota and to the world's linguistic resources. The > complexity and unique > aspects of Ojibwe and Dakota languages provide > important worldviews and concepts > that can enrich all Minnesotans. Richard LaFortune > says, "Native American > languages represent some of the richest and most > sophisticated languages on > earth. Language revitalization presents an outstanding > opportunity of our young > people to maintain heritage and increase education > success. > > The Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance > will be sharing their > stories, visions and dreams for a Minnesota where the > Dakota and Ojibwe languages > are revitalized, where members of the Dakota and > Ojibwe communities hear their > language every day, reclaim their positive self > identity, and unlock their > great potential for educational achievements. > > "We look forward to hearing Governor Pawlenty's > response, as well as his > commissioners of education and health and human > services," noted LaFortune. > > > > > > > __________________________________ > Do you Yahoo!? > SBC Yahoo! - Internet access at a great low price. > http://promo.yahoo.com/sbc/ > > > ----- End message from anguksuar at YAHOO.COM ----- From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Tue May 18 16:03:10 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 18 May 2004 09:03:10 -0700 Subject: Cherokee People Work To Save Language (fwd) Message-ID: Cherokee People Work To Save Language Hundreds Of Adults, Children Studying Their Native Tongue http://www.thehometownchannel.com/news/3316827/detail.html POSTED: 9:51 PM CDT May 17, 2004 UPDATED: 10:14 PM CDT May 17, 2004 TAHLEQUAH, Okla. -- Although the Cherokee language is one of the oldest languages still spoken in North America, Cherokee Nation leaders have worried in recent years that their native tongue is in danger of being lost forever. Cherokees Keep Language Alive [video insert] But as 40/29's Melissa Kelly reported, Cherokee leaders aren't letting their language become just another page in history. A group of elders, teachers and tribal leaders began taking steps to preserve the cornerstone of their culture when they began to suspect that few members of the tribe spoke the Cherokee language. Tribal leaders said that a recent study found that only 1 percent of the Cherokee Nation is fluent in Cherokee. Indeed, very few members of the Cherokee Nation speak their native language -- and even fewer know how it looks on paper. But Cherokee language teacher Harry Oosawhee said a new trend among the Cherokee people may change that statistic. "What we're trying to do is create an epidemic, so people will want to learn and share," he said. At Lost City Elementary School in eastern Oklahoma, every student in the Cherokee language immersion class is learning to speak Cherokee –- and English is not allowed while class is in session. 6-year-old Hawk said his mother and grandmother speak some Cherokee, but his father does not. When he leaves school, Hawk said, he becomes the teacher at home. "It makes me feel more Cherokee," he said. Tribal officials said more and more adults are learning the language. According to Principal Chief Chad Smith, online Cherokee language classes are booked solid. "The bottom line is, if you know our language, you're happier (and) healthier," he said. "It's something we need to do." In addition to the renewed interest in language courses, native songs now flood the airwaves of a local radio station that broadcasts in Cherokee. Many Cherokees say the importance of the language is hard to explain. "It brought us together ... it binds our people," said elder John Ketcher. "As long as there are Cherokee speakers, there will always be Cherokee." From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Tue May 18 16:12:27 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 18 May 2004 09:12:27 -0700 Subject: Preserving a native tongue (fwd) Message-ID: Preserving a native tongue By Sarah Villicana, The Porterville Recorder http://www.portervillerecorder.com/articles/2004/05/18/news/local_state/news01.txt Christina Jaquez is on a mission, one to save a dying language and in the process preserve a piece of the Valley's culture. To achieve her goal, she's enlisting an unlikely set of burgeoning experts: preschool-age children from the Tule River Indian tribe. "What do we see and hear with?" Jaquez asks a roomful of youngsters. "We see with our 'sahsah' and hear with our 'took,'" says Jaquez as she points from her eyes to her ears. Every Friday morning, Jaquez teaches a couple dozen pre-school age children words in Yowlumni, the native language of the Tule River Indian tribe. The lessons take place at the Tule River Child Care Center, run by the Tulare County Office of Education. "We keep the lessons short," Jaquez said. "We go over colors, numbers and everyday objects and then we finish by telling a story or singing songs in the Yowlumni language." After 10 minutes of instruction, the children start to become restless so they are read an adaptation of "Goldilocks and the Three Bears" in Yowlumni - with porridge replaced by acorn mush. Jaquez, who has been speaking Yowlumni for 11 years, was part of a master-apprentice program. Her instructor, Jane Flippo, one of the few master speakers left, died last March. "The youngest master speakers are in their 70s," Jaquez said. "I always wanted to learn the language but it was difficult to find people still willing to teach," Jaquez said. "It's really very beautiful. There are no bad words in the Yowlumni language." After the story, the day's lesson wraps up with a sing-a-long of "The Deer Song." "Ho-yeh-nah, Oh-chip-nee," sang Denise Peyron, an instructor who teaches the children songs that the Yokut people have been singing for hundreds of years. Peyron has been speaking Yowlumni words her whole life but has only studied the language for the last two years. "I started learning by singing through church," Peyron said. "When you're troubled, the words can be soothing to your soul." "It's important for the kids to hear the words, retain them and keep them in their heart. The whole philosophy of a culture is in the language," Jaquez said. "We are trying to keep our past alive, but the language is near extinction." Before the children leave, Peyron takes out a special surprise. "Be very careful children, this was a gift I received for learning my language," said Peyron as she hands over an eagle feather with a brightly beaded handle. She was given the feather for saying a prayer in Yowlumni at a recent ceremony. There are only a few people left at the reservation who are fluent in Yowlumni. Jaquez estimates that maybe a dozen elders still speak the native language. "I work on learning my language every day," Peyron said. "I know 200 more words than I knew before I started. Teaching the kids really helps. It wasn't until I started teaching that I learned all the words for numbers and parts of the body." On Saturdays, the teachers become the students and attend a language class open to all ages on the reservation. "There is so much to learn," Peyron said. "One word can have 20 different meanings, depending on how you say it." "If we don't teach it now, once they're gone there will be no one left to remember. Yowlumni is one of the most unique indigenous languages in North America," Jaquez said. "Linguists have come here from all over to study it because it contains sounds that you won't find anywhere else in the country." Jaquez and Peyron have found children are perhaps the best hope to save the tribe's native language. "I have three grandchildren and one niece that I'm teaching Yowlumni," Peyron said. "They pick it up so quickly. My granddaughter learned how to count in Yowlumni before I did." "My dream is to open an immersion school," Jaquez said. "These kids are going to go on to surprise everyone. This generation will be the one that finally saves our language." Contact Sarah Villicana at 784-5000, or svillicana at portervillerecorder.com This story was published in The Porterville Recorder on May 178, 2004 From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Tue May 18 22:41:30 2004 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 18 May 2004 15:41:30 -0700 Subject: audio tip... Message-ID: tá'c haláXp (good day!), audio tip of the day...i just found out something interesting for audio playback. when playing sound files, haven't you noticed that RealPlayer, Windows Media Player, or Winamp has become cumbersome lately (though Quicktime is still very nice -- extremely nice with the Pro version). i never quite liked the newer versions because it was too awkward when handling all my language files. try a Windows solution: play your audio in the pared-down, minimal Windows Media Player 6. all you have to do is got to Start, Run, and then type in "mplayer2". and there you have it, right!? i heard that WMP6 plays all of the same codecs as version 9.0 does. and it doesn't eat up processing time and resources like 9.0. kaa mawá (later), phil UofA, ILAT -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 878 bytes Desc: not available URL: From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed May 19 16:01:58 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Wed, 19 May 2004 09:01:58 -0700 Subject: Preserving Languages (fwd) Message-ID: Preserving Languages Linguists say more than 150 of the remaining 175 indigenous U.S. languages are in peril of disappearing By W. JAMES HONABERGER | For The New Mexican Sunday, May 16, 2004 http://www.santafenewmexican.com/main.asp?Search=1&ArticleID=44796&SectionID=2&SubSectionID=&S=1 [photo insert - Charlotte Baltazar, 15, of Dulce, forgets some of her lines spoken in Jicarilla on Saturday, during a presentation on the origins of the Jicarilla people and their culture at the annual Native American Youth Language Fair at the Santa Fe Indian School. - Raul Vasquez/The New Mexican] Bea Duran of Tesuque Pueblo didn't teach her children to speak their tribe's language because, as a child, she was punished for speaking the language at school. "It shouldn't have been an issue, but in the back of my head I had that thought," Duran says. "I should have taught them. I feel bad that I didn't." On Saturday, looking at her granddaughters dressed in traditional outfits at an indigenous language fair in Santa Fe, Duran said proudly that she is teaching them to speak Tewa. "I still have a chance," she said. Duran and her grandchildren were among dozens of people who attended the event, hosted by the Indigenous Language Institute at the Santa Fe Indian School. Students from kindergarten to high school sang songs, recited poems and counted in Navajo, Tewa, Jicarilla Apache and Cherokee. Despite the seemingly vibrant demonstration of indigenous languages, the idioms are in danger of being lost. According to linguists, if tribal members -- most especially the youngest generation -- do not learn to speak their languages, the next 60 years might see the silence of more than 150 of the remaining 175 indigenous languages in the United States. "We are in trouble," said Tessie Naranjo of Santa Clara Pueblo, the institute's vice president. "More than any other time in our history we need our language. It's through the language that we keep ourselves going." As late as 1776, at least 300 indigenous languages were spoken in what is now the United States. Their roots trace to as many as 15 language families. European languages, with rare exceptions, belong to one language family -- Indo-European. Despite the fact that linguists have documented most remaining indigenous languages, comprehensive learning aids for indigenous languages are virtually non-existent. Maura Studi, a volunteer with the language institute, said she was surprised at the lack of Cherokee-language-learning aids when she and her husband, actor Wes Studi, began to teach their son the language. "There just were not a lot of materials or help around," Maura Studi said. "I realized that not everything was in place for making this an easy process for anyone." Lack of learning aids might be a thing of the past, as native communities become tech savvy and multimedia devices become accessible. "Many people are using the computer to create tutorial programs, and we're finding that those are very powerful tools," said Inee Yang Slaughter, institute director. As Native Americans fluent in their language grow older and take Tewa, Hawaiian or Choctaw to their graves, efforts to cultivate younger speakers are helping. Naranjo said language and culture have a symbiotic relationship. "Behavior is embedded in the language; language reflects what the values of your community are," she said. "If you don't know your language, you won't learn how to be a good Tewa person ... or a good anything person." At Saturday's fair, Duran's grandchildren Maylinda Reynolds, 7, and Crystal Rain Reynolds, 5, recited a poem and counted in Tewa. "It's fun," Maylinda Reynolds said. "I can count to 20. I know how to say thank you ... Ku'daa." From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed May 19 16:03:52 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Wed, 19 May 2004 09:03:52 -0700 Subject: Tribe wants to revive Arapaho language (fwd0 Message-ID: Tribe wants to revive Arapaho language By WHITNEY ROYSTER Star-Tribune staff writer http://www.casperstartribune.net/articles/2004/05/19/news/wyoming/8bde50ae4a0bcb6a87256e9900069a70.txt JACKSON -- Unless drastic changes are implemented on the Wind River Reservation, the Arapaho language will die within 15 years, a language professor said Tuesday. Eugene Ridgely Jr., director of the bilingual education program for the Wind River Tribal College in Ethete, said the key is to speak Arapaho in the home and elsewhere as much as possible. "Without the language, you don't have the culture," Ridgely said. "The stories, even everyday conversation, it's different than we're going to have with English." An Arapaho language revitalization effort is being undertaken by the tribe members and was spearheaded by a Council of Elders concerned with the culture loss. A meeting with the Arapaho Business Council, Council of Elders, Arapaho Language and Cultural Commission, school officials and teachers will be held today at 11 a.m. at the college. "First, we've got to get the people to care," Ridgely said. "If they don't care then we have a big problem. We need to lay down the groundwork to address those (language) concerns. ... We need cooperation from every entity that we're going to talk to." Ways of infusing the Arapaho language in schools and in homes is the group's primary focus. Ridgely said the college conducted a survey in 1995, asking students, parents and grandparents in the community about the language they spoke. "From there we drew some conclusions that (the Arapaho language) was in a sense declining very rapidly," he said. "This was also foreseen back in the years of the 1970s." In the 1970s, the level of language loss was determined to be a "three" on a scale of one to five, with five being a level of total extinction. The Arapaho language was flourishing until the 1950s. "It's gotten worse really fast," Ridgely said. "Now we maybe have about 15 years of fluency left, maybe less." Years of fluency are determined by the age of elders who are still fluent. Of the nearly 8,000 tribe members, less than 1,000 are fluent and at a conversational speaking stage, according to the college. Ridgely said some words don't translate into English. He said some stories told in the Arapaho language don't translate readily to English, and those stories are important in the history of the tribe. The loss of native languages are the result, in part, of the U.S. government and churches infusing reservations with European thinking and the English language. The "No Child Left Behind" act also makes teaching native languages in schools difficult, because so much emphasis is placed on traditional curriculum, Ridgely said. Language revitalization efforts have been successful for tribes in the Hawaiian islands. "It starts with total immersion from the little ones up, gradually working their way to speaking adults," Ridgely said. "Those revitalization efforts will take several years; it won't happen overnight." Non-speakers and non-tribe members need to be concerned about the disappearance of the language, too, Ridgely said, if people want to experience native cultures. One way to ensure the viability of the language is to pair children with fluent, Arapaho-speaking elders, Ridgely said. "This is going to be the first step in many," he explained. "We want to get the word out that it needs to be addressed soon or else we will all be English speaking within 15 years. It's going to be an uphill struggle." From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed May 19 18:15:43 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Wed, 19 May 2004 11:15:43 -0700 Subject: Audacity update... Message-ID: dear ilat, fyi, for those that use the free software Audacity on a regular basis, note the new updated release Audacity 1.2.1. http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ qó'c (later), phil cash cash UofA, ILAT From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 20 16:42:45 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 20 May 2004 09:42:45 -0700 Subject: Typesetting Native American Languages (link) Message-ID: [fyi, a nice article on typsetting. pcc] Typesetting Native American Languages The Journal of Electronic Publishing August, 2002   Volume 8, Issue 1 ISSN 1080-2711   http://www.press.umich.edu/jep/08-01/syropoulos.html From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri May 21 16:08:22 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 21 May 2004 09:08:22 -0700 Subject: Mexican schools teach indigenous languages (fwd) Message-ID: Mexican schools teach indigenous languages http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/centralphoenix/articles/0521mexlanguage0521Z4.html# Mary Jordan The Washington Post May. 21, 2004 12:00 AM MEXICO CITY - Jose Roberto Cleofas depends on red lights to make a living. As soon as cars brake for the stoplight in front of the Pizza Hut on Insurgentes Avenue, Cleofas, 14, moves in on dirty windshields and starts wiping. "How else can I eat?" said the fifth-grader, one of the hundreds of thousands of indigenous people who have migrated to Mexican cities in search of work as agriculture has failed in their dying villages. The federal government is struggling to educate migrant children here and in other Mexican cities. The Education Ministry has opened more than 2,000 bilingual schools for speakers of 62 indigenous languages in the past 10 years. In part, the initiative is a response to the armed Zapatista movement in southern Mexico in the 1990s, which embarrassed the government by bringing worldwide attention to its neglect of indigenous people. Most of the new schools are in rural areas where indigenous children are in the majority. Now, the challenge is to accommodate their growing numbers in cities where they are a minority. Like 300,000 other Mexicans, Cleofas' first language is Otomi. There are 10 million indigenous Mexicans in a population of 103 million. During the Spanish conquest 500 years ago, indigenous people fled to remote desert and mountain areas and remain among Mexico's poorest, marginalized by racial prejudice and inferior schooling. Cleofas attends the Alfredo Correo school, a two-story brick schoolhouse, where about 100 of the 124 students are indigenous, according to the principal. The school was chosen last year to be one of 76 city schools in a vanguard bicultural project because nearly all students speak the same language and are from Santiago Mexquititlan, a farming village 100 miles north of Mexico City. The schools' computers are programmed in Spanish and Otomi, and teachers are required to learn Otomi so they can communicate easily with students who are not proficient in Spanish. Cleofas, who began speaking Spanish five years ago at age 9, has already attended school longer than many indigenous students, who typically don't finish primary school. He said no one in his family had ever finished fifth grade. The soaring number of indigenous children in urban Mexico is being compared by education officials to the situation in the United States. In both countries, the influx of migrant children is prompting schools to introduce native languages in the classroom. And in both countries, multicultural education is facing some resistance. "Yes, there are parents who don't like it," said Nancy Miranda, head of the parents association at the Alfredo Correo school. She said some parents believe assimilation and speaking Spanish are the way to get ahead in Mexico. Some parents said the cost of training teachers in indigenous languages and creating special bilingual textbooks was a wasteful expenditure for an already thin education budget. Rather than have their children learn Otomi, some parents interviewed said they would prefer their children learn English or French, the languages wealthier Mexicans study. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri May 21 16:11:22 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 21 May 2004 09:11:22 -0700 Subject: Fort Belknap hears it first on KGVA (fwd) Message-ID: Fort Belknap hears it first on KGVA A fresh start By JARED MILLER Tribune Regional Reporter http://www.greatfallstribune.com/news/stories/20040521/localnews/470964.html [TRIBUNE PHOTO BY JARED MILLER - Radio announcer Brian Hammett, known on air as "B.J. the D.J.," is a state certified Native language instructor. He teaches a daily language lesson for radio listeners.] As word of the tribal president's unprecedented resignation swept over the Fort Belknap Reservation last week, residents tuned their radios to 88.1 FM. Behind the microphone, KGVA station manager Will Gray Jr. broadcast live from tribal headquarters, and studio announcers discussed the resignation on the air. "A lot of people really didn't know what was going on," Gray said. "That's where we come in." The live coverage is one example of how KGVA -- part of a national network of Native American-owned radio stations -- has become more than just a signal on the radio dial. Just minutes after Gray announced that the Fort Belknap Indian Community Council had ended discussions about the resignation, the doors to tribal headquarters swung open. People poured inside to talk about what they'd heard on the radio. Tune to 88.1 on any given day and you'll hear the steady beat of powwow music, contemporary tunes selected by local DJs and free Indian language lessons. High school basketball games air on the weekends, and homebound elders get their only access to powwows through a remote radio feed. KGVA also carries programs like National Native News by National Public Radio and Native America Calling by American Indian Radio On Satellite. What you won't hear on the 24-hour station is commercials. KGVA has been on the air since 1996 and broadcasts from Fort Belknap College, which holds the license and provides most of the funding. Ultimately, the Fort Belknap Indian Community Council has control of the station and its content. The Fort Belknap Reservation, home to Montana's Gros Ventre and Assinibione tribes, is 35 miles east of Havre on the Hi-Line. It wasn't until 2001 that KGVA became a centerpiece for news, information and entertainment. The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks helped sharpen the station's focus as a news source. For two days after the attacks, the station broadcast nothing but NPR. Then Gray decided to turn the microphone to the reservation. He interviewed members of the Fort Belknap Indian Community Council, and he asked locals what they had to say about the attacks. "I wanted to give them a voice," Gray said. "This is their radio station." Tuning in When a crippling blizzard hit in December 2003, the reservation again tuned to KGVA. With police dispatch inundated with calls, radio announcers relayed message from stranded travelers and families that needed help. The reservation eventually was declared a disaster area, and the station got the word out immediately. "They try to keep the people involved and informed," said Fort Belknap resident Gene Brockie, who first tuned in after moving back to the reservation in January. "I think they do a good job." Tribal President Darrell Martin said the station helps get information to the reservation elders who may not have television. "It's very important that people know what's going on the reservation," Martin said. "It's a great tool." A strong signal During the last 30 years, radio has found a special place on America's reservations, said Susan Braine, an operating chief for Koahnic Broadcast Corp., the native-owned media center in Anchorage, Alaska. All together, there are 32 commercial-free reservation radio stations. Most are linked by the American Indian Radio On Satellite and most are National Public Radio affiliates. "I think it's cool that you don't have to go the IHS (Indian Health Service) clinic or the post office to read the bulletin board to find out what's going on anymore," Braine said. "All you have to do is tune in to your tribal radio station. "I would say that every one of them is the community center," she said. The oldest reservation stations -- in Alaska, North Carolina and New Mexico -- have been on the air for at least three decades. Some stations, including the NPR station in Pine Hill, N.M., KTDB, are bilingual. That station translates all NPR programs into the Navajo language, Braine said. Learning curve Gray and the KGVA staff all got their start as station volunteers, and none had broadcast experience. But their talents blended with the station goals, and eventually they got permanent jobs. Announcer Brian Hammett, known on air as "B.J. the DJ," is certified by the state of Montana to teach the White Clay language and gives a daily language lesson. Both Hammett and announcer Dean Snow, known on air as "Luke Warm Water," rely heavily on humor to drive their programming. Unlike a lot of contemporary stations today, Hammett and Snow pick their own tunes; nothing is prerecorded. Room to grow Under Grays' leadership, the station continues to sharpen its focus on news and local voice. There's still plenty of room to grow, he said. In fact, the station is in the process of hiring a third announcer and will soon extend its reach well beyond the reservation. KGVA will be on the Internet in about two months. Miller can be reached by e-mail at jarmille at greatfal.gannett.com, or by phone at (406) 791-6573 or (800) 438-6600. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sun May 23 05:10:17 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Sat, 22 May 2004 22:10:17 -0700 Subject: Campers challenged to use only Lakota language for a week (fwd) Message-ID: Campers challenged to use only Lakota language for a week http://www.rapidcityjournal.com/articles/2004/05/23/news/local/news03.txt By Jomay Steen, Journal Staff Writer EAGLE BUTTE -- No cell signals, no radio waves, no cable, no English. It's all part of a plan to keep technology and the 21st century at bay while immersing students into the American Indian language and culture of the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation. As a way to strengthen an endangered language, Si Tanka University will challenge 100 student campers to a week of accelerated learning where only the Lakota language is spoken. Setting up campsites along the sandy banks of the Cheyenne River on the southern border of the reservation, students will have had a two-day vocabulary and camp orientation before entering the outdoor seminar. Rosalita Roach, program director of Cheyenne River Resource Consortium, said the consortium sponsors the camp as part of Waonspekiya Oyasin, a language revitalization project for teachers. "It's a full-immersion camp," Roach said. "They're going to use local resources, like the elders, for activities and for conversation." Cultural aspects, such as set-up of the camp, storytelling and music will be a part of the experience, she said. But it also demands full participation from the students. "Once campers go in, they can't come out," she said. "That is, if they want to earn their credits." "It's going to be informational and educational," Barry Mann said. Mann, Si Tanka University academic dean, said the basic idea behind the camp is to preserve the Lakota language. "It's what makes us the people that we are," he said. It's the first time the camp has focused on adults and teachers, and will incorporate a lot of the values, tradition and culture of the Lakota people, he said. Sponsored by Waonspekiya Oyasin, Si Tanka University and Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Language Department, the camp runs June 1-6. Pre-camp courses will begin June 1 at Si Tanka University at the Eagle Butte campus. Language teachers and university officials will introduce Lakota vocabulary, class syllabus, orientation and core concepts. Campers are asked to bring their own tents, bedrolls and gear. A complete list of what to bring will be provided at pre-registration. The camp experience costs $249 plus a $50 fee. The tuition and course fees will pay for the three-credit course work, materials and meals. Tuition is free to enrolled tribal members, with a priority to those living on the reservation. Language campers will arrive for check-in at noon to 1 p.m. June 3 at the site. Maps to the site will be given to students at the orientation. The camp offers Lakota introduction course for 35 students; Lakota II for 35 students; Lakota III for 15 students and Lakota IV for 15 students. The participants will have an on-site camp experience. Family-centered, campers are welcome to bring their children, ages 5 and older. Children's activities will be provided. Campers would have to provide their own babysitters for very young children. To pre-register for the three-credit course, call Carol Rave or Barry Mann at 1-605-964-8011 by May 30. "Based on people's interest, we may have to do it again," Mann said. Contact Jomay Steen at 394-8418 or jomay.steen at rapidcityjournal.com Copyright © 2004 The Rapid City Journal Rapid City, SD From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sun May 23 16:08:53 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 09:08:53 -0700 Subject: Seneca Faithkeepers School tries to keep alive the tribe's traditional ways, language (fwd) Message-ID: Seneca Faithkeepers School tries to keep alive the tribe's traditional ways, language By DAN HERBECK News Staff Reporter 5/20/2004 http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial/20040520/1053043.asp [photo insert - Robert Kirkham/Buffalo News. "Bear beans" from the Faithkeepers School garden will one day be part of lunch for students, from left, Ryan Abrams, Landon Sequoyah, Jacob Dowdy and Franklin Brown.] [photo insert - Robert Kirkham/Buffalo News. Rudi George listens to a Seneca lesson from a tribal historian.] [photo insert - Robert Kirkham/Buffalo News. Sandy Dowdy, co-founder of the Faithkeepers School, teaches history from Seneca perspective.] [photo insert - Derek Gee/Buffalo News. Lena Pearl Dowdy, named for her great-great grandmother Lena Snow, learns respect for tribal elders at the traditional Seneca school.] Last winter, at a meeting of the Seneca Tribal Council, an 8-year-old boy stood up to give the invocation. In front of a council filled with smoke shop owners and casino enthusiasts, the boy spoke the language of his forefathers, the language of the Longhouse. "This little boy spoke for eight to 10 minutes, all in the Seneca language," said Rickey L. Armstrong Sr., the tribe's president. "I was in awe listening to this." And it all happened because Lehman "Dar" Dowdy doesn't want Seneca tradition to die. "Ninety-nine percent of Senecas don't know how to speak the Seneca language. Everywhere you look, our old ways of life are disappearing," said Dowdy, 65. To counter that loss of heritage, Dowdy and his wife, Sandy, in 1998 started the Seneca Faithkeepers School, where the boy learned to speak the Seneca language. The school is located in the woods of the Allegany Reservation, in a long cedar building modeled after the longhouses, where traditional Senecas hold religious ceremonies. In that building, Seneca children and teenagers spend five days a week learning their nation's language, its history and traditions, from farming techniques to an ancient game played with dice carved from animal bones. Attending the school is a major commitment for young people and their parents. Because the Faithkeepers program is not geared to meet government requirements, each student needs tutoring or home schooling to learn subjects such as math, English and science. Twelve students, ages 8 to 14, now attend the school which, the Dowdys realize, is just a small step toward saving the Senecas' heritage. "I would like to see each of these 12 kids grow up and teach 12 other kids about our language and customs," Dowdy said. "And hopefully, that second group will go on to teach others." The school teaches students the ways of the Longhouse religion, as specified in a spiritual guide called the Gaiwi:yo:h. Pronounced Guy-wee-yo, the book provides the moral code for Longhouse Senecas. The roles of males and females at the school follow Seneca traditions that aren't always in step with modern America. Only girls are taught to cook. Only boys can play - or even watch - a popular winter sport called "snowsnakes," which involves pushing spears of polished hardwood down a quarter-mile ramp lined with ice. Students maintain the big, bountiful garden behind the school, growing corn, tobacco and scarlet runner beans. One recent afternoon, an elder named Marilyn Cooper taught the girls how to sew colorful "ribbon shirts" that are worn for tribal ceremonies. The children learn about traditional song and dance, self-esteem, the earth's natural energy forces - wind, water, thunder, sun, moon and stars - and the use of plants and bushes to make medicines. "I like the school . . . especially the cultural stuff," said student Robynn George, 13, who first introduced herself by her Seneca name, Gayenesha'a:h. "I like learning about our traditions." Dowdy is a Longhouse faithkeeper who leads many of the ceremonies at the Cold Spring Longhouse on the Allegany Reservation. As a teacher, he gives his lessons a different spin from what the students would hear in public schools. "When I teach them about George Washington, I tell them about the things that George Washington did to our nation," Dowdy said, referring to the army sent to burn and destroy Seneca villages during the Revolutionary War. Students pay nothing to attend the school. Most expenses are covered by donations from Senecas who believe in preserving the nation's old ways. Merle Watt, a wealthy Seneca smoke shop owner, raised much of the money and provided laborers to build the school. The Seneca Nation donated 10 acres for the school, does repairs on the building, provides some tutors and pays Dowdy as a part-time employee. Earlier this month, the nation government donated more than $70,000 to the school after a fund-raiser at the new Seneca Allegany Casino. Armstrong said it would "sicken" him if the nation completely lost touch with its old ways. He said many Seneca elders still recall the days when they learned to speak their own language before English. "I'd like to see a second Faithkeepers School started on the Cattaraugus Territory," Armstrong said. "Anything that Dar Dowdy asks for, I think we should step up to the plate and help him." From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sun May 23 16:17:36 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 09:17:36 -0700 Subject: Swinomish youth pick up cameras, tell their own stories (fwd) Message-ID: Swinomish youth pick up cameras, tell their own stories By Tina Potterf Seattle Times staff reporter Alcoholics. Drug addicts. High school dropouts. Native American youth are aware of the stereotypes that taint their heritage. Ask a group of Native kids from the Swinomish tribe near La Conner, Skagit County, about what it means to be an American Indian, and you may be surprised by their candor and insight: "You probably think I'm another stoned Indian. Well, you're wrong. I'm going to become a lawyer." "You probably think that I've already dropped out of school. Well, I've kept my grades up and plan to go to the University of Washington." [text inset - Native Lens. Later this month, the short digital films created by Swinomish youth will be available for viewing online at www.911media.org. To learn more about Native Lens, or to bring a workshop to your tribe, call 206-682-6552, ext. 18. For more information about classes and other workshops at 911 Media Arts Center, visit www.911media.org.] "You probably think I'm a druggie or an alcoholic because I'm Native. I plan to finish high school and go to college." These statements, from a public service announcement created by Swinomish teens, drive home a central message: Native Americans have pride and, as is stated at the outset of the PSA, are "More than what you think." The PSA was created as part of Native Lens, a new program of Seattle's 911 Media Arts Center. The program's goal is to dismantle Native American stereotypes and encourage youth to take on the role of storytellers, whether through public service announcements or documentary films. Over the next two years, 911 Media Arts Center will present a series of programs that center on media literacy and digital filmmaking for Native youth. The project, funded by a grant from the Time Warner Foundation, launched earlier this month with two days of workshops at the arts center. More than two dozen Swinomish youth traveled by bus to Seattle to learn the nuts and bolts of digital movie-making, from handling a camera to framing a shot and lighting. [photo inset - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Travis Tom, left, and Nick Clark set up backdrops.] The teens and early twentysomethings also learned about collaboration and how to work under the pressure of a deadline — in this case, they had four or five hours to make either a PSA, an interview-intensive documentary, or an animation short. The goal was to create tangible, lasting works that educate and enlighten people about their tribe. On top of developing a strong idea and executing it, the group learned how to operate digital video equipment, from technical stuff, like what buttons do what — to composition, such as framing a person's face and editing a few hours of footage down to a few minutes. The young people were divided into groups and teamed with instructors such as Roy Wilson, who oversaw the making of the public service announcement. "Your job is to make something small, say in 30 seconds," Wilson said, "that will have an effect on people." After a concentrated brainstorming session in a large, cool back room at 911 Media Arts Center, the kids decided to build the PSA around the theme of "Native Pride," and one by one stepped in front of the camera, operated by their peers, to state their accomplishments and aspirations. Getting tips from the pros [photo insert - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Nick Clark, center, frames up a shot of Amanda Hansen for his 30-second video.] In addition to learning how to make digital films, the group took a field trip to the Experience Music Project and talked with rising young Native American actors Eddie Spears ("Dreamkeeper," "Black Cloud") and Cody Lightning ("Smoke Signals," "Manic"), who answered questions and offered suggestions to the aspiring filmmakers. The students' finished works were shown to a rousing reception at a Saturday evening screening at 911. The decision to partner with the Swinomish was a logical one because the tribe has an existing outlet in the form of tribal cable station SWIN96 for the youth to take what they learn through Native Lens and apply it in ways that benefit the whole community. The students' PSA and other Native Lens short films will eventually be broadcast on the cable station and be shopped to various youth film festivals. "It was important to work with one tribe to create a model" for the program, said Annie Silverstein, director of the Young Producers Project and Native Lens. "We want to help them develop sustainable media on the reservation." La Conner Middle School sixth grader Anna Cladoosby, part of the PSA team, embraced the opportunity to learn more about digital media. "I want to learn the process and how hard you have to work to make a movie," she said. Through Native Lens, Cladoosby said, "People can learn more about our culture." Robert Williams was one of only a few participants with prior experience in shooting and editing videos. Sharing what they've learned "I've tried sports, basketball and baseball, and it didn't work out," Williams said, "So I picked up a camera." [photo inset - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Nolita Bob is interviewed by a friend and is also seen on the monitor at right, which is for the video crew to watch so they have proper framing of the image.] Williams, 21, has a penchant for short documentaries, mostly of his buddies playing basketball or hanging out, set to an underground hip-hop soundtrack. He hopes to build on and pass along the experiences gained through Native Lens, a program he said "gives us a chance to go back to the tribe and tell them what we have learned and what we've done." Getting the youth to think critically and creatively, and to empower them to share their stories with others, is ultimately what Native Lens is about. "These kids are really good storytellers... ," said Tracy Edwards, Swinomish education director. "I hope that they continue with what they learned here and bring it back to the tribe. "And if they have a story to tell, they can get it out to the community." Tina Potterf: 206-464-8214 or tpotterf at seattletimes.com From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sun May 23 16:18:35 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 09:18:35 -0700 Subject: Swinomish youth pick up cameras, tell their own stories (fwd) In-Reply-To: <1085329056.19cfd35c44c8f@www.email.arizona.edu> Message-ID: here is the url: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/living/2001933657_nativelens23.html > ----- Message from cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU --------- > Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 09:17:36 -0700 > From: phil cash cash > Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology > Subject: Swinomish youth pick up cameras, tell their own stories (fwd) > To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU > > Swinomish youth pick up cameras, tell their own stories > > By Tina Potterf > Seattle Times staff reporter > > Alcoholics. Drug addicts. High school dropouts. > > Native American youth are aware of the stereotypes that taint their > heritage. Ask a group of Native kids from the Swinomish tribe near La > Conner, Skagit County, about what it means to be an American Indian, > and you may be surprised by their candor and insight: > > "You probably think I'm another stoned Indian. Well, you're wrong. > I'm > going to become a lawyer." > > "You probably think that I've already dropped out of school. Well, > I've > kept my grades up and plan to go to the University of Washington." > > [text inset - Native Lens. Later this month, the short digital films > created by Swinomish youth will be available for viewing online at > www.911media.org. To learn more about Native Lens, or to bring a > workshop to your tribe, call 206-682-6552, ext. 18. For more > information about classes and other workshops at 911 Media Arts > Center, > visit www.911media.org.] > > "You probably think I'm a druggie or an alcoholic because I'm Native. > I > plan to finish high school and go to college." > > These statements, from a public service announcement created by > Swinomish teens, drive home a central message: Native Americans have > pride and, as is stated at the outset of the PSA, are "More than what > you think." > > The PSA was created as part of Native Lens, a new program of > Seattle's > 911 Media Arts Center. The program's goal is to dismantle Native > American stereotypes and encourage youth to take on the role of > storytellers, whether through public service announcements or > documentary films. > > Over the next two years, 911 Media Arts Center will present a series > of > programs that center on media literacy and digital filmmaking for > Native youth. The project, funded by a grant from the Time Warner > Foundation, launched earlier this month with two days of workshops at > the arts center. More than two dozen Swinomish youth traveled by bus > to > Seattle to learn the nuts and bolts of digital movie-making, from > handling a camera to framing a shot and lighting. > > [photo inset - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Travis Tom, left, and > Nick Clark set up backdrops.] > > The teens and early twentysomethings also learned about collaboration > and how to work under the pressure of a deadline — in this case, they > had four or five hours to make either a PSA, an interview-intensive > documentary, or an animation short. The goal was to create tangible, > lasting works that educate and enlighten people about their tribe. > > On top of developing a strong idea and executing it, the group > learned > how to operate digital video equipment, from technical stuff, like > what > buttons do what — to composition, such as framing a person's face and > editing a few hours of footage down to a few minutes. The young > people > were divided into groups and teamed with instructors such as Roy > Wilson, who oversaw the making of the public service announcement. > > "Your job is to make something small, say in 30 seconds," Wilson > said, > "that will have an effect on people." > > After a concentrated brainstorming session in a large, cool back room > at > 911 Media Arts Center, the kids decided to build the PSA around the > theme of "Native Pride," and one by one stepped in front of the > camera, > operated by their peers, to state their accomplishments and > aspirations. > > Getting tips from the pros > > [photo insert - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Nick Clark, center, > frames up a shot of Amanda Hansen for his 30-second video.] > > In addition to learning how to make digital films, the group took a > field trip to the Experience Music Project and talked with rising > young > Native American actors Eddie Spears ("Dreamkeeper," "Black Cloud") > and > Cody Lightning ("Smoke Signals," "Manic"), who answered questions and > offered suggestions to the aspiring filmmakers. The students' > finished > works were shown to a rousing reception at a Saturday evening > screening > at 911. > > The decision to partner with the Swinomish was a logical one because > the > tribe has an existing outlet in the form of tribal cable station > SWIN96 > for the youth to take what they learn through Native Lens and apply > it > in ways that benefit the whole community. The students' PSA and other > Native Lens short films will eventually be broadcast on the cable > station and be shopped to various youth film festivals. > > "It was important to work with one tribe to create a model" for the > program, said Annie Silverstein, director of the Young Producers > Project and Native Lens. "We want to help them develop sustainable > media on the reservation." La Conner Middle School sixth grader Anna > Cladoosby, part of the PSA team, embraced the opportunity to learn > more > about digital media. > > "I want to learn the process and how hard you have to work to make a > movie," she said. > > Through Native Lens, Cladoosby said, "People can learn more about our > culture." > > Robert Williams was one of only a few participants with prior > experience > in shooting and editing videos. > > Sharing what they've learned > > "I've tried sports, basketball and baseball, and it didn't work out," > Williams said, "So I picked up a camera." > > [photo inset - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Nolita Bob is > interviewed by a friend and is also seen on the monitor at right, > which > is for the video crew to watch so they have proper framing of the > image.] > > Williams, 21, has a penchant for short documentaries, mostly of his > buddies playing basketball or hanging out, set to an underground > hip-hop soundtrack. He hopes to build on and pass along the > experiences > gained through Native Lens, a program he said "gives us a chance to > go > back to the tribe and tell them what we have learned and what we've > done." > > Getting the youth to think critically and creatively, and to empower > them to share their stories with others, is ultimately what Native > Lens > is about. > > "These kids are really good storytellers... ," said Tracy Edwards, > Swinomish education director. "I hope that they continue with what > they > learned here and bring it back to the tribe. > > "And if they have a story to tell, they can get it out to the > community." > > Tina Potterf: 206-464-8214 or tpotterf at seattletimes.com > > > ----- End message from cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU ----- From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Mon May 24 17:20:20 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Mon, 24 May 2004 10:20:20 -0700 Subject: Native speech (fwd) Message-ID: Monday, May 24, 2004 http://starbulletin.com/2004/05/24/features/story1.html [photo insert - CRAIG T. KOJIMA / CKOJIMA at STARBULLETIN.COM Kiele Akana-Gooch has helped produce an introductory Hawaiian-language course on audio CD, as well as in an interactive version for computer.] Native speech An audio CD package aims to give the Hawaiian language the place it deserves in everyday life By Pat Gee pgee at starbulletin.com Beyond "aloha" and "mahalo," the common tourist knows about as many Hawaiian words as do most residents of this state, unless they are the names of local food or streets. But with the growing sovereignty movement and continuing controversy over Native Hawaiian rights, cultural awareness has prompted some kamaaina and malihini to learn the language for their own enrichment. [photo insert - "Instant Hawaiian Immersion" (Topics Entertainment, $29.95; available at Costco and Borders stores)] To others, the pursuit of the language goes even further. Kaliko Beamer-Trapp, a Hawaiian language teacher, is among those who think Hawaiian should be on par with English -- spoken all the time at work and play, and used more commonly in legal documents. He has developed an audio CD series to keep the language "surviving in today's world." "We represent a lot of young people trying to get the language spoken to each other all the time. If you don't believe in it this way, why do this at all?" he asks. "We" includes Kiele Akana-Gooch, who translates historic Hawaiian documents into English for Alu Like (an education-oriented Hawaiian nonprofit agency), as does Beamer-Trapp. He and Akana-Gooch provide the two voices on an eight-disc audio "Instant Hawaiian Immersion" course produced by the Seattle-based Topics Entertainment. The smiling face of the pretty, young woman who is "one-eighth Hawaiian and nine different things" graces the box. "I see my face all over the place," she says, covering her face with her hands in modesty. Bookstores and other outlets carry the Instant Immersion product line that offers courses in Spanish, Japanese, French and English. Akana-Gooch said many people don't know that Hawaiian is an official language of the state, along with English; and that Hawaii is the only state with two official languages. So much has changed since a time when speaking Hawaiian "used to be forbidden" -- when Hawaii was subjugated to rule of the United States in 1898, she said. "People can write checks in Hawaiian, testify before the Legislature in Hawaiian (with an interpreter), and write land deeds -- all the major functions ... I'm really proud that the Hawaiian language is being embraced. It's about time," she said. "I'd like to see Hawaii become more of a bilingual state, like in Canada (where, on all store merchandise) one side is written in French and the other side in English," she said. Tricia Vander Leest, the Topics project coordinator who approached Beamer-Trapp to work on the project, said the CDseries, as well as a three-disc audio-visual interactive software package, are "doing really well," totaling 25,000 in sales a month. Most of the sales have originated in Hawaii, followed by Washington state, California and Las Vegas, since the $29.95 CD set went on the market in January. The mainland states are the ones where many former Hawaii have relocated, and they're interested in going "back to their roots," she said. HOW Beamer-Trapp came to make a Hawaiian language teaching tape is a good example of how Hawaii creates and is created by melting boundaries between people of diverse cultures. His name sounds as though it belongs to a local boy, rather than someone born as Simon Trapp in England. His first name, "Kaliko," which means "the young leaf of the 'ohia lehua tree," was given to him by kumu hula Patrick Makuakane in the early '90s when he was dancing in a San Francisco Polynesian revue. The Beamer surname was bestowed on him after the legendary entertainer Aunty Nona Beamer adopted him several years ago. "I was very honored. ... I was very, very fortunate" to be adopted by someone who has become an icon of the aloha spirit, he said, adding the only other student she has adopted is Maile Beamer-Loo of Oahu, who has preserved hula in the Beamer style of teaching. When he arrived in Hawaii from California in 1994 with Beamer's help, "I was interested in reinventing myself" and focusing on the Hawaiian language and culture. He taught Hawaiian for six years in a Hawaiian Language Immersion School in Keaau on the Big Island, under the auspices of the University of Hawaii at Hilo. In 2002 he started Kili'apu Services, which has three branches: DrMacNut, a repair service for Apple Macintosh computers; 11th Avenue Filmworks, which makes educational videos and does freelance production work; and translating and editing services in Hawaiian, Marquesan and French languages. Topics Entertainment wanted him to make the CDs without written text, as is the style of their other CDs. Topics' idea is that people can learn a language by listening to it as they are driving or doing housework. "I know how difficult that is," he said, recalling how he couldn't pronounce Hawaiian words without seeing the way they were spelled. One day he had a "breakthrough" idea to divide a word into "component parts," each with its own definition, he said. For instance, the word "Kaimuki," he broke into Ka (meaning "the"), imu (underground oven), and ki (ti leaf). He told Topics he would publish some text on his own Web site for free, because "I can't imagine people trying to learn with out it. The name of the site is panpolynesia.net, which is mentioned on the first CD of the series in the introduction, but not on the box. "It must've helped a lot of people," he said. After ignoring the site after setting it up at Christmas, he returned to discover 1,777 hits. Akana-Gooch said the CDs are organized so that she and Beamer-Trapp act as guides, taking the student on a tour of the Hawaiian islands so they learn not only the language, but a little about the history, cultural stories, place names, music and more. The program's goal is to teach basic sentence patterns, words and phrases, and help students apply the vocabulary and build sentences for practical conversation practice. At the start of each section, music introduces each island, followed by a story about each island and a list of vocabulary words to be used in the CD. There is no English translation, so student start to recognize key words and memorize phrases right away. Beamer-Trapp said the language is still relevant in the modern world, even though there are words for objects unknown in ancient Hawaii, such as "computer" and "chemistry." Since 1996, he has been a member of the Hawaiian Lexicon Committee, "Ke Komike Hua 'Olelo," that translates modern words into Hawaiian. The lexicon has been published every two years since 1987, and projects like the Instant Hawaiian Immersion course guarantee the language will continue to grow and maintain relevance in the 21st century. From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Tue May 25 05:38:13 2004 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn) Date: Tue, 25 May 2004 00:38:13 -0500 Subject: Written Anyi (Ivory Coast / Cote d'Ivoire) In-Reply-To: <1085155882.dcfd65366cdba@www.email.arizona.edu> Message-ID: "Lives locally, acts globally" by Annie Baxter, Minnesota Public Radio May 20, 2004 http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2004/05/21_baxtera_anyilanguage/ Summer break doesn't mean vacation for professor Ettien Koffi at St. Cloud State University. He's a linguistics professor who hails from the Ivory Coast, in West Africa. Koffi's a member of the Anyi tribe. And he's spent many summers translating his tribe's oral tradition into written language. Now he's gone a step further to develop a literacy program back in the village where he grew up. Koffi is visiting the Ivory Coast to see how the program's progressing. St. Cloud, Minn. ~W As the din of college students recedes at the end of the semester, Ettien Koffi's mind is turning to another place, to the little rectangular clay huts and dusty roads that he calls home. He's thinking of his native village in the Ivory Coast, and of the literacy program he started there. The work has been a major project in Koffi's professional life, but it has deep personal roots. Koffi's father always anguished over the fact that he never learned to read and write. "My father wanted to go to school," Koffi explains. "And he would even go stand by the window at the school, and as the pupils were repeating the things the teacher was telling them, he would repeat along with them." Koffi's father never had the chance to go to school. But he made sure all seven of his own kids did attend school, including the girls. That was unheard of in their Ivory Coast village. Ettien Koffi went on to college. He later came to the United States to get a Phd in linguistics at Indiana University in Bloomington. Along the way, he studied five languages. But he always wanted to go back to the Ivory Coast and help improve the quality of life there. He knew that fewer than half the people in his Anyi tribe were literate. That mostly means they're literate in French, which is the official language of the Ivory Coast. But plenty of people in rural areas never learn to speak French, let alone read or write it. And they don't have the chance to become literate in their local African languages, because many aren't written down, which was the case with the Anyi language. So Koffi started to study the speech of Anyi speakers. And he devised a written equivalent of the oral Anyi language. It would become the basis for a literacy program. For Koffi, the benefits of literacy in languages like Anyi are simple but significant; they can include access to information about disease. "Malaria is a big problem at home," Koffi says. "You can just translate a pamphlet from the World Health Organization ... and (the villagers) can say, 'Oh, they have malaria, let's give them this or give them this.' You know, small steps. I'm not looking for gigantic steps." But there's another element to Koffi's work in the Ivory Coast. He has translated the New Testament into the Anyi language, with the hope that Christian religious practices, like Bible study, will foster the habit of reading. This part of the project isn't new to the region. There's a long tradition of missionaries who have come to Africa to teach literacy and Christianity. The legacy of those missionaries still plays out on a continent where Christianity and Islam compete for ascendancy, and local African religions are dying out. As an African-born Christian, Koffi wants to spread his faith. But he says the spread of literacy is just as important. "When we are teaching the basics, A,B,C, there is no religion in A,B,C," Koffi says. "You teach the people the ABCs, the syllables, and they know how to read, and they can apply it any way they want." Those applications could include better accounting methods for small businesses, and more profitable agricultural techniques. In addition, Koffi hopes that once people know how to write, they'll transcribe some of the local lore. Koffi will have all these goals in mind as he leaves St. Cloud and heads back to the Ivory Coast, where he'll wind his way along the dusty paths of his village, a spelling primer in hand. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Tue May 25 16:49:33 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 25 May 2004 09:49:33 -0700 Subject: Native Community Technology Initiative (fwd pdf) Message-ID: Native Community Technology Initiative (California) Native Cultures Fund Grant Guidelines and Application Application Deadline: Aug. 2, 2004 [fyi: please take note for those working on languages in California] -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: TechnologyApplication.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 452645 bytes Desc: not available URL: From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed May 26 16:13:08 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Wed, 26 May 2004 09:13:08 -0700 Subject: Linking families, language and heritage (fwd) Message-ID: Linking families, language and heritage Center for Native Americans opens in Visalia http://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/news/stories/20040526/localnews/504888.html By Shannon Darling Staff writer [photo inste - Steve R. Fujimoto/Times-Delta. Andrew Hernandez, 19 months-old, left, and his brother Mathew Hernandez, 3, explore the infant-toddler room. The room is part of the Tulare County Family Literacy Program at the Owens Valley Career Development Center, 2376 W. Whitendale Ave. in Visalia. The center celebrated its grand opening Tuesday.] [photo inset - Steve R. Fujimoto/Times-Delta. Nicole Herron, 7, looks through the library-resource center at the Tulare County Family Literacy Program at the Owens Valley Career Development Center.] [photo inset - Steve R. Fujimoto/Times-Delta. Mathew Hernandez, 3, explores the school-age room.] Seventy-year-old Marie Wilcox has a simple dream, a dream in which she hears the language spoken by her Wukchummi grandparents once again. The language is dying. "It is something I feel in my heart, I want to hear again," Wilcox said. The dream came one step closer to becoming a reality Tuesday when the Owens Valley Career Development Center held its grand opening. 'The center's mission is to provide Native American Indians with cultural education, programs and opportunities. Wilcox will teach families that go to the center the Wukchummi her grandparents taught her. "[Learning the language] will help bring families together," Wilcox said. "And they will be proud of their heritage." Wilcox, a resident of Woodlake, said it is a welcome sight to see a center for Native Americans open in Visalia. The center will provide services for Native American families. Those services include Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, vocational education and family literacy. The nonprofit, federally funded center says it hopes to use welfare reform money not only to help families in need, but also to empower Native Americans with culture. "We will provide families an opportunity to strive for economic self-sufficiency," Esther Stauffer, family literacy coordinator, said. "It will also help them identify who they are and where they came from." Stauffer, a native Alaskan, said it is important for Native Americans to know their language and history. Tracy Andrew of Visalia is half Cherokee Indian. She said the center is a great place for her children. "They make moccasins and take classes on Indian heritage," Andrew said. Her children also participate in basketball, boxing, basketmaking and photography classes. The center will also have math, reading and writing tutoring, parenting classes and vocational classes, which will vary. Stauffer said the center currently serves about 65 Native American families, and that is before its official opening. There are other Owens Valley Centers in Tulare County also in Porterville and on the Tule Indian Reservation. Owens Valley Centers are also in Inyo, Mono, Kern, Kings and Fresno counties. Families gathered at the opening of the center, and Wilcox gave a blessing in her native language before they ate dinner. "Help us learn our Indian language," she said. "Help me bring my language back to me." From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Thu May 27 16:31:04 2004 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Thu, 27 May 2004 09:31:04 -0700 Subject: Alliance Against Racial Mascots (ALLARM) Message-ID: Friends, We need your help in Sacramento on June 9!!. AB 858 is scheduled for a hearing in the Senate Education Committee at 9:00 a.m. June 9, 2004. We have just learned that Republican senators are organizing busloads of students from schools with a "Redskins" nickname to attend the hearing and oppose the bill. Please plan to join us in Sacramento for the hearing (for updates, see www.allarm.org ) and encourage others to do the same. The Native people who will testify in favor of the bill NEED YOUR SUPPORT. If you want to attend but do not have transportation, please call Juliana Serrano at 213-250-8787 ext 223. Please forward this message to others. Thanks all. Lori Nelson Alliance Against Racial Mascots (ALLARM) California www.allarm.org Alliance Against Racial Mascots (ALLARM) From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 27 16:41:24 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 27 May 2004 09:41:24 -0700 Subject: Waipa Foundation: Bringing the Hawaiian Language back to =?iso-8859-1?b?SGFsZZFsZWE=?= (fwd) Message-ID: Waipa Foundation: Bringing the Hawaiian Language back to Hale‘lea http://www.kauaiworld.com/articles/2004/05/27/news/news02.txt [photo inset - Makana, the landmark mountain at Ha‘ena, is more commonly known as Bali Hai due to its use as a backdrop in the movie musical "South Pacific." Returning such Hawaiian words to regular use on the North Shore is the goal of a new project based at Waipa.] By LESTER CHANG - TGI Staff Writer Members of the Waipa Foundation have secured a $53,500 grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Native Americans to revive the use of the Hawaiian language in the Halele‘a district, known more commonly as Kaua‘i's North Shore. Another $14,892 in matching funds is anticipated to be secured to complement the federal grant, according to Stacy Sproat-Beck, a spokeswoman for the foundation, a Native Hawaiian non-profit organization. The project sets out to ensure the "continued existence of our ‘Olelo Makuahine (mother tongue) in Halele‘a," Sproat said. The native tongue was widely spoken in the district at one time. The district today consists of Kilauea, Kalihiwai, Kalihikai —‘Anini, Princeville, Hanalei - Wai‘oli, Waipa, Wainiha and Ha‘ena, Sproat said. The district boasts a population of 6,348 people, according to U.S. Census figures for 2003. Within the next few months, volunteers and staffers with the Waipa Foundation will survey the kanaka ( the indigenous people of Hawai‘i) in the district. Supporting the effort will be Hanalei Hawaiian Civic Club members. The intent behind the survey is to determine how best to use and understand the native tongue. Most Native Hawaiians don't speak their native tongue because of history and because of the pressures "our kupuna faced that kept them from teaching us," Sproat said in a news release. "Today we have the opportunity to turn the tide, to learn and to speak (it) once again, to teach our children, so that they will be able to teach their children," Sproat said. As part of the project, Waipa Foundation proponents hope to interview kupuna and native speakers to learn and "malama" (take care of) the dialect, place names, mo‘olelo (story) and the history of Halele‘a District, Sproat said. The impetus for the project apparently materialized four years ago. During the Kaua‘i Taro Festival in 2000, representatives for the Waipa Foundation surveyed members of the Halele‘a community and people attending the festival, Sproat said. "Overwhelmingly, both Hawaiian and non-Hawaiian members of the Halele‘a community identified Hawaiian language programs at the top of the priority list," Sproat said. A small, informal survey of the kupuna in the Halele‘a district done by the Waipa Foundation in 2003 indicated that there may be just a few native speakers remaining in the community, Sproat said. The survey also revealed there are almost no "venues in the community" where the native tongue is spoken, Sproat said. Historically, the Hawaiian language varied from island to island, using different sounds, vocal patterns and expressions that led to regional dialects, Sproat said. Providing support for the project are the Hawaiian Farmers of Hanalei Inc., Hui Maka ‘ainana o Makana, and the Hanalei Canoe Club. Those wanting to help with surveying work can call the Waipa Foundation Office at 826-9969.   The Garden Island Copyright © 2004, Pulitzer Inc. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Tue May 4 16:33:54 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 4 May 2004 09:33:54 -0700 Subject: Executive Order: American Indian and Alaska Native Education (fwd) Message-ID: For Immediate Release Office of the Press Secretary April 30, 2004 Executive Order American Indian and Alaska Native Education By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and to recognize the unique educational and culturally related academic needs of American Indian and Alaska Native students consistent with the unique political and legal relationship of the Federal Government with tribal governments, it is hereby ordered as follows: Section 1. Purpose. The United States has a unique legal relationship with Indian tribes and a special relationship with Alaska Native entities as provided in the Constitution of the United States, treaties, and Federal statutes. This Administration is committed to continuing to work with these Federally recognized tribal governments on a government-to-government basis, and supports tribal sovereignty and self-determination. It is the purpose of this order to assist American Indian and Alaska Native students in meeting the challenging student academic standards of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (Public Law 107-110) in a manner that is consistent with tribal traditions, languages, and cultures. This order builds on the innovations, reforms, and high standards of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, including: stronger accountability for results; greater flexibility in the use of Federal funds; more choices for parents; and an emphasis on research-based instruction that works. Sec. 2. Interagency Working Group. There is established an Interagency Working Group on American Indian and Alaska Native Education (Working Group) to oversee the implementation of this order. (a) The Working Group's members shall consist exclusively of the heads of the executive branch departments, agencies, or offices listed below: (i) the Department of Education; (ii) the Department of the Interior; (iii) the Department of Health and Human Services; (iv) the Department of Agriculture; (v) the Department of Justice; (vi) the Department of Labor; and (vii) such other executive branch departments, agencies, or offices as the Co-Chairs of the Working Group may designate. A member of the Working Group may designate, to perform the Working Group functions of the member, an employee of the member's department, agency, or office who is either an officer of the United States appointed by the President, or a full-time employee serving in a position with pay equal to or greater than the minimum rate payable for GS-15 of the General Schedule. The Working Group shall be led by the Secretaries of Education and the Interior, or their designees under this section, who shall serve as Co-Chairs. (b) The function of the Working Group is to oversee the implementation of this order. The Working Group shall, within 90 days of the date of this order, develop a Federal interagency plan that recommends initiatives, strategies, and ideas for future interagency actions that promote the purpose, as stated in section 1, of this order. In carrying out its activities under this order, the Working Group may consult with repre-sentatives of American Indian and Alaska Native tribes and organizations, in conformity with Executive Order 13175 of November 6, 2000, and with the National Advisory Council on Indian Education (NACIE). Any such consultations shall be for the purpose of obtaining information and advice concerning American Indian and Alaska Native education and shall be conducted in a manner that seeks individual advice and does not involve collective judgment or consensus advice or deliberation. Sec. 3. Study and Report. The Secretary of Education, in coordination with the Working Group, shall conduct a multi-year study of American Indian and Alaska Native education with the purpose of improving American Indian and Alaska Native students' ability to meet the challenging student academic standards of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. (a) The study shall include, but not be limited to: (i) the compilation of comprehensive data on the academic achievement and progress of American Indian and Alaska Native students toward meeting the challenging student academic standards of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001; (ii) identification and dissemination of research-based practices and proven methods in raising academic achievement and, in particular, reading achievement, of American Indian and Alaska Native students; (iii) assessment of the impact and role of native language and culture on the development of educational strategies to improve academic achievement; (iv) development of methods to strengthen early childhood education so that American Indian and Alaska Native students enter school ready to learn; and (v) development of methods to increase the high school graduation rate and develop pathways to college and the workplace for American Indian and Alaska Native students. The Secretary of Education shall develop an agenda, including proposed timelines and ongoing activities, for the conduct of the study, and shall make that agenda available to the public on the Internet. (b) The Secretary of Education, in coordination with the Working Group, shall issue a report to the President that shall: (i) provide the latest data available from the study; (ii) comprehensively describe the educational status and progress of American Indian and Alaska Native students with respect to meeting the goals outlined in the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and any other student achievement goals the Secretary of Education or the Secretary of the Interior may deem necessary; (iii) report on proven methods for improving American Indian and Alaska Native student academic achievement; and (iv) update the Federal interagency plan outlined in section 2(b) of this order. Sec. 4. Enhancement of Research Capabilities of Tribal-Level Educational Institutions. The Secretary of Education and the Secretary of the Interior shall consult with the entities set forth in section 2(a) of this order and tribally controlled colleges and universities to seek ways to develop and enhance the capacity of tribal governments, tribal universities and colleges, and schools and educational programs serving American Indian and Alaska Native students and communities to carry out, disseminate, and implement education research, as well as to develop related partnerships or collaborations with non-tribal universities, colleges, and research organizations. Sec. 5. National Conference. The Secretary of Education and the Secretary of the Interior, in collaboration with the Working Group and Federal, State, tribal, and local government representatives, shall jointly convene a forum on the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 to identify means to enhance communica-tion, collaboration, and cooperative strategies to improve the education of American Indian and Alaska Native students attending Federal, State, tribal, and local schools. Sec. 6. Administration. The Department of Education shall provide appropriate administrative services and staff support to the Working Group. With the consent of the Department of Education, other participating agencies may provide admini-stra-tive support to the Working Group, to the extent permitted by law and consistent with their statutory authority. Sec. 7. Termination. The Working Group established under section 2 of this order shall terminate not later than 5 years from the date of this order, unless extended by the President. Sec. 8. Consultation. The Secretary of Education and Secretary of the Interior shall consult the Attorney General as appropriate on the implementation of this order, to ensure that such implementation affords the equal protection of the laws required by the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution. Sec. 9. General Provisions. (a) This order is intended only to improve the internal management of the executive branch and is not intended to, and does not, create any right, benefit, or trust responsibility, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or equity, by a party against the United States, its agencies or instrumen-talities, its officers or employees, or any other person. (b) Executive Order 13096 of August 6, 1998, is revoked. GEORGE W. BUSH THE WHITE HOUSE, April 30, 2004. # # # Return to this article at: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/04/20040430-10.html From mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US Tue May 4 19:19:22 2004 From: mward at LUNA.CC.NM.US (Matthew Ward) Date: Tue, 4 May 2004 13:19:22 -0600 Subject: Linguapax speakers urge protection for minority languages (fwd) Message-ID: I noticed that this article mentions the issue of Navajo immersion programs being threatened by Arizona's English-only law. On that subject, I recently recieved the following e-mail from the ACLU of Arizona: Hi Matthew - we are in receipt of your 3/4/04 complaint to the ACLU of Arizona re: the Attorney General's absurd opinion that public schools on the reservations. We are VERY interested in this issue and I will be calling the Superintendent of Window Rock Schools, Deborah Jackson-Dennison, to see if they need our assistance. The AG's office is misconstruing the law. The English Only requirement of Prop 203 was struck down by the Arizona Supreme Court in 1998. Thanks for bringing this issue to our attention. -Angie Polizzi, Staff attorney This makes it seem like the ACLU is indeed a good resource in any situation in which native-language immersion programs are being threatened by various barbaric English-only laws. phil cash cash wrote: >Linguapax speakers urge protection for minority languages >http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/newse/20040427wob2.htm > >Cristoph Mark Daily Yomiuri Staff Writer > >Languages of minority political and cultural groups must be protected to >avoid being lost in favor of more dominant languages, Felix Marti >warned at the inaugural Linguapax Asia conference, held in Tokyo on >April 17. > >"A lot of the problems in our world are provoked by the lack of >attention to cultural and political minorities. If you protect >linguistic minorities all over the world, you work for peace," said >Marti, Linguapax Institute President and human rights activist. > >Governments, multinational corporations and the mass media are among the >agents of globalization that promote the move toward dominant languages >and away from minority languages, he said. > >The daylong conference was held at United Nations University in Tokyo, >and covered a range of issues, from the perseverance and decline of >Slovene linguistic communities in Italy, Austria and Hungary, to the >struggle to offer bilingual education for children in California and >Arizona in the face of public opposition. > >Lectures were presented by experts from Japan, Austria, Hungary and the >United States, and were given in English, Japanese and German. The >proceedings were moderated by two of the organizers, Frances >Fister-Stoga and Jelisava Sethna. > >"A lot of linguistic communities have decided to maintain their >linguistic identity. That has been a change in the last 20 years, >probably because a lot of communities until now were declining >linguistic communities," Marti said. "Simultaneously, we observe some >linguistic communities that are losing their linguistic practices and >are now changing into 'important' languages." > >Many minority languages and cultures exist in Europe, and to protect >them, an independent union called the Federal Union of European >Nationalities was established, according to Kolomon Brenner, Assistant >Professor of Eotvos-Lorand University in Budhapest. > >In Thailand, according to Donald Smith, linguistics expert and professor >at Notre Dame Seishin University, many areas of the country have >several levels of language, with locals speaking their local and >regional languages, as well as standard Thai, among others. About 80 >different languages are spoken in Thailand. > >"Today, the 80 languages...are all vital, and there is apparently no >danger of language extinction, there is no phenomena of language death >in Thailand," Smith explained. "People are multilingual--not >bilingual--often trilingual and quadrilingual. They just speak whatever >language is appropriate wherever they are." > >Another example of language that could be said to be thriving is that of >Palau. The island nation was colonized by Spain, Japan and eventually >the United States, which took the country as a protectorate following >World War II. Over the years, according to Yoko Okayama, associate >professor at Ibaraki University, English began to virtually wipe out >the local language, with children learning less and less Palau as they >went through school. > >To avoid the complete attrition of their native language, the tiny South >Pacific nation has made Palau a part of the educational curriculum, >spending a portion of each day teaching children to speak, read and >write it. In many cases, parents end up learning new words from their >children, Okayama said. > >Still, many of the world's minority languages face decay and potential >extinction. > >In Italy, Slovene is facing extinction in the Friuli-Venezia Giulia >region. Slovene speakers are a minority within the Friulian-speaking >community, itself a minority Italian dialect. While use of the Friulian >dialect actually expanded during the 20th century, Slovene in the area >has been abandoned as a language, and most of its native speakers can >no longer speak the language, said Shinji Yamamoto, senior lecturer of >Italian Linguistics at Tokyo University. > >In the United States, bilingual education is facing a less natural, more >oppressive problem on a number of fronts, according to Melvin Andrade, >English professor at Sophia Junior College, and Cary Duval, associate >professor in the Faculty of International Studies at Bunkyo University. > >In California, despite an extremely large number of residents who speak >a language other than English at home, there is much opposition to >bilingual education. Previously, children were expected to spend about >four years in English as a second language (ESL) classes so they could >obtain functional fluency, from which point they would enter regular >classes. > >"The hope is that once ELL (ESL) students are fairly proficient in >English, they can continue their education in classes with their >English-speaking peers. This is nothing about preserving heritage >languages though--it's to get them to use English," Andrade pointed >out. > >However, as a backlash against a wave of immigration--particularly from >south of the border--a successful ballot initiative put forward by >anti-bilingual millionaire Ron Unz introduced a "sheltered English" ESL >program, which reduced special instruction to one year, only allowing >English to be used in classes, Andrade said. > >California, though, has a legal loophole, making it possible for local >governments to provide such families and children with information in >their primary language, and to offer linguistic assistance, thereby >helping the students to participate in their own education, Duval >stressed. > >However, he pointed out that Arizona has done away with any loopholes >that would allow for such education, which is greatly affecting the >Navajo tribes in the area. Many Native American languages have already >become extinct. The Navajo nation is 250,000 strong, and if their >language cannot survive, none of the other Native American languages >have a chance, Duval warned. > >There is opposition--again an Unz-backed initiative--to Navajo bilingual >education. The initiative aims to make English the only language to be >used in an official capacity, such as teaching. > >In some cases, teachers have been sued for using languages other than >English in their instruction. > >Although greater language maintenance and signs of revival have been >seen in recent years, there is clearly an uphill battle to be fought to >preserve the world's linguistic heritage and protect the rights of >frequently displaced minorities. > > > From phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET Tue May 4 20:50:21 2004 From: phonosemantics at EARTHLINK.NET (jess tauber) Date: Tue, 4 May 2004 16:50:21 -0400 Subject: Yahgan language discussion list at Yahoo groups Message-ID: Hi. I'm new to the list. Hello out there to the lurkers who know me! Usually I read through earlier postings from lists I join- I noticed early on you folks heard about the Linguistic Discovery report by Lindsey Whaley and Lenore Grenoble "What does Yahgan have to do with digital technology?". While throwing materials together for an endangered grant application a month ago I started thinking that a discussion list would be a good "clearinghouse" for information on Yahgan, which I've been working on for a number of years, at least until a permanent scholarly home could be found (and pages will be going up at Dartmouth, thanks to Prof. Whaley). In just a few days we already have a set of serious discussions going on about phonology, spelling conventions, dialects, and the beginings of syntax. In addition to the academic people we also now count in our number the granddaughter of one of the last speakers, Cristina Zarraga, who has been doing what she can back in Ukika, in Tierra del Fuego, to try to help revitalize the language. There is a lot to do. Even though there is a mass of information about the language, much of it has been tucked away in obscure corners, unavailable to most scholars as well as to the people who need it most. I hope the list and the web pages will help to get around these problems. And there has been a major discovery in Yahgan linguistics- a copy of the "lost" grammar of Thomas Bridges was located serendipitously in the Library of Congress this past summer- I've been re-editing it and it will be one of the documents that will serve as a base for revitalization. The unusable published dictionary (which should get the "worst" award for dictionaries edited by people with doctorates) is being completely reworked, from original manuscripts as well as many other materials that will be added to it. I'm hoping to get an interactive version up and running within the next year at the Dartmouth site. Terry Langendoen has offered to help (you still out there? I can be a bit uncommunicative during the winter!). In addition to published texts in the language (Bridges' translations of the Acts of the Apostles as well as the Gospels of John and Luke- which were in Yahgan only and are being back-translated morpheme-by-morpheme into English and Spanish) there are also new recordings- some done for documentaries over the past 15 or so years (I'm trying to get the unedited footage as these contain conversations as well as speech of people now gone), and more recently those done on site by the OMORA bioconservancy group. I'm hoping also to get down there myself soon to gather missing information on prosody, complex predicational structure, and pragmatics. If you read the piece on Linguistic Discovery mentioned at the top, you may have noticed the sound file of Furlong cylinder excerpts. I was just in contact with a scientist at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory who has new technology which allows scanning and digitization of information off old wax recordings without doing them any damage, and which allows the data to be cleaned up to remove distortions from cracks, wax degradation, etc. I'm hoping to be able to take at least the linguistically salient cylinders to the lab for scan. It would be wonderful to be able to clearly hear Yahgan recorded in 1908, which not only is the earliest known, but the only such for the next three quarters of a century. It would be great to be able to find funds (which I know is not easy) to help provide teaching aids for the small Yahgan community in Ukika (about 70 people, half the known ethnically Yahgan population alive today, out of an estimated 10000 in 1800) beyond the usual pen and paper. The technologies available today which allow interactive learning environments, fast desktop publication, etc., could be invaluable to the revitalization of the language, now spoken by one (maybe two) fluent elders. And without the conveniences offered by the modern computer I don't know where my own efforts would be today. Anyway, that's my say about Yahgan and technology (for now). The online discussion (if any of you care to visit- the post archives are public, though if you join you get to look at the great links, including a link to an online streaming video version of one of the documentaries I mentioned - 60 minutes long where you can hear quite a bit of spoken Yahgan) is at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/waata_chis ("Old News/Stories" in Yahgan). I look forward to interaction with folks here on the list. Best regards to all, Jess Tauber phonosemantics at earthlink.net From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 6 17:03:52 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 6 May 2004 10:03:52 -0700 Subject: S 2382 Native American Connectivity Act Message-ID: S 2382 IS http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?c108:1:./temp/~c108bdKvf6:: 108th CONGRESS 2d Session S. 2382 To establish grant programs for the development of telecommunications capacities in Indian country. IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES May 4, 2004 Mr. INOUYE introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Indian Affairs A BILL To establish grant programs for the development of telecommunications capacities in Indian country. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. This Act may be cited as the `Native American Connectivity Act'. SEC. 2. FINDINGS. Congress finds that-- (1)(A) disparities exist in the areas of education, health care, workforce training, commerce, and economic activity of Indians due to the rural nature of most Indian reservations; and (B) access to basic and advanced telecommunications infrastructure is critical in eliminating those disparities; (2) currently, only 67.9 percent of Indian homes have telephone service, compared with the national average of 95.1 percent; (3) the telephone service penetration rate on some reservations is as low as 39 percent; (4) even on reservations and trust land, non-Indian homes are more likely to have telephone service than Indian homes; (5) only 10 percent of Indian households on tribal land have Internet access; (6) only 17 percent of Indian tribes have developed comprehensive technology plans; (7) training and technical assistance have been identified as the most significant needs for the development and effective use of telecommunications and information technology in Indian country; (8) funding for telecommunications and information technology projects in Indian country remains inadequate to address the needs of Indian communities; (9) many Indian tribes are located on or adjacent to Indian land in which unemployment rates exceed 50 percent; (10) the lack of telecommunications infrastructure and low telephone and Internet penetration rates adversely affects the ability of Indian tribes to pursue economic development opportunities; and (11) health care, disease prevention education, and cultural preservation are greatly enhanced with access to and use of telecommunications technology and electronic information. SEC. 3. PURPOSES. The purposes of this Act are-- (1) to promote affordable and universal access among Indian tribal governments, tribal entities, and Indian households to telecommunications and information technology in Indian country; (2) to encourage and promote tribal economic development, self-sufficiency, and strong tribal governments; (3) to enhance the health of Indian tribal members through the availability and use of telemedicine and telehealth; and (4) to assist in the retention and preservation of native languages and cultural traditions. SEC. 4. DEFINITIONS. In this Act: (1) BLOCK GRANT- The term `block grant' means a grant provided under section 5. (2) ELIGIBLE ACTIVITY- The term `eligible activity' means an activity carried out-- (A) to acquire or lease real property (including licensed spectrum, water rights, dark fiber, exchanges, and other related interests) to provide telecommunications services, facilities, and improvements; (B) to acquire, construct, reconstruct, or install telecommunications facilities, sites, or improvements (including design features), or utilities; (C) to retain any real property acquired under this Act for tribal communications purposes; (D) to pay the non-Federal share required by a Federal grant program undertaken as part of activities funded under this Act; (E) to carry out activities necessary-- (i) to develop a comprehensive telecommunications development plan; and (ii) to develop a policy, planning, and management capacity so that an eligible entity may more rationally and effectively-- (I) determine the needs of the entity; (II) set long term and short term goals; (III) devise programs and activities to meet the goals of the entity, including, if appropriate, telehealth; (IV) evaluate the progress of the programs and activities in meeting the goals; and (V) carry out management, coordination, and monitoring of activities necessary for effective planning implementation; (F) to pay reasonable administrative costs and carrying charges relating to the planning and execution of telecommunications development activities, including the provision of information and resources about the planning and execution of the activities to residents of areas in which telecommunications development activities are to be concentrated; (G) to increase the capacity of an eligible entity to carry out telecommunications activities; (H) to provide assistance to institutions of higher education that have a demonstrated capacity to carry out eligible activities; (I) to enable an eligible entity to facilitate telecommunications development by-- (i) providing technical assistance, advice, and business support services (including services for developing business plans, securing funding, and conducting marketing); and (ii) providing general support (including peer support programs and mentoring programs) to Indian tribes in developing telecommunications projects; (J) to evaluate eligible activities to ascertain and promote effective telecommunications and information technology deployment practices and usages among Indian tribes; or (K) to provide research, analysis, data collection, data organization, and dissemination of information relevant to telecommunications and information technology in Indian country for the purpose of promoting effective telecommunications and information technology deployment practices and usages among tribes. (3) ELIGIBLE ENTITY- The term `eligible entity' means-- (A) an Indian tribe; (B) an Indian organization; (C) a tribal college or university; (D) an intertribal organization; or (E) a private or public institution of higher education acting jointly with an Indian tribe. (4) INDIAN TRIBE- The term `Indian tribe' has the meaning given the term in section 4 of the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act (25 U.S.C. 450b). (5) SECRETARY- The term `Secretary' means the Secretary of Commerce. (6) TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE- The term `technical assistance' means the facilitation of skills and knowledge in planning, developing, assessing, and administering eligible activities. (7) TRAINING AND TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE GRANT- The term `training and technical assistance grant' means a grant provided under section 6. (8) TRIBAL COLLEGE OR UNIVERSITY- The term `tribal college or university' has the meaning given the term `tribally controlled college or university' in section 2 of the Tribally Controlled Community College Assistance Act of 1978 (25 U.S.C. 1801), except that the term also includes an institution listed in the Equity in Educational Land-Grant Status Act of 1994 (7 U.S.C. 301 note). (9) TELEHEALTH- The term `telehealth' means the use of electronic information and telecommunications technologies to support long-distance clinical health care, patient and professional health-related education, public health, and health administration. SEC. 5. BLOCK GRANT PROGRAM. (a) ESTABLISHMENT- There is established within the National Telecommunications and Information Administration a Native American telecommunications block grant program to provide grants on a competitive basis to eligible entities to carry out eligible activities under subsection (c). (b) BLOCK GRANTS- The Secretary may provide a block grant to an eligible entity that submits a block grant application to the Secretary for approval. (c) ELIGIBLE ACTIVITIES- A grant under this section may only be used for an eligible activity. (d) REGULATIONS- Not later than 180 days after the date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary shall promulgate regulations establishing specific criteria for the competition conducted to select eligible entities to receive grants under this section for each fiscal year. SEC. 6. TRAINING AND TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE GRANTS. (a) NOTIFICATION AND CRITERIA- The Secretary-- (1) shall provide notice of the availability of training and technical assistance grants; and (2) publish criteria for selecting recipients. (b) GRANTS- The Secretary may provide training and technical assistance grants to eligible entities with a demonstrated capacity to carry out eligible activities. (c) USE OF FUNDS- A training and technical assistance grant shall be used-- (1) to develop a training program for telecommunications employees; or (2) to provide assistance to students who-- (A) participate in telecommunications or information technology work study programs; and (B) are enrolled in a full-time graduate or undergraduate program in telecommunications-related education, development, planning, or management. (d) SETASIDE- (1) IN GENERAL- For each fiscal year, the Secretary shall set aside $2,000,000 of the amount made available under section 12 for training and technical assistance grants, to remain available until expended. (2) TREATMENT- A training and technical assistance grant to an entity shall be in addition to any block grant provided to the entity. (e) PROVISION OF TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE BY THE SECRETARY- The Secretary may provide technical assistance, directly or through contracts, to-- (1) tribal governments; and (2) persons or entities that assist tribal governments. SEC. 7. COMPLIANCE. (a) AUDIT BY THE COMPTROLLER GENERAL- (1) IN GENERAL- The Comptroller General of the United States may audit any financial transaction involving grant funds that is carried out by a block grant recipient or training and technical assistance grant recipient. (2) SCOPE OF AUTHORITY- In conducting an audit under paragraph (1), the Comptroller General shall have access to all books, accounts, records, reports, files, and other papers, things, or property belonging to or in use by the grant recipient that relate to the financial transaction and are necessary to facilitate the audit. (3) REGULATIONS- The Comptroller General shall promulgate regulations to carry out this subsection. (b) ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION- (1) IN GENERAL- After consultation with Indian tribes, the Secretary may promulgate regulations to carry out this subsection that-- (A) ensure that the policies of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.), and other laws that further the purposes of that Act (as specified by the regulations), are most effectively implemented in connection with the expenditure of funds under this Act; and (B) assure the public of undiminished protection of the environment. (2) SUBSTITUTE MEASURES- Subject to paragraph (3), the Secretary may provide for the release of funds under this Act for eligible activities to grant recipients that assume all of the responsibilities for environmental review, decisionmaking, and related action under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.), and other laws that further the purposes of that Act (as specified by the regulations promulgated under paragraph (1)), that would apply to the Secretary if the Secretary carried out the eligible activities as Federal projects. (3) RELEASE- (A) IN GENERAL- The Secretary shall approve the release of funds under paragraph (2) only if, at least 15 days prior to approval, the grant recipient submits to the Secretary a request for release accompanied by a certification that meets the requirements of paragraph (4). (B) APPROVAL- The approval by the Secretary of a certification shall be deemed to satisfy the responsibilities of the Secretary under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.) and the laws specified by the regulations promulgated under paragraph (1), to the extent that those responsibilities relate to the release of funds for projects described in the certification. (4) CERTIFICATION- A certification shall-- (A) be in a form acceptable to the Secretary; (B) be executed by the tribal government; (C) specify that the grant recipient has fully assumed the responsibilities described in paragraph (2); and (D) specify that the tribal officer-- (i) assumes the status of a responsible Federal official under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.) and each law specified by the regulations promulgated under paragraph (1), to the extent that the provisions of that Act or law apply; and (ii) is authorized to consent, and consents, on behalf of the grant recipient and on behalf of the tribal officer to accept the jurisdiction of the Federal courts for enforcement of the responsibilities of the tribal officer as a responsible Federal official. SEC. 8. REMEDIES FOR NONCOMPLIANCE. (a) FAILURE TO COMPLY- If the Secretary finds, on the record after opportunity for an agency hearing, that a block grant recipient or training and technical assistance grant recipient has failed to comply substantially with any provision of this Act, the Secretary, until satisfied that there is no longer a failure to comply, shall-- (1) terminate payments to the grant recipient; (2) reduce payments to the grant recipient by an amount equal to the amount of payments that were not expended in accordance with this Act; (3) limit the availability of payments under this Act to programs, projects, or activities not affected by the failure to comply; or (4) refer the matter to the Attorney General with a recommendation that the Attorney General bring an appropriate civil action. (b) ACTION BY THE ATTORNEY GENERAL- After a referral by the Secretary under subsection (a)(4), the Attorney General may bring a civil action in United States district court for appropriate relief (including mandatory relief, injunctive relief, and recovery of the amount of the assistance provided under this Act that was not expended in accordance with this Act). SEC. 9. REPORTING REQUIREMENTS. (a) ANNUAL REPORT TO CONGRESS- Not later than 180 days after the end of each fiscal year in which assistance under this Act is provided, the Secretary shall submit to Congress a report that includes-- (1) a description of the progress made in accomplishing the objectives of this Act; (2) a summary of the use of funds under this Act during the preceding fiscal year; and (3) an evaluation of the status of telephone, Internet, and personal computer penetration rates, by type of technology, among Indian households throughout Indian country on a tribe-by-tribe basis. (b) REPORTS TO SECRETARY- The Secretary may require grant recipients under this Act to submit reports and other information necessary for the Secretary to prepare the report under subsection (a). SEC. 10. CONSULTATION. In carrying out this Act, the Secretary shall consult with other Federal agencies administering Federal grant programs. SEC. 11. HISTORIC PRESERVATION REQUIREMENTS. A telecommunications project funded under this Act shall comply with the National Historic Preservation Act (16 U.S.C. 470 et seq.). SEC. 12. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS. (a) IN GENERAL- There are authorized to be appropriated to carry out this Act-- (1) $20,000,000 for fiscal year 2005; and (2) such sums as are necessary for each subsequent fiscal year. (b) AVAILABILITY- Funds made available under subsection (a) shall remain available until expended. END From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 6 17:57:11 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 6 May 2004 10:57:11 -0700 Subject: New money found for 'language nests' (fwd) Message-ID: New money found for 'language nests' WebPosted May 5 2004 02:42 PM CDT http://north.cbc.ca/regional/servlet/EmailStory?filename=nwt-langnest05052004®ion=North YELLOWKNIFE A program to introduce aboriginal children to their language and culture in the N.W.T. is getting a new lease on life. The territorial government has announced it has found $900,000 to keep the "nests" program alive. It started as a pilot project three years ago, but ran out of money in March. The preschool immersion program features "language nests" modelled on a program that successfully revitalized the Maori language in New Zealand. Young children learn their language and traditional skills with teachers and elders in their community. On Tuesday education minister Charles Dent announced the new spending, saying it would continue into the future. He says funding is scarce in the territory right now, but the government can't afford to let go of this program. "It may help to save some of the aboriginal languages but the primary function is to make sure that young people are comfortable in their own culture and heritage," he says. "Because knowing oneself is important to be successful in the learning setting." Members of the legislative assembly unanimously supported a reinstatement of the project. Cate Sills, executive director of the N.W.T. Literacy Council, says the council was disappointed when the government didn't renew the program this year. She's glad to see it back so soon. "The link between language and culture is you can't distinguish between the two, language is culture," she says. "So it's really important that there be some public investment so the communities can build capacity to try to reclaim their language." The money will be used to hire and train teachers and buy learning aids. The program will be available in 18 Northwest Territories communities. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed May 12 05:00:02 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 11 May 2004 22:00:02 -0700 Subject: Language Fair strives to save dying languages (fwd) Message-ID: Language Fair strives to save dying languages Efforts to support traditional speakers http://www.nativetimes.com/index.asp?action=displayarticle&article_id=4421 SANTE FE NM 5/11/2004 On May 15, the Fifth Native Youth Language Fair and Poster Contest will honor living languages and the young people who are keeping them alive. The Youth Language Fair will begin at 10 a.m. in the gymnasium of the Santa Fe Indian School and will feature young people performing, singing or conversing in their original Tribal languages. Additionally, children and teens will draw posters and comic strips to illustrate this year?s theme, ?Learning from Our Elders.? The fair is the brainchild of the Santa Fe-based Indigenous Language Institute (ILI), which serves as a national center that supports Tribes around the country in preserving original languages. Of the 300 languages that existed when Columbus came to the Americas, it?s estimated that only 175 survive, with only 50 being learned by children. If the situation does not change in the next 50 years, only 20 languages could survive. The Youth Language Fair recognizes young people who are helping to preserve their original language and culture. It is open for children preschool to 19 years of age. Back for the fifth time as master of ceremonies will be actor Wes Studi, a Cherokee speaker and star of PBS? hit mysteries, ?Thief of Time? and ?Skinwalkers.? The language fair started small with just a handful of children participating and grew to more than 200 children taking part in language presentations in 2002, and some 450 participating in the language fair, poster contest and powwow. However, as donations to nonprofits dried up around the country, the ILI had to halt the language fair in 2003 because it had no money to stage the popular event, said director Inee Yang Slaughter. ?Those were tough times,? Slaughter said. ?But we have a renewed vision and solid seed money to put on the fair, so we are back stronger than ever.? The language fair has attracted participants from as far away as North Carolina, and also has given birth to language fairs in other parts of the country, including the Oneida and Comanche nations. From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Wed May 12 05:32:50 2004 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn) Date: Wed, 12 May 2004 00:32:50 -0500 Subject: Fwd: Washington Post: Learning in Their Native Tongue Message-ID: FYI... Note among other things mention of use of computers in Otomi. Don Osborn Bisharat.net ----- Forwarded message from Ryan Monroe ----- Date: Tue, 11 May 2004 21:19:00 -0400 From: Ryan Monroe Reply-To: "multied-l at usc.edu" Subject: Washington Post: Learning in Their Native Tongue To: "multied-l at usc.edu" Learning in Their Native Tongue Mexican Cities Join Experiment in Bilingual Education By Mary Jordan Washington Post Foreign Service Tuesday, May 11, 2004; Page A10 MEXICO CITY -- Jose Roberto Cleofas depends on red lights to make a living. As soon as cars brake for the stoplight in front of the Pizza Hut on Insurgentes Avenue, Cleofas, 14, moves in on dirty windshields and starts wiping. "How else can I eat?" said the fifth-grader, one of the hundreds of thousands of indigenous people who have migrated to Mexican cities in search of work as agriculture has failed in their dying villages. The federal government is struggling to educate migrant children here and in other Mexican cities. The Education Ministry has opened more than 2,000 bilingual schools for speakers of 62 indigenous languages in the past 10 years. In part, the initiative is a response to the armed Zapatista movement in southern Mexico in the 1990s, which embarrassed the government by bringing worldwide attention to its neglect of indigenous people. Most of the new schools are in rural areas where indigenous children are in the majority. Now, the challenge is to accommodate their growing numbers in cities where they are a minority. Like 300,000 other Mexicans, Cleofas's first language is Otomi. There are 10 million indigenous Mexicans in a population of 103 million. During the Spanish conquest 500 years ago, indigenous people fled to remote desert and mountain areas and remain among Mexico's poorest, marginalized by racial prejudice and inferior schooling. Cleofas attends the Alfredo Correo school, a two-story brick schoolhouse, where about 100 of the 124 students are indigenous, according to the principal. The school was chosen last year to be one of 76 city schools in a vanguard bicultural project, because nearly all students speak the same language and are from Santiago Mexquititlan, a farming village 100 miles north of Mexico City. The schools' computers are programmed in both Spanish and Otomi, and teachers are required to learn Otomi so they can communicate more easily with students who are not proficient in Spanish. The national anthem is even sung in Otomi. Cleofas, who began speaking Spanish five years ago at age 9, said he no longer feels bad in class for not knowing a certain word in Spanish. Rather, he said, he enjoys helping others pronounce Otomi words. Science concepts are clearer when explained in his native language, he said, and when he sings the Mexican national anthem in Otomi "it rings with more meaning." Cleofas has already attended school longer than many indigenous students, who typically don't finish primary school. He said no one in his family had ever finished fifth grade. He said he had moved to Mexico City last year, aspiring only to earn money cleaning windshields. But he now likes school, especially math. The soaring number of indigenous children in urban Mexico is being compared by education officials to the situation in the United States. In both countries, the influx of migrant children is prompting schools to introduce native languages in the classroom. And in both countries, multicultural education is facing some resistance. "Yes, there are parents who don't like it," said Nancy Miranda, head of the parents association at the Alfredo Correo school. She said some parents believe assimilation and speaking Spanish are the way to get ahead in Mexico. Some parents said the cost of training teachers in indigenous languages and creating special bilingual textbooks was a wasteful expenditure for an already thin education budget. Rather than have their children learn Otomi, some parents interviewed said they would prefer their children learn English or French, the languages wealthier Mexicans study. Sylvia Schmelkes, coordinator of bilingual and intercultural education for the Education Ministry, said some of the opposition is based on discrimination against indigenous people. "Racism is very profound in Mexico," she said. "You can ask any Mexican whether he or she is a racist, and they'll say, 'Of course, not.' . . . Nevertheless, in direct interaction, it exists." Miranda, the parent association head, said some parents object to the growing number of indigenous children in their neighborhood school. She said some parents unfairly complain that the newcomers "are slower to learn, don't know how to speak, are lower class." Miranda, who is not indigenous, said she feels it is "neither positive nor negative" that her son Donovan, 9, comes home singing songs in Otomi. But she said there are practical benefits for him to be part of this experiment: The school receives additional funds, computers, and attention. President Vicente Fox visited recently to see the new program, considered a blueprint for integrating indigenous languages and customs in additional urban schools next year. Students in the program receive scholarships of a few hundred dollars a year to make up for the cash that children might earn if they dropped out of school. As Miranda spoke, the recess bell rang in the tidy school in the upper middle-class Roma neighborhood. Boys and girls wearing the school's blue uniform ran onto the concrete playground, some laughing and telling jokes in Otomi. Most of the indigenous children at Alfredo Correo live in shacks haphazardly built in alleyways in a neighborhood of ornate homes and expensive apartments. Life is harder for them, said school principal Juan Valente Garcia Lopez. Nearly all are so poor they quality for subsidized lunches of oranges, bananas, peanuts and milk, which were stacked in boxes outside his office. Garcia said his job was to create an environment that raises self-esteem: "School represents a place where they are treated equally, where they aren't discriminated against, where they are happy." When classes end for the day, Cleofas walks two blocks to the busy street corner where he earns, on a good evening, about $6 for eight hours washing windshields. Nearly all his classmates also work after school. Most of them sell handmade dolls from their village, or gum and candies. "Usually their mom is working in one spot, but they are off on their own," said Rosalba Esquivel Fernandez, a first-grade teacher. She said most of her students, who are as young as 6, work on the streets until after midnight. The migration of indigenous families to such major cities as Tijuana, Monterrey and Mexico City is more visible every year, in large part because of the women and small children it is bringing to urban street corners. The mothers commonly wear colorful traditional dresses and carry a baby strapped to their back. Children knock on car windows selling homemade handicrafts for the equivalent of $1. It is a business born of desperation. "All that is left is a ghost town," said Domingo Gonzalez, a town official in Santiago Mexquititlan, Cleofas's village. So many people have left, he said in a telephone interview, because there is "no food, no jobs, nothing here." The price of Mexican corn, the staple many indigenous people have grown on small plots for generations, has been undercut by less expensive U.S. corn that has flooded the Mexican market in the 10 years since the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement. Alejandro Lopez, director of Mexico City's office of indigenous affairs, estimated that as many as 40 percent of Mexico's indigenous people now live in urban areas, compared with 20 percent 15 years ago. He said there has been nearly a four-fold increase in Mexico City since 1990, with about 500,000 indigenous people now living in the capital. In the northern city of Monterrey, public school officials are struggling with how to help thousands of new indigenous students who speak dozens of languages. Regina Martinez Casas, an academic researcher, said the rapid growth of the indigenous population in Guadalajara is generating culture clashes. She said an indigenous girl, who by custom would be married by age 13, is now exposed to other 13-year-olds who are studying and "putting rings in their belly button and having fun." Cleofas sat at a computer in his school's new media lab, toggling between Spanish and Otomi during a lesson on the human nervous system. A shy boy with black wavy hair, Cleofas said that his mother died last year and that he survived on a little corn and the edible parts of cactus plants until he left his village for Mexico City. "There is nothing left at home. It's better here," he said, wearing new tennis shoes and sport clothes he bought with his earnings from washing windshields. He now lives with his sisters, who had previously migrated to Mexico City. Cleofas said school has given him goals and that he is now thinking about studying medicine, because, "I'd like to help others." Just maybe, he said, "I'll be a doctor one day." ? 2004 The Washington Post Company _________________________________________________________________ Stop worrying about overloading your inbox - get MSN Hotmail Extra Storage! http://join.msn.com/?pgmarket=en-us&page=hotmail/es2&ST=1/go/onm00200362ave/direct/01/ ----- End forwarded message ----- From anguksuar at YAHOO.COM Wed May 12 13:36:05 2004 From: anguksuar at YAHOO.COM (Richard LaFortune) Date: Wed, 12 May 2004 06:36:05 -0700 Subject: MN Native languages in State Senate In-Reply-To: <1083863032.5d55405a99325@www.email.arizona.edu> Message-ID: this is due for floor vote sometime in the next couple of hours,we are advised (8:30 AM/CST) http://www.senate.leg.state.mn.us/committee/2003-2004/Finance_Early/update04.htm Early Childhood Policy and Budget Division Update Update: April 21, 2004 2:40 p.m. Updates are listed in reverse order with the most recent at the top. Native languages discussed The cultural and educational importance of the Dakota and Ojibwe languages provided the focal point for discussion at the Tues., Apr. 20, meeting of the Early Childhood Policy and Budget Division. The panel, chaired by Sen. John Hottinger (DFL-St. Peter), heard extensive testimony on a resolution urging state agencies to work in concert with American Indian communities to bring existing policies and procedures into compliance in order to support the revitalization of the Dakota and Ojibwe languages and to promote educational achievement for American Indian students. John Poupart, speaking on behalf of the Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance, said there are many native language initiatives across Minnesota and the nation, but all are united in the effort to preserve our native languages. "Native language is the crucible of our culture and our heritage," Poupart said. Poupart then introduced elders to speak on their experiences with American Indian languages. "The elders are the real libraries of our communities," Poupart said. Members also heard young children demonstrate their growing competence in the use of their native languages. Gabriella Strong, a professor at the University of Minnesota, said there is a strong link between native language fluency and educational achievement. In addition, the panel heard from several individuals who experienced the boarding school era that removed American Indian children from their families and prohibited the use of native languages. Several other groups, including tribal leaders, a representative of the Army's World War II code talkers and additional scholars, spoke before the panel. All speakers emphasized the importance of native languages as a basic medium for the transmission and survival of American Indian heritage, cultures, oral histories, spirituality and cultural values. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Movies - Buy advance tickets for 'Shrek 2' http://movies.yahoo.com/showtimes/movie?mid=1808405861 From CRUZ471 at AOL.COM Wed May 12 15:44:00 2004 From: CRUZ471 at AOL.COM (CRUZ471 at AOL.COM) Date: Wed, 12 May 2004 11:44:00 EDT Subject: Otomi language on computer Message-ID: To whomever sent the Washington Post article about Cleofa and his use of the computer in Mexico to study Otomi and Spanish at school. How can anyone get access to the studies Cleofa is using? Who wrote it? Is it online? Does one have to contact the Instituto National de Indigenista headquarters to get more information on the language studies? Where in Mexico is Otomi taught and in which other communities are the other indigenous languages taught? What is their contact number? I thank you in advance for any information you may provide. Robert. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 13 15:37:22 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 13 May 2004 08:37:22 -0700 Subject: Signs spell out tribe's passion to revitalize native language (fwd link) Message-ID: Signs spell out tribe's passion to revitalize native language By Jon Ostendorff, Staff Writer May 12, 2004 10:17 p.m CHEROKEE - Henry Welch tightened the bolts on the bottom of a green street sign with Council House Circle on top and the same words printed in Cherokee on the bottom. http://cgi.citizen-times.com/cgi-bin/story/regional/54741 From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 13 15:56:35 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 13 May 2004 08:56:35 -0700 Subject: Northwest Education: Native Students (fwd links) Message-ID: Northwest Education: Native Students Balancing Two Worlds Spring 2004 Volume 9 Number 3 ISSN: 1546-5020 http://www.nwrel.org/nwedu/09-03/index.php In the Language of Our Ancestors Programs in Montana and Washington Give Voice to Disappearing Words http://www.nwrel.org/nwedu/09-03/language.php Charter School Keeps Native Language Alive Determined teachers enhance students' cultural identity http://www.nwrel.org/nwedu/09-03/charter.php From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri May 14 00:52:46 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 13 May 2004 17:52:46 -0700 Subject: =?iso-8859-1?b?RGlu6Q==?= Language and Culture Program Summer Institute (fwd) Message-ID: Din? Language and Culture Program Summer Institute What: Din? Language and Culture Program Summer Institute When: June 1st ? June 30th, 2004 Where: Phoenix Indian Center, 2601 N. 3rd Street, Navajo Language Classroom Suite 201-B Have you ever wondered what being Din? was all about? Would you like to know what our clans represent and how we can use our clans to survive in the Society we live in today? Have you wondered about who you really are? What Din? really means? If you answered ?yes? to any of the above questions, this is for you! The classes will be held Monday ? Thursday of each week. There will be only one session in the morning. The sessions will be 2 hours (10:00am-12:00pm). There is a limit of 25 students due to limited classroom space. If more than 25 people sign up, there will be two sessions (an afternoon session will be added.) There will be guest speakers that will present on Motivation, Discipline, Self Identity, and Self Awareness. No H.S. credit will be given for this Summer Institute. If interested in this Summer Institute, please contact Freddie Johnson for more information at (602) 264-6655 or email: johnson at phxindcenter.org. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sun May 16 16:46:00 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Sun, 16 May 2004 09:46:00 -0700 Subject: Regina woman seeks to save language (fwd) Message-ID: Regina woman seeks to save language Pamela Cowan Regina Leader-Post Saturday, May 15, 2004 http://www.canada.com/ottawa/ottawacitizen/features/onlineextras/story.html?id=50657340-e16a-4e79-b8f4-338fbbfc3f37 REGINA -- Lindsay Weichel left for Guatemala this week to help preserve an endangered Mayan language and way of life. "The preservation of Indian languages is vitally important," said Weichel. "If you lose the language, then the culture dies, too. You lose an entire way of thinking. You don?t just lose grammar; you lose an entire way of describing the world around you." Now that she?s completed the first year of her master?s degree in linguistics at the First Nations University of Canada, Weichel is enthused about exploring Pokomchi, a Mayan language she will learn from native speakers in San Cristobal. "There?s never been work done on this language in English," she said. "I will be writing a description of the language?s grammar. The only data available to me in Canada about Pokomchi was this old grammar written 70 years ago by a priest who didn?t really know anything about linguistics, so he kind of compared it to Latin and it?s not alike at all." Documenting Pokomchi grammar will form the basis for Weichel?s master?s thesis. She speaks Spanish, so she will look for an interpreter bilingual in Spanish and Pokomchi and enlist his help in interviewing two or three native speakers. She?ll begin by learning culturally significant words that have one meaning - such as man, woman, corn or water. "You start with words so that you can get all the sounds, all the consonants and vowels that make up the language and then, after that, we?ll go on to phrases," she said. Guatemala?s high level of illiteracy poses some challenges. "If you?re illiterate, it changes the way you view language - it changes the way you view sounds and spellings," she said. The 22-year-old received a $17,500 grant from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and $4,000 from the University of Regina. A portion of the money will be used to pay each speaker $10 a day, the standard rate of pay for speakers. English-speaking missionaries working in Guatemala helped arrange accommodations for Weichel with a local family. Prior to leaving for Guatemala earlier this week, she tried to prepare for culture shock. "I?m a really conservative dresser, but I had to buy a whole new wardrobe because I?m not conservative enough," she said. "All my clothes must be below the knee so, out of respect, I bought a bunch of new skirts and capri pants." Once Weichel completes her master?s thesis, she plans to return to Guatemala. "I want to do my PhD on the same language - they need a dictionary so, hopefully, I?ll get to work on that. You can?t write a dictionary until you understand the grammar." ??Regina Leader-Post 2004 From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Mon May 17 18:20:32 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 11:20:32 -0700 Subject: Minority Languages Face Extinction (fwd) Message-ID: Minority Languages Face Extinction http://allafrica.com/stories/200405170590.html The Herald (Harare) NEWS May 17, 2004 Posted to the web May 17, 2004 By Sifelani Tsiko Harare "OUR languages are the cornerstone of who we are as a people," one renowned author once wrote. And now, minority languages are fast vanishing throughout the world as their last speakers die, or as dominant languages like English, Shona and Ndebele in the case of Zimbabwe push them out of common usage. In Zimbabwe, linguists say there are up to 16 African languages or dialects spoken in the country of which ChiShona and IsiNdebele are the dominant ones. There are up to 14 minority dialects in the country, which include Kalanga spoken in Bulilimamangwe district in Matabeleland South, Hwesa in the Nyanga district, Sotho in Gwanda South, Shangani in Chiredzi, Chitoko-Tonga (Mudzi Tonga) in Mudzi district, Venda in Beitbridge and Tonga in the Binga, Omay and Nyaminyami districts. Other minority languages include Chikunda and Doma spoken in Lower Guruve and Muzarabani districts, Chewa and Nyanja in various parts of the country, Khoisan or Tshwawo in Tsholotsho, Barwe in Nyamaropa and Nyakomba districts in Nyanga, Tswana in Bulilimamangwe and Fingo or Xhosa in Mbembesi. Nambya is widely spoken in Hwange district and Sena in various parts of the country. Shona and Ndebele are the only recognised official languages apart from English. Government documents, signs and television programmes are still being produced in English, Shona and Ndebele with some little or none in the other minority languages. Now, there is growing pressure to promote the use of more than a dozen other unofficial languages as well. "Government has shown some commitment, but lack of funds and the snail's pace process in the implementation of minority language policies is worrying and a cause for concern," says a language expert at the University of Zimbabwe. "There is no specific budget for minority language policies," he says. "It's difficult to see how these languages will survive, especially now that our youth are being bombarded daily with everything English and American." But the Minister of Education, Sport and Culture, Cde Aeneas Chigwedere, argues differently. "In the language, culture is embedded," he says. "I know the value of language. The Tonga were the first people to come into Zimbabwe. I know this and we are building up (minority language education)." A number of minority dialects in Zimbabwe have neither books nor documents to ensure their survival and rely on the spoken word for their continuity. These include Hwesa, Shangani, Venda, Chikunda, Doma, Barwe, Tshwawo and Nambya. Simooya Hachipola, a linguistic expert, wrote in "Survey of the Minority Languages in Zimbabwe" (1998) that most of the material identified in the study was either old (pre-1965) or too advanced to be used in primary and secondary schools. "Much work still needs to be done in the area of language description, particularly for those languages without orthography and have not been committed to writing," he wrote. What is lacking, he says, are descriptive grammars, dictionaries and literary books in minority languages, something which has curtailed the full growth of these marginalised languages. Some minority languages like Hwesa, Tshwawo and Barwe, the study found out, had no known published books and prospects for teaching are none or limited. The Government has shown its willingness to address the concerns of minority language speakers by taking steps to promote the use of the country's dozen minority languages at primary school level. "We are building up now. In the past, minority languages could only be taught up to Grade Three, but now we have extended this to Grade Seven," the minister says. "Minority language communities have been clamouring for the teaching of their languages. They have been against the idea of marginalising their languages. "We are only responding to their call. Books are not there, teachers are not there and this exercise is not something that can be done overnight, but certainly we are building up." Moves are underway to amend the Education Act to ensure that all schools implement the teaching of indigenous languages and that they be accorded the same time allotted the country's three main languages. Last year, the Zimbabwe Indigenous Languages Promotion Association (Zilpa) commended Cde Chigwedere for taking steps to promote indigenous languages in the country. The Ministry of Education sourced funds for the publication of books in indigenous languages and a printing machine to facilitate their publication last year. Zimbabwe's efforts, though small, have won the praise of linguists, anthropologists and others interested in the preservation of cultural diversity. Linguists say the use of any language in daily life is the only way to ensure that it continues to survive and thrive. Across the world, minority languages are under threat from larger, dominant languages and cultures and linguistic experts estimate that by the end of this century 50 percent of the world's languages will have disappeared. In Australia, it is reported that 95 percent of the indigenous Aboriginal languages are not being learnt by children and many are already extinct or down to the last few speakers. "Issues of linguistic diversity and the need for language planning are peripheral in America and almost non-existent in Europe," says Matthew Johnson in "Journal on Language Planning in Africa". He says European colonial powers ordered that their colonies adopt a single national language as the nations in Europe itself did, resulting in the marginalisation or extinction of countless dialects in Africa. Africa is one continent with the world's most linguistically diverse people. For instance, the Central African Republic has 68 distinct language groups in a population of just 3,4 million people. Others include Cameroon with 279 language groups, the Democratic Republic of Congo 221, Tanzania 131, Chad 127, while Africa's most populous nation, Nigeria, has over 400 language groups, according to a 1998 study by Robinson and Varley. "People see many languages as a sin and say, 'No, we must have one language.' I think it is necessary for Africans to accept the reality of multilingual societies," writes Ngugi WaThiong'o in "African Visions". Linguistic experts say language diversity and planning are the most critical and often overlooked issue on the continent. They say governments, minority language communities and the media should begin linguistic and cultural revival programmes to reclaim the traditions and heritage of these minority languages, which are fast becoming extinct. "Nothing stays longer in our souls than the language we inherit," one writer put it. And a budget, books, official recognition and media coverage for minority languages will help entrench language not only in the soul, but also in the heart and mind as well. From anguksuar at YAHOO.COM Mon May 17 19:50:55 2004 From: anguksuar at YAHOO.COM (Richard LaFortune) Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 12:50:55 -0700 Subject: MN Native languages legislative victory In-Reply-To: <1084818032.356c731ee2d23@www.email.arizona.edu> Message-ID: May 17, 2004 PRESS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE MINNESOTA LEGISLATURE PASSES RESOLUTION SUPPORTING OJIBWE AND DAKOTA LANGUAGE REVITALIZATION For more information contact: Richard LaFortune, 612-871-0731 or 612-267-1682 (cell) Native American language researcher, writer, linguist consultant At the height of spring, as the rain blessed the plants of Minnesota, the Senate and the House of Representatives of the Minnesota Legislature formally adopted a concurrent resolution to support the revitalization of the Dakota and Ojibwe languages that are native to this state, but are on the verge of extinction. Native languages are recognized a pathway to learning excellence for Native American students across the country. The Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance is poised to make this accomplishment one of many in the long road to revitalization of the Dakota and Ojibwe languages. The language alliance will be working with elders and communities around the state through the summer. With less than 30 fully fluent Dakota speakers living in Minnesota and few fully fluent speakers left on each of the seven Ojibwe Reservations in Minnesota, there isn't a moment to lose. Legislative co-chair Richard LaFortune says, "This is a bright spot in state relations amidst so many other differences that arose this past year." The Language Revitalization Alliance is a gathering of elders; fluent Dakota and Ojibwe speakers, early childhood and childcare providers, members from all eleven tribes in Minnesota, educators, school achievement, and education advocates, and community members. This Alliance has been meeting since June, 2003 to examine the existing barriers and opportunities to language revitalization, convening people who are concerned about the loss of language, supporting each others work, and building awareness at the state and local levels of language revitalization and immersion programs. For Alliance members, language is important to fully understand the cultures and traditions of the Dakota and Ojibwe people. Because the Ojibwe and Dakota languages were forcefully and often violently taken away thorough the boarding schools, many people see language revitalization as an important step in reclaiming cultures, educational achievement, and a positive image of one's self. Experts see a connection to many of the difficulties in the Native American community as an outgrowth of the historical trauma and unresolved grief from so much loss as well as continuing injustices toward Native people. John Poupart, facilitator for the Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance, says, "Connecting to our inner identity is a corner stone of where we must go, language is part of that cornerstone." There have been many strategies to increase the success of Native children many designed by the mainstream culture that does not recognize the ways of thinking and being of the Native American community. Research is now showing that students in a language immersion experience have greater success in school and had consistent measurable improvement on local and national measures of achievements. (Bringing Thunder by Janine Pease Pretty on Top, Tribal College Journal of American Indian Higher Education). Native Hawaiian children in immersion experience outperform the average for Native Hawaiian children. The Maori tribes in New Zealand went from a 5%-15% pass rate in school to a soaring 75% when students were involved in language immersion. Similar statistics are found at the Piegan Institute in Montana with Blackfeet language and other immersion schools around the United States. Language immersion is shown to have a multiplier effect for young Native American children. Language Immersion with children has developed 'intensive language acquisition' which benefits in communication. Learning one's native language reveals and teaches tribal philosophies is a link between the past and future of Native American tribal nations. Darrell Kipp of the Piegan Institute has documented the precious bond created between the children and elders. "Knowledge of the Native language gives tribal members a unique tool for analy zing and synthesizing the world, and the incorporating the knowledge and values of the tribal nation into the world at large."(Crawford) As Minnesota's first languages, Dakota and Ojibwe are important assets to Minnesota and to the world's linguistic resources. The complexity and unique aspects of Ojibwe and Dakota languages provide important worldviews and concepts that can enrich all Minnesotans. Richard LaFortune says, "Native American languages represent some of the richest and most sophisticated languages on earth. Language revitalization presents an outstanding opportunity of our young people to maintain heritage and increase education success. The Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance will be sharing their stories, visions and dreams for a Minnesota where the Dakota and Ojibwe languages are revitalized, where members of the Dakota and Ojibwe communities hear their language every day, reclaim their positive self identity, and unlock their great potential for educational achievements. "We look forward to hearing Governor Pawlenty's response, as well as his commissioners of education and health and human services," noted LaFortune. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? SBC Yahoo! - Internet access at a great low price. http://promo.yahoo.com/sbc/ From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Mon May 17 20:00:46 2004 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 13:00:46 -0700 Subject: Language Diversity Message-ID: Please find the complete programme of the Congress on Language Diversity, Sustainability and Peace that is to be held in Barcelona (20-23 May) at the following link : http://www.linguapax.org/ From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Mon May 17 21:05:49 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 14:05:49 -0700 Subject: MN Native languages legislative victory In-Reply-To: <20040517195055.36659.qmail@web11207.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Great news Richard! phil cash cash UofA > ----- Message from anguksuar at YAHOO.COM --------- > Date: Mon, 17 May 2004 12:50:55 -0700 > From: Richard LaFortune > Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology > Subject: MN Native languages legislative victory > To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU > > May 17, 2004 > PRESS RELEASE > FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE > > > MINNESOTA LEGISLATURE PASSES RESOLUTION SUPPORTING > OJIBWE AND DAKOTA LANGUAGE > REVITALIZATION > > For more information contact: > Richard LaFortune, 612-871-0731 or 612-267-1682 (cell) > Native American language researcher, writer, linguist > consultant > > At the height of spring, as the rain blessed the > plants of Minnesota, the > Senate and the House of Representatives of the > Minnesota Legislature formally > adopted a concurrent resolution to support the > revitalization of the Dakota and > Ojibwe languages that are native to this state, but > are on the > verge of extinction. Native languages are recognized a > pathway to learning > excellence for Native American students across the > country. > > The Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance is > poised to make this > accomplishment one of many in the long road to > revitalization of the Dakota and > Ojibwe languages. The language alliance will be > working with elders and > communities around the state through the summer. With > less than 30 fully fluent > Dakota speakers living in Minnesota and few fully > fluent speakers left on each of > the seven Ojibwe Reservations in Minnesota, there > isn't a moment to lose. > Legislative co-chair Richard LaFortune says, "This is > a bright spot in state > relations amidst so many other differences that arose > this past year." > > The Language Revitalization Alliance is a gathering of > elders; fluent Dakota > and Ojibwe speakers, early childhood and childcare > providers, members from all > eleven tribes in Minnesota, educators, school > achievement, and education > advocates, and community members. This Alliance has > been meeting since June, 2003 > to examine the existing barriers and opportunities to > language revitalization, > convening people who are concerned about the loss of > language, supporting > each others work, and building awareness at the state > and local levels of > language revitalization and immersion programs. > > For Alliance members, language is important to fully > understand the cultures > and traditions of the Dakota and Ojibwe people. > Because the Ojibwe and > Dakota languages were forcefully and often violently > taken away thorough the > boarding schools, many people see language > revitalization as an important step in > reclaiming cultures, educational achievement, and a > positive image of one's > self. > > Experts see a connection to many of the difficulties > in the Native American > community as an outgrowth of the historical trauma and > unresolved grief from so > much loss as well as continuing injustices toward > Native people. John > Poupart, facilitator for the Dakota Ojibwe Language > Revitalization Alliance, says, > "Connecting to our inner identity is a corner stone of > where we must go, > language is part of that cornerstone." > > There have been many strategies to increase the > success of Native children > many designed by the mainstream culture that does not > recognize the ways of > thinking and being of the Native American community. > Research is now showing > that students in a language immersion experience have > greater success in school > and had consistent measurable improvement on local and > national measures of > achievements. (Bringing Thunder by Janine Pease Pretty > on Top, Tribal College > Journal of American Indian Higher Education). Native > Hawaiian children in > immersion experience outperform the average for Native > Hawaiian children. The Maori > tribes in New Zealand went from a 5%-15% pass rate in > school to a soaring 75% > when students were involved in language immersion. > Similar statistics are > found at the Piegan Institute in Montana with > Blackfeet language and other > immersion schools around the United States. > > Language immersion is shown to have a multiplier > effect for young Native > American children. Language Immersion with children > has developed 'intensive > language acquisition' which benefits in communication. > Learning one's native > language reveals and teaches tribal philosophies is a > link between the past and > future of Native American tribal nations. Darrell Kipp > of the Piegan Institute > has documented the precious bond created between the > children and elders. > "Knowledge of the Native language gives tribal members > a unique tool for analy > zing and synthesizing the world, and the incorporating > the knowledge and values > of the tribal nation into the world at > large."(Crawford) > > As Minnesota's first languages, Dakota and Ojibwe are > important assets to > Minnesota and to the world's linguistic resources. The > complexity and unique > aspects of Ojibwe and Dakota languages provide > important worldviews and concepts > that can enrich all Minnesotans. Richard LaFortune > says, "Native American > languages represent some of the richest and most > sophisticated languages on > earth. Language revitalization presents an outstanding > opportunity of our young > people to maintain heritage and increase education > success. > > The Dakota Ojibwe Language Revitalization Alliance > will be sharing their > stories, visions and dreams for a Minnesota where the > Dakota and Ojibwe languages > are revitalized, where members of the Dakota and > Ojibwe communities hear their > language every day, reclaim their positive self > identity, and unlock their > great potential for educational achievements. > > "We look forward to hearing Governor Pawlenty's > response, as well as his > commissioners of education and health and human > services," noted LaFortune. > > > > > > > __________________________________ > Do you Yahoo!? > SBC Yahoo! - Internet access at a great low price. > http://promo.yahoo.com/sbc/ > > > ----- End message from anguksuar at YAHOO.COM ----- From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Tue May 18 16:03:10 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 18 May 2004 09:03:10 -0700 Subject: Cherokee People Work To Save Language (fwd) Message-ID: Cherokee People Work To Save Language Hundreds Of Adults, Children Studying Their Native Tongue http://www.thehometownchannel.com/news/3316827/detail.html POSTED: 9:51 PM CDT May 17, 2004 UPDATED: 10:14 PM CDT May 17, 2004 TAHLEQUAH, Okla. -- Although the Cherokee language is one of the oldest languages still spoken in North America, Cherokee Nation leaders have worried in recent years that their native tongue is in danger of being lost forever. Cherokees Keep Language Alive [video insert] But as 40/29's Melissa Kelly reported, Cherokee leaders aren't letting their language become just another page in history. A group of elders, teachers and tribal leaders began taking steps to preserve the cornerstone of their culture when they began to suspect that few members of the tribe spoke the Cherokee language. Tribal leaders said that a recent study found that only 1 percent of the Cherokee Nation is fluent in Cherokee. Indeed, very few members of the Cherokee Nation speak their native language -- and even fewer know how it looks on paper. But Cherokee language teacher Harry Oosawhee said a new trend among the Cherokee people may change that statistic. "What we're trying to do is create an epidemic, so people will want to learn and share," he said. At Lost City Elementary School in eastern Oklahoma, every student in the Cherokee language immersion class is learning to speak Cherokee ?- and English is not allowed while class is in session. 6-year-old Hawk said his mother and grandmother speak some Cherokee, but his father does not. When he leaves school, Hawk said, he becomes the teacher at home. "It makes me feel more Cherokee," he said. Tribal officials said more and more adults are learning the language. According to Principal Chief Chad Smith, online Cherokee language classes are booked solid. "The bottom line is, if you know our language, you're happier (and) healthier," he said. "It's something we need to do." In addition to the renewed interest in language courses, native songs now flood the airwaves of a local radio station that broadcasts in Cherokee. Many Cherokees say the importance of the language is hard to explain. "It brought us together ... it binds our people," said elder John Ketcher. "As long as there are Cherokee speakers, there will always be Cherokee." From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Tue May 18 16:12:27 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 18 May 2004 09:12:27 -0700 Subject: Preserving a native tongue (fwd) Message-ID: Preserving a native tongue By Sarah Villicana, The Porterville Recorder http://www.portervillerecorder.com/articles/2004/05/18/news/local_state/news01.txt Christina Jaquez is on a mission, one to save a dying language and in the process preserve a piece of the Valley's culture. To achieve her goal, she's enlisting an unlikely set of burgeoning experts: preschool-age children from the Tule River Indian tribe. "What do we see and hear with?" Jaquez asks a roomful of youngsters. "We see with our 'sahsah' and hear with our 'took,'" says Jaquez as she points from her eyes to her ears. Every Friday morning, Jaquez teaches a couple dozen pre-school age children words in Yowlumni, the native language of the Tule River Indian tribe. The lessons take place at the Tule River Child Care Center, run by the Tulare County Office of Education. "We keep the lessons short," Jaquez said. "We go over colors, numbers and everyday objects and then we finish by telling a story or singing songs in the Yowlumni language." After 10 minutes of instruction, the children start to become restless so they are read an adaptation of "Goldilocks and the Three Bears" in Yowlumni - with porridge replaced by acorn mush. Jaquez, who has been speaking Yowlumni for 11 years, was part of a master-apprentice program. Her instructor, Jane Flippo, one of the few master speakers left, died last March. "The youngest master speakers are in their 70s," Jaquez said. "I always wanted to learn the language but it was difficult to find people still willing to teach," Jaquez said. "It's really very beautiful. There are no bad words in the Yowlumni language." After the story, the day's lesson wraps up with a sing-a-long of "The Deer Song." "Ho-yeh-nah, Oh-chip-nee," sang Denise Peyron, an instructor who teaches the children songs that the Yokut people have been singing for hundreds of years. Peyron has been speaking Yowlumni words her whole life but has only studied the language for the last two years. "I started learning by singing through church," Peyron said. "When you're troubled, the words can be soothing to your soul." "It's important for the kids to hear the words, retain them and keep them in their heart. The whole philosophy of a culture is in the language," Jaquez said. "We are trying to keep our past alive, but the language is near extinction." Before the children leave, Peyron takes out a special surprise. "Be very careful children, this was a gift I received for learning my language," said Peyron as she hands over an eagle feather with a brightly beaded handle. She was given the feather for saying a prayer in Yowlumni at a recent ceremony. There are only a few people left at the reservation who are fluent in Yowlumni. Jaquez estimates that maybe a dozen elders still speak the native language. "I work on learning my language every day," Peyron said. "I know 200 more words than I knew before I started. Teaching the kids really helps. It wasn't until I started teaching that I learned all the words for numbers and parts of the body." On Saturdays, the teachers become the students and attend a language class open to all ages on the reservation. "There is so much to learn," Peyron said. "One word can have 20 different meanings, depending on how you say it." "If we don't teach it now, once they're gone there will be no one left to remember. Yowlumni is one of the most unique indigenous languages in North America," Jaquez said. "Linguists have come here from all over to study it because it contains sounds that you won't find anywhere else in the country." Jaquez and Peyron have found children are perhaps the best hope to save the tribe's native language. "I have three grandchildren and one niece that I'm teaching Yowlumni," Peyron said. "They pick it up so quickly. My granddaughter learned how to count in Yowlumni before I did." "My dream is to open an immersion school," Jaquez said. "These kids are going to go on to surprise everyone. This generation will be the one that finally saves our language." Contact Sarah Villicana at 784-5000, or svillicana at portervillerecorder.com This story was published in The Porterville Recorder on May 178, 2004 From pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET Tue May 18 22:41:30 2004 From: pasxapu at DAKOTACOM.NET (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 18 May 2004 15:41:30 -0700 Subject: audio tip... Message-ID: t?'c hal?Xp (good day!), audio tip of the day...i just found out something interesting for audio playback. when playing sound files, haven't you noticed that RealPlayer, Windows Media Player, or Winamp has become cumbersome lately (though Quicktime is still very nice -- extremely nice with the Pro version). i never quite liked the newer versions because it was too awkward when handling all my language files. try a Windows solution: play your audio in the pared-down, minimal Windows Media Player 6. all you have to do is got to Start, Run, and then type in "mplayer2". and there you have it, right!? i heard that WMP6 plays all of the same codecs as version 9.0 does. and it doesn't eat up processing time and resources like 9.0. kaa maw? (later), phil UofA, ILAT -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 878 bytes Desc: not available URL: From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed May 19 16:01:58 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Wed, 19 May 2004 09:01:58 -0700 Subject: Preserving Languages (fwd) Message-ID: Preserving Languages Linguists say more than 150 of the remaining 175 indigenous U.S. languages are in peril of disappearing By W. JAMES HONABERGER | For The New Mexican Sunday, May 16, 2004 http://www.santafenewmexican.com/main.asp?Search=1&ArticleID=44796&SectionID=2&SubSectionID=&S=1 [photo insert - Charlotte Baltazar, 15, of Dulce, forgets some of her lines spoken in Jicarilla on Saturday, during a presentation on the origins of the Jicarilla people and their culture at the annual Native American Youth Language Fair at the Santa Fe Indian School. - Raul Vasquez/The New Mexican] Bea Duran of Tesuque Pueblo didn't teach her children to speak their tribe's language because, as a child, she was punished for speaking the language at school. "It shouldn't have been an issue, but in the back of my head I had that thought," Duran says. "I should have taught them. I feel bad that I didn't." On Saturday, looking at her granddaughters dressed in traditional outfits at an indigenous language fair in Santa Fe, Duran said proudly that she is teaching them to speak Tewa. "I still have a chance," she said. Duran and her grandchildren were among dozens of people who attended the event, hosted by the Indigenous Language Institute at the Santa Fe Indian School. Students from kindergarten to high school sang songs, recited poems and counted in Navajo, Tewa, Jicarilla Apache and Cherokee. Despite the seemingly vibrant demonstration of indigenous languages, the idioms are in danger of being lost. According to linguists, if tribal members -- most especially the youngest generation -- do not learn to speak their languages, the next 60 years might see the silence of more than 150 of the remaining 175 indigenous languages in the United States. "We are in trouble," said Tessie Naranjo of Santa Clara Pueblo, the institute's vice president. "More than any other time in our history we need our language. It's through the language that we keep ourselves going." As late as 1776, at least 300 indigenous languages were spoken in what is now the United States. Their roots trace to as many as 15 language families. European languages, with rare exceptions, belong to one language family -- Indo-European. Despite the fact that linguists have documented most remaining indigenous languages, comprehensive learning aids for indigenous languages are virtually non-existent. Maura Studi, a volunteer with the language institute, said she was surprised at the lack of Cherokee-language-learning aids when she and her husband, actor Wes Studi, began to teach their son the language. "There just were not a lot of materials or help around," Maura Studi said. "I realized that not everything was in place for making this an easy process for anyone." Lack of learning aids might be a thing of the past, as native communities become tech savvy and multimedia devices become accessible. "Many people are using the computer to create tutorial programs, and we're finding that those are very powerful tools," said Inee Yang Slaughter, institute director. As Native Americans fluent in their language grow older and take Tewa, Hawaiian or Choctaw to their graves, efforts to cultivate younger speakers are helping. Naranjo said language and culture have a symbiotic relationship. "Behavior is embedded in the language; language reflects what the values of your community are," she said. "If you don't know your language, you won't learn how to be a good Tewa person ... or a good anything person." At Saturday's fair, Duran's grandchildren Maylinda Reynolds, 7, and Crystal Rain Reynolds, 5, recited a poem and counted in Tewa. "It's fun," Maylinda Reynolds said. "I can count to 20. I know how to say thank you ... Ku'daa." From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed May 19 16:03:52 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Wed, 19 May 2004 09:03:52 -0700 Subject: Tribe wants to revive Arapaho language (fwd0 Message-ID: Tribe wants to revive Arapaho language By WHITNEY ROYSTER Star-Tribune staff writer http://www.casperstartribune.net/articles/2004/05/19/news/wyoming/8bde50ae4a0bcb6a87256e9900069a70.txt JACKSON -- Unless drastic changes are implemented on the Wind River Reservation, the Arapaho language will die within 15 years, a language professor said Tuesday. Eugene Ridgely Jr., director of the bilingual education program for the Wind River Tribal College in Ethete, said the key is to speak Arapaho in the home and elsewhere as much as possible. "Without the language, you don't have the culture," Ridgely said. "The stories, even everyday conversation, it's different than we're going to have with English." An Arapaho language revitalization effort is being undertaken by the tribe members and was spearheaded by a Council of Elders concerned with the culture loss. A meeting with the Arapaho Business Council, Council of Elders, Arapaho Language and Cultural Commission, school officials and teachers will be held today at 11 a.m. at the college. "First, we've got to get the people to care," Ridgely said. "If they don't care then we have a big problem. We need to lay down the groundwork to address those (language) concerns. ... We need cooperation from every entity that we're going to talk to." Ways of infusing the Arapaho language in schools and in homes is the group's primary focus. Ridgely said the college conducted a survey in 1995, asking students, parents and grandparents in the community about the language they spoke. "From there we drew some conclusions that (the Arapaho language) was in a sense declining very rapidly," he said. "This was also foreseen back in the years of the 1970s." In the 1970s, the level of language loss was determined to be a "three" on a scale of one to five, with five being a level of total extinction. The Arapaho language was flourishing until the 1950s. "It's gotten worse really fast," Ridgely said. "Now we maybe have about 15 years of fluency left, maybe less." Years of fluency are determined by the age of elders who are still fluent. Of the nearly 8,000 tribe members, less than 1,000 are fluent and at a conversational speaking stage, according to the college. Ridgely said some words don't translate into English. He said some stories told in the Arapaho language don't translate readily to English, and those stories are important in the history of the tribe. The loss of native languages are the result, in part, of the U.S. government and churches infusing reservations with European thinking and the English language. The "No Child Left Behind" act also makes teaching native languages in schools difficult, because so much emphasis is placed on traditional curriculum, Ridgely said. Language revitalization efforts have been successful for tribes in the Hawaiian islands. "It starts with total immersion from the little ones up, gradually working their way to speaking adults," Ridgely said. "Those revitalization efforts will take several years; it won't happen overnight." Non-speakers and non-tribe members need to be concerned about the disappearance of the language, too, Ridgely said, if people want to experience native cultures. One way to ensure the viability of the language is to pair children with fluent, Arapaho-speaking elders, Ridgely said. "This is going to be the first step in many," he explained. "We want to get the word out that it needs to be addressed soon or else we will all be English speaking within 15 years. It's going to be an uphill struggle." From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed May 19 18:15:43 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Wed, 19 May 2004 11:15:43 -0700 Subject: Audacity update... Message-ID: dear ilat, fyi, for those that use the free software Audacity on a regular basis, note the new updated release Audacity 1.2.1. http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ q?'c (later), phil cash cash UofA, ILAT From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 20 16:42:45 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 20 May 2004 09:42:45 -0700 Subject: Typesetting Native American Languages (link) Message-ID: [fyi, a nice article on typsetting. pcc] Typesetting Native American Languages The Journal of Electronic Publishing August, 2002 ? Volume 8, Issue 1 ISSN 1080-2711 ? http://www.press.umich.edu/jep/08-01/syropoulos.html From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri May 21 16:08:22 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 21 May 2004 09:08:22 -0700 Subject: Mexican schools teach indigenous languages (fwd) Message-ID: Mexican schools teach indigenous languages http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/centralphoenix/articles/0521mexlanguage0521Z4.html# Mary Jordan The Washington Post May. 21, 2004 12:00 AM MEXICO CITY - Jose Roberto Cleofas depends on red lights to make a living. As soon as cars brake for the stoplight in front of the Pizza Hut on Insurgentes Avenue, Cleofas, 14, moves in on dirty windshields and starts wiping. "How else can I eat?" said the fifth-grader, one of the hundreds of thousands of indigenous people who have migrated to Mexican cities in search of work as agriculture has failed in their dying villages. The federal government is struggling to educate migrant children here and in other Mexican cities. The Education Ministry has opened more than 2,000 bilingual schools for speakers of 62 indigenous languages in the past 10 years. In part, the initiative is a response to the armed Zapatista movement in southern Mexico in the 1990s, which embarrassed the government by bringing worldwide attention to its neglect of indigenous people. Most of the new schools are in rural areas where indigenous children are in the majority. Now, the challenge is to accommodate their growing numbers in cities where they are a minority. Like 300,000 other Mexicans, Cleofas' first language is Otomi. There are 10 million indigenous Mexicans in a population of 103 million. During the Spanish conquest 500 years ago, indigenous people fled to remote desert and mountain areas and remain among Mexico's poorest, marginalized by racial prejudice and inferior schooling. Cleofas attends the Alfredo Correo school, a two-story brick schoolhouse, where about 100 of the 124 students are indigenous, according to the principal. The school was chosen last year to be one of 76 city schools in a vanguard bicultural project because nearly all students speak the same language and are from Santiago Mexquititlan, a farming village 100 miles north of Mexico City. The schools' computers are programmed in Spanish and Otomi, and teachers are required to learn Otomi so they can communicate easily with students who are not proficient in Spanish. Cleofas, who began speaking Spanish five years ago at age 9, has already attended school longer than many indigenous students, who typically don't finish primary school. He said no one in his family had ever finished fifth grade. The soaring number of indigenous children in urban Mexico is being compared by education officials to the situation in the United States. In both countries, the influx of migrant children is prompting schools to introduce native languages in the classroom. And in both countries, multicultural education is facing some resistance. "Yes, there are parents who don't like it," said Nancy Miranda, head of the parents association at the Alfredo Correo school. She said some parents believe assimilation and speaking Spanish are the way to get ahead in Mexico. Some parents said the cost of training teachers in indigenous languages and creating special bilingual textbooks was a wasteful expenditure for an already thin education budget. Rather than have their children learn Otomi, some parents interviewed said they would prefer their children learn English or French, the languages wealthier Mexicans study. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Fri May 21 16:11:22 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Fri, 21 May 2004 09:11:22 -0700 Subject: Fort Belknap hears it first on KGVA (fwd) Message-ID: Fort Belknap hears it first on KGVA A fresh start By JARED MILLER Tribune Regional Reporter http://www.greatfallstribune.com/news/stories/20040521/localnews/470964.html [TRIBUNE PHOTO BY JARED MILLER - Radio announcer Brian Hammett, known on air as "B.J. the D.J.," is a state certified Native language instructor. He teaches a daily language lesson for radio listeners.] As word of the tribal president's unprecedented resignation swept over the Fort Belknap Reservation last week, residents tuned their radios to 88.1 FM. Behind the microphone, KGVA station manager Will Gray Jr. broadcast live from tribal headquarters, and studio announcers discussed the resignation on the air. "A lot of people really didn't know what was going on," Gray said. "That's where we come in." The live coverage is one example of how KGVA -- part of a national network of Native American-owned radio stations -- has become more than just a signal on the radio dial. Just minutes after Gray announced that the Fort Belknap Indian Community Council had ended discussions about the resignation, the doors to tribal headquarters swung open. People poured inside to talk about what they'd heard on the radio. Tune to 88.1 on any given day and you'll hear the steady beat of powwow music, contemporary tunes selected by local DJs and free Indian language lessons. High school basketball games air on the weekends, and homebound elders get their only access to powwows through a remote radio feed. KGVA also carries programs like National Native News by National Public Radio and Native America Calling by American Indian Radio On Satellite. What you won't hear on the 24-hour station is commercials. KGVA has been on the air since 1996 and broadcasts from Fort Belknap College, which holds the license and provides most of the funding. Ultimately, the Fort Belknap Indian Community Council has control of the station and its content. The Fort Belknap Reservation, home to Montana's Gros Ventre and Assinibione tribes, is 35 miles east of Havre on the Hi-Line. It wasn't until 2001 that KGVA became a centerpiece for news, information and entertainment. The Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks helped sharpen the station's focus as a news source. For two days after the attacks, the station broadcast nothing but NPR. Then Gray decided to turn the microphone to the reservation. He interviewed members of the Fort Belknap Indian Community Council, and he asked locals what they had to say about the attacks. "I wanted to give them a voice," Gray said. "This is their radio station." Tuning in When a crippling blizzard hit in December 2003, the reservation again tuned to KGVA. With police dispatch inundated with calls, radio announcers relayed message from stranded travelers and families that needed help. The reservation eventually was declared a disaster area, and the station got the word out immediately. "They try to keep the people involved and informed," said Fort Belknap resident Gene Brockie, who first tuned in after moving back to the reservation in January. "I think they do a good job." Tribal President Darrell Martin said the station helps get information to the reservation elders who may not have television. "It's very important that people know what's going on the reservation," Martin said. "It's a great tool." A strong signal During the last 30 years, radio has found a special place on America's reservations, said Susan Braine, an operating chief for Koahnic Broadcast Corp., the native-owned media center in Anchorage, Alaska. All together, there are 32 commercial-free reservation radio stations. Most are linked by the American Indian Radio On Satellite and most are National Public Radio affiliates. "I think it's cool that you don't have to go the IHS (Indian Health Service) clinic or the post office to read the bulletin board to find out what's going on anymore," Braine said. "All you have to do is tune in to your tribal radio station. "I would say that every one of them is the community center," she said. The oldest reservation stations -- in Alaska, North Carolina and New Mexico -- have been on the air for at least three decades. Some stations, including the NPR station in Pine Hill, N.M., KTDB, are bilingual. That station translates all NPR programs into the Navajo language, Braine said. Learning curve Gray and the KGVA staff all got their start as station volunteers, and none had broadcast experience. But their talents blended with the station goals, and eventually they got permanent jobs. Announcer Brian Hammett, known on air as "B.J. the DJ," is certified by the state of Montana to teach the White Clay language and gives a daily language lesson. Both Hammett and announcer Dean Snow, known on air as "Luke Warm Water," rely heavily on humor to drive their programming. Unlike a lot of contemporary stations today, Hammett and Snow pick their own tunes; nothing is prerecorded. Room to grow Under Grays' leadership, the station continues to sharpen its focus on news and local voice. There's still plenty of room to grow, he said. In fact, the station is in the process of hiring a third announcer and will soon extend its reach well beyond the reservation. KGVA will be on the Internet in about two months. Miller can be reached by e-mail at jarmille at greatfal.gannett.com, or by phone at (406) 791-6573 or (800) 438-6600. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sun May 23 05:10:17 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Sat, 22 May 2004 22:10:17 -0700 Subject: Campers challenged to use only Lakota language for a week (fwd) Message-ID: Campers challenged to use only Lakota language for a week http://www.rapidcityjournal.com/articles/2004/05/23/news/local/news03.txt By Jomay Steen, Journal Staff Writer EAGLE BUTTE -- No cell signals, no radio waves, no cable, no English. It's all part of a plan to keep technology and the 21st century at bay while immersing students into the American Indian language and culture of the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation. As a way to strengthen an endangered language, Si Tanka University will challenge 100 student campers to a week of accelerated learning where only the Lakota language is spoken. Setting up campsites along the sandy banks of the Cheyenne River on the southern border of the reservation, students will have had a two-day vocabulary and camp orientation before entering the outdoor seminar. Rosalita Roach, program director of Cheyenne River Resource Consortium, said the consortium sponsors the camp as part of Waonspekiya Oyasin, a language revitalization project for teachers. "It's a full-immersion camp," Roach said. "They're going to use local resources, like the elders, for activities and for conversation." Cultural aspects, such as set-up of the camp, storytelling and music will be a part of the experience, she said. But it also demands full participation from the students. "Once campers go in, they can't come out," she said. "That is, if they want to earn their credits." "It's going to be informational and educational," Barry Mann said. Mann, Si Tanka University academic dean, said the basic idea behind the camp is to preserve the Lakota language. "It's what makes us the people that we are," he said. It's the first time the camp has focused on adults and teachers, and will incorporate a lot of the values, tradition and culture of the Lakota people, he said. Sponsored by Waonspekiya Oyasin, Si Tanka University and Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Language Department, the camp runs June 1-6. Pre-camp courses will begin June 1 at Si Tanka University at the Eagle Butte campus. Language teachers and university officials will introduce Lakota vocabulary, class syllabus, orientation and core concepts. Campers are asked to bring their own tents, bedrolls and gear. A complete list of what to bring will be provided at pre-registration. The camp experience costs $249 plus a $50 fee. The tuition and course fees will pay for the three-credit course work, materials and meals. Tuition is free to enrolled tribal members, with a priority to those living on the reservation. Language campers will arrive for check-in at noon to 1 p.m. June 3 at the site. Maps to the site will be given to students at the orientation. The camp offers Lakota introduction course for 35 students; Lakota II for 35 students; Lakota III for 15 students and Lakota IV for 15 students. The participants will have an on-site camp experience. Family-centered, campers are welcome to bring their children, ages 5 and older. Children's activities will be provided. Campers would have to provide their own babysitters for very young children. To pre-register for the three-credit course, call Carol Rave or Barry Mann at 1-605-964-8011 by May 30. "Based on people's interest, we may have to do it again," Mann said. Contact Jomay Steen at 394-8418 or jomay.steen at rapidcityjournal.com Copyright ? 2004 The Rapid City Journal Rapid City, SD From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sun May 23 16:08:53 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 09:08:53 -0700 Subject: Seneca Faithkeepers School tries to keep alive the tribe's traditional ways, language (fwd) Message-ID: Seneca Faithkeepers School tries to keep alive the tribe's traditional ways, language By DAN HERBECK News Staff Reporter 5/20/2004 http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial/20040520/1053043.asp [photo insert - Robert Kirkham/Buffalo News. "Bear beans" from the Faithkeepers School garden will one day be part of lunch for students, from left, Ryan Abrams, Landon Sequoyah, Jacob Dowdy and Franklin Brown.] [photo insert - Robert Kirkham/Buffalo News. Rudi George listens to a Seneca lesson from a tribal historian.] [photo insert - Robert Kirkham/Buffalo News. Sandy Dowdy, co-founder of the Faithkeepers School, teaches history from Seneca perspective.] [photo insert - Derek Gee/Buffalo News. Lena Pearl Dowdy, named for her great-great grandmother Lena Snow, learns respect for tribal elders at the traditional Seneca school.] Last winter, at a meeting of the Seneca Tribal Council, an 8-year-old boy stood up to give the invocation. In front of a council filled with smoke shop owners and casino enthusiasts, the boy spoke the language of his forefathers, the language of the Longhouse. "This little boy spoke for eight to 10 minutes, all in the Seneca language," said Rickey L. Armstrong Sr., the tribe's president. "I was in awe listening to this." And it all happened because Lehman "Dar" Dowdy doesn't want Seneca tradition to die. "Ninety-nine percent of Senecas don't know how to speak the Seneca language. Everywhere you look, our old ways of life are disappearing," said Dowdy, 65. To counter that loss of heritage, Dowdy and his wife, Sandy, in 1998 started the Seneca Faithkeepers School, where the boy learned to speak the Seneca language. The school is located in the woods of the Allegany Reservation, in a long cedar building modeled after the longhouses, where traditional Senecas hold religious ceremonies. In that building, Seneca children and teenagers spend five days a week learning their nation's language, its history and traditions, from farming techniques to an ancient game played with dice carved from animal bones. Attending the school is a major commitment for young people and their parents. Because the Faithkeepers program is not geared to meet government requirements, each student needs tutoring or home schooling to learn subjects such as math, English and science. Twelve students, ages 8 to 14, now attend the school which, the Dowdys realize, is just a small step toward saving the Senecas' heritage. "I would like to see each of these 12 kids grow up and teach 12 other kids about our language and customs," Dowdy said. "And hopefully, that second group will go on to teach others." The school teaches students the ways of the Longhouse religion, as specified in a spiritual guide called the Gaiwi:yo:h. Pronounced Guy-wee-yo, the book provides the moral code for Longhouse Senecas. The roles of males and females at the school follow Seneca traditions that aren't always in step with modern America. Only girls are taught to cook. Only boys can play - or even watch - a popular winter sport called "snowsnakes," which involves pushing spears of polished hardwood down a quarter-mile ramp lined with ice. Students maintain the big, bountiful garden behind the school, growing corn, tobacco and scarlet runner beans. One recent afternoon, an elder named Marilyn Cooper taught the girls how to sew colorful "ribbon shirts" that are worn for tribal ceremonies. The children learn about traditional song and dance, self-esteem, the earth's natural energy forces - wind, water, thunder, sun, moon and stars - and the use of plants and bushes to make medicines. "I like the school . . . especially the cultural stuff," said student Robynn George, 13, who first introduced herself by her Seneca name, Gayenesha'a:h. "I like learning about our traditions." Dowdy is a Longhouse faithkeeper who leads many of the ceremonies at the Cold Spring Longhouse on the Allegany Reservation. As a teacher, he gives his lessons a different spin from what the students would hear in public schools. "When I teach them about George Washington, I tell them about the things that George Washington did to our nation," Dowdy said, referring to the army sent to burn and destroy Seneca villages during the Revolutionary War. Students pay nothing to attend the school. Most expenses are covered by donations from Senecas who believe in preserving the nation's old ways. Merle Watt, a wealthy Seneca smoke shop owner, raised much of the money and provided laborers to build the school. The Seneca Nation donated 10 acres for the school, does repairs on the building, provides some tutors and pays Dowdy as a part-time employee. Earlier this month, the nation government donated more than $70,000 to the school after a fund-raiser at the new Seneca Allegany Casino. Armstrong said it would "sicken" him if the nation completely lost touch with its old ways. He said many Seneca elders still recall the days when they learned to speak their own language before English. "I'd like to see a second Faithkeepers School started on the Cattaraugus Territory," Armstrong said. "Anything that Dar Dowdy asks for, I think we should step up to the plate and help him." From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sun May 23 16:17:36 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 09:17:36 -0700 Subject: Swinomish youth pick up cameras, tell their own stories (fwd) Message-ID: Swinomish youth pick up cameras, tell their own stories By Tina Potterf Seattle Times staff reporter Alcoholics. Drug addicts. High school dropouts. Native American youth are aware of the stereotypes that taint their heritage. Ask a group of Native kids from the Swinomish tribe near La Conner, Skagit County, about what it means to be an American Indian, and you may be surprised by their candor and insight: "You probably think I'm another stoned Indian. Well, you're wrong. I'm going to become a lawyer." "You probably think that I've already dropped out of school. Well, I've kept my grades up and plan to go to the University of Washington." [text inset - Native Lens. Later this month, the short digital films created by Swinomish youth will be available for viewing online at www.911media.org. To learn more about Native Lens, or to bring a workshop to your tribe, call 206-682-6552, ext. 18. For more information about classes and other workshops at 911 Media Arts Center, visit www.911media.org.] "You probably think I'm a druggie or an alcoholic because I'm Native. I plan to finish high school and go to college." These statements, from a public service announcement created by Swinomish teens, drive home a central message: Native Americans have pride and, as is stated at the outset of the PSA, are "More than what you think." The PSA was created as part of Native Lens, a new program of Seattle's 911 Media Arts Center. The program's goal is to dismantle Native American stereotypes and encourage youth to take on the role of storytellers, whether through public service announcements or documentary films. Over the next two years, 911 Media Arts Center will present a series of programs that center on media literacy and digital filmmaking for Native youth. The project, funded by a grant from the Time Warner Foundation, launched earlier this month with two days of workshops at the arts center. More than two dozen Swinomish youth traveled by bus to Seattle to learn the nuts and bolts of digital movie-making, from handling a camera to framing a shot and lighting. [photo inset - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Travis Tom, left, and Nick Clark set up backdrops.] The teens and early twentysomethings also learned about collaboration and how to work under the pressure of a deadline ? in this case, they had four or five hours to make either a PSA, an interview-intensive documentary, or an animation short. The goal was to create tangible, lasting works that educate and enlighten people about their tribe. On top of developing a strong idea and executing it, the group learned how to operate digital video equipment, from technical stuff, like what buttons do what ? to composition, such as framing a person's face and editing a few hours of footage down to a few minutes. The young people were divided into groups and teamed with instructors such as Roy Wilson, who oversaw the making of the public service announcement. "Your job is to make something small, say in 30 seconds," Wilson said, "that will have an effect on people." After a concentrated brainstorming session in a large, cool back room at 911 Media Arts Center, the kids decided to build the PSA around the theme of "Native Pride," and one by one stepped in front of the camera, operated by their peers, to state their accomplishments and aspirations. Getting tips from the pros [photo insert - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Nick Clark, center, frames up a shot of Amanda Hansen for his 30-second video.] In addition to learning how to make digital films, the group took a field trip to the Experience Music Project and talked with rising young Native American actors Eddie Spears ("Dreamkeeper," "Black Cloud") and Cody Lightning ("Smoke Signals," "Manic"), who answered questions and offered suggestions to the aspiring filmmakers. The students' finished works were shown to a rousing reception at a Saturday evening screening at 911. The decision to partner with the Swinomish was a logical one because the tribe has an existing outlet in the form of tribal cable station SWIN96 for the youth to take what they learn through Native Lens and apply it in ways that benefit the whole community. The students' PSA and other Native Lens short films will eventually be broadcast on the cable station and be shopped to various youth film festivals. "It was important to work with one tribe to create a model" for the program, said Annie Silverstein, director of the Young Producers Project and Native Lens. "We want to help them develop sustainable media on the reservation." La Conner Middle School sixth grader Anna Cladoosby, part of the PSA team, embraced the opportunity to learn more about digital media. "I want to learn the process and how hard you have to work to make a movie," she said. Through Native Lens, Cladoosby said, "People can learn more about our culture." Robert Williams was one of only a few participants with prior experience in shooting and editing videos. Sharing what they've learned "I've tried sports, basketball and baseball, and it didn't work out," Williams said, "So I picked up a camera." [photo inset - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Nolita Bob is interviewed by a friend and is also seen on the monitor at right, which is for the video crew to watch so they have proper framing of the image.] Williams, 21, has a penchant for short documentaries, mostly of his buddies playing basketball or hanging out, set to an underground hip-hop soundtrack. He hopes to build on and pass along the experiences gained through Native Lens, a program he said "gives us a chance to go back to the tribe and tell them what we have learned and what we've done." Getting the youth to think critically and creatively, and to empower them to share their stories with others, is ultimately what Native Lens is about. "These kids are really good storytellers... ," said Tracy Edwards, Swinomish education director. "I hope that they continue with what they learned here and bring it back to the tribe. "And if they have a story to tell, they can get it out to the community." Tina Potterf: 206-464-8214 or tpotterf at seattletimes.com From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Sun May 23 16:18:35 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 09:18:35 -0700 Subject: Swinomish youth pick up cameras, tell their own stories (fwd) In-Reply-To: <1085329056.19cfd35c44c8f@www.email.arizona.edu> Message-ID: here is the url: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/living/2001933657_nativelens23.html > ----- Message from cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU --------- > Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 09:17:36 -0700 > From: phil cash cash > Reply-To: Indigenous Languages and Technology > Subject: Swinomish youth pick up cameras, tell their own stories (fwd) > To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU > > Swinomish youth pick up cameras, tell their own stories > > By Tina Potterf > Seattle Times staff reporter > > Alcoholics. Drug addicts. High school dropouts. > > Native American youth are aware of the stereotypes that taint their > heritage. Ask a group of Native kids from the Swinomish tribe near La > Conner, Skagit County, about what it means to be an American Indian, > and you may be surprised by their candor and insight: > > "You probably think I'm another stoned Indian. Well, you're wrong. > I'm > going to become a lawyer." > > "You probably think that I've already dropped out of school. Well, > I've > kept my grades up and plan to go to the University of Washington." > > [text inset - Native Lens. Later this month, the short digital films > created by Swinomish youth will be available for viewing online at > www.911media.org. To learn more about Native Lens, or to bring a > workshop to your tribe, call 206-682-6552, ext. 18. For more > information about classes and other workshops at 911 Media Arts > Center, > visit www.911media.org.] > > "You probably think I'm a druggie or an alcoholic because I'm Native. > I > plan to finish high school and go to college." > > These statements, from a public service announcement created by > Swinomish teens, drive home a central message: Native Americans have > pride and, as is stated at the outset of the PSA, are "More than what > you think." > > The PSA was created as part of Native Lens, a new program of > Seattle's > 911 Media Arts Center. The program's goal is to dismantle Native > American stereotypes and encourage youth to take on the role of > storytellers, whether through public service announcements or > documentary films. > > Over the next two years, 911 Media Arts Center will present a series > of > programs that center on media literacy and digital filmmaking for > Native youth. The project, funded by a grant from the Time Warner > Foundation, launched earlier this month with two days of workshops at > the arts center. More than two dozen Swinomish youth traveled by bus > to > Seattle to learn the nuts and bolts of digital movie-making, from > handling a camera to framing a shot and lighting. > > [photo inset - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Travis Tom, left, and > Nick Clark set up backdrops.] > > The teens and early twentysomethings also learned about collaboration > and how to work under the pressure of a deadline ? in this case, they > had four or five hours to make either a PSA, an interview-intensive > documentary, or an animation short. The goal was to create tangible, > lasting works that educate and enlighten people about their tribe. > > On top of developing a strong idea and executing it, the group > learned > how to operate digital video equipment, from technical stuff, like > what > buttons do what ? to composition, such as framing a person's face and > editing a few hours of footage down to a few minutes. The young > people > were divided into groups and teamed with instructors such as Roy > Wilson, who oversaw the making of the public service announcement. > > "Your job is to make something small, say in 30 seconds," Wilson > said, > "that will have an effect on people." > > After a concentrated brainstorming session in a large, cool back room > at > 911 Media Arts Center, the kids decided to build the PSA around the > theme of "Native Pride," and one by one stepped in front of the > camera, > operated by their peers, to state their accomplishments and > aspirations. > > Getting tips from the pros > > [photo insert - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Nick Clark, center, > frames up a shot of Amanda Hansen for his 30-second video.] > > In addition to learning how to make digital films, the group took a > field trip to the Experience Music Project and talked with rising > young > Native American actors Eddie Spears ("Dreamkeeper," "Black Cloud") > and > Cody Lightning ("Smoke Signals," "Manic"), who answered questions and > offered suggestions to the aspiring filmmakers. The students' > finished > works were shown to a rousing reception at a Saturday evening > screening > at 911. > > The decision to partner with the Swinomish was a logical one because > the > tribe has an existing outlet in the form of tribal cable station > SWIN96 > for the youth to take what they learn through Native Lens and apply > it > in ways that benefit the whole community. The students' PSA and other > Native Lens short films will eventually be broadcast on the cable > station and be shopped to various youth film festivals. > > "It was important to work with one tribe to create a model" for the > program, said Annie Silverstein, director of the Young Producers > Project and Native Lens. "We want to help them develop sustainable > media on the reservation." La Conner Middle School sixth grader Anna > Cladoosby, part of the PSA team, embraced the opportunity to learn > more > about digital media. > > "I want to learn the process and how hard you have to work to make a > movie," she said. > > Through Native Lens, Cladoosby said, "People can learn more about our > culture." > > Robert Williams was one of only a few participants with prior > experience > in shooting and editing videos. > > Sharing what they've learned > > "I've tried sports, basketball and baseball, and it didn't work out," > Williams said, "So I picked up a camera." > > [photo inset - ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES. Nolita Bob is > interviewed by a friend and is also seen on the monitor at right, > which > is for the video crew to watch so they have proper framing of the > image.] > > Williams, 21, has a penchant for short documentaries, mostly of his > buddies playing basketball or hanging out, set to an underground > hip-hop soundtrack. He hopes to build on and pass along the > experiences > gained through Native Lens, a program he said "gives us a chance to > go > back to the tribe and tell them what we have learned and what we've > done." > > Getting the youth to think critically and creatively, and to empower > them to share their stories with others, is ultimately what Native > Lens > is about. > > "These kids are really good storytellers... ," said Tracy Edwards, > Swinomish education director. "I hope that they continue with what > they > learned here and bring it back to the tribe. > > "And if they have a story to tell, they can get it out to the > community." > > Tina Potterf: 206-464-8214 or tpotterf at seattletimes.com > > > ----- End message from cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU ----- From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Mon May 24 17:20:20 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Mon, 24 May 2004 10:20:20 -0700 Subject: Native speech (fwd) Message-ID: Monday, May?24, 2004 http://starbulletin.com/2004/05/24/features/story1.html [photo insert - CRAIG T. KOJIMA / CKOJIMA at STARBULLETIN.COM Kiele Akana-Gooch has helped produce an introductory Hawaiian-language course on audio CD, as well as in an interactive version for computer.] Native speech An audio CD package aims to give the Hawaiian language the place it deserves in everyday life By Pat Gee pgee at starbulletin.com Beyond "aloha" and "mahalo," the common tourist knows about as many Hawaiian words as do most residents of this state, unless they are the names of local food or streets. But with the growing sovereignty movement and continuing controversy over Native Hawaiian rights, cultural awareness has prompted some kamaaina and malihini to learn the language for their own enrichment. [photo insert - "Instant Hawaiian Immersion" (Topics Entertainment, $29.95; available at Costco and Borders stores)] To others, the pursuit of the language goes even further. Kaliko Beamer-Trapp, a Hawaiian language teacher, is among those who think Hawaiian should be on par with English -- spoken all the time at work and play, and used more commonly in legal documents. He has developed an audio CD series to keep the language "surviving in today's world." "We represent a lot of young people trying to get the language spoken to each other all the time. If you don't believe in it this way, why do this at all?" he asks. "We" includes Kiele Akana-Gooch, who translates historic Hawaiian documents into English for Alu Like (an education-oriented Hawaiian nonprofit agency), as does Beamer-Trapp. He and Akana-Gooch provide the two voices on an eight-disc audio "Instant Hawaiian Immersion" course produced by the Seattle-based Topics Entertainment. The smiling face of the pretty, young woman who is "one-eighth Hawaiian and nine different things" graces the box. "I see my face all over the place," she says, covering her face with her hands in modesty. Bookstores and other outlets carry the Instant Immersion product line that offers courses in Spanish, Japanese, French and English. Akana-Gooch said many people don't know that Hawaiian is an official language of the state, along with English; and that Hawaii is the only state with two official languages. So much has changed since a time when speaking Hawaiian "used to be forbidden" -- when Hawaii was subjugated to rule of the United States in 1898, she said. "People can write checks in Hawaiian, testify before the Legislature in Hawaiian (with an interpreter), and write land deeds -- all the major functions ... I'm really proud that the Hawaiian language is being embraced. It's about time," she said. "I'd like to see Hawaii become more of a bilingual state, like in Canada (where, on all store merchandise) one side is written in French and the other side in English," she said. Tricia Vander Leest, the Topics project coordinator who approached Beamer-Trapp to work on the project, said the CDseries, as well as a three-disc audio-visual interactive software package, are "doing really well," totaling 25,000 in sales a month. Most of the sales have originated in Hawaii, followed by Washington state, California and Las Vegas, since the $29.95 CD set went on the market in January. The mainland states are the ones where many former Hawaii have relocated, and they're interested in going "back to their roots," she said. HOW Beamer-Trapp came to make a Hawaiian language teaching tape is a good example of how Hawaii creates and is created by melting boundaries between people of diverse cultures. His name sounds as though it belongs to a local boy, rather than someone born as Simon Trapp in England. His first name, "Kaliko," which means "the young leaf of the 'ohia lehua tree," was given to him by kumu hula Patrick Makuakane in the early '90s when he was dancing in a San Francisco Polynesian revue. The Beamer surname was bestowed on him after the legendary entertainer Aunty Nona Beamer adopted him several years ago. "I was very honored. ... I was very, very fortunate" to be adopted by someone who has become an icon of the aloha spirit, he said, adding the only other student she has adopted is Maile Beamer-Loo of Oahu, who has preserved hula in the Beamer style of teaching. When he arrived in Hawaii from California in 1994 with Beamer's help, "I was interested in reinventing myself" and focusing on the Hawaiian language and culture. He taught Hawaiian for six years in a Hawaiian Language Immersion School in Keaau on the Big Island, under the auspices of the University of Hawaii at Hilo. In 2002 he started Kili'apu Services, which has three branches: DrMacNut, a repair service for Apple Macintosh computers; 11th Avenue Filmworks, which makes educational videos and does freelance production work; and translating and editing services in Hawaiian, Marquesan and French languages. Topics Entertainment wanted him to make the CDs without written text, as is the style of their other CDs. Topics' idea is that people can learn a language by listening to it as they are driving or doing housework. "I know how difficult that is," he said, recalling how he couldn't pronounce Hawaiian words without seeing the way they were spelled. One day he had a "breakthrough" idea to divide a word into "component parts," each with its own definition, he said. For instance, the word "Kaimuki," he broke into Ka (meaning "the"), imu (underground oven), and ki (ti leaf). He told Topics he would publish some text on his own Web site for free, because "I can't imagine people trying to learn with out it. The name of the site is panpolynesia.net, which is mentioned on the first CD of the series in the introduction, but not on the box. "It must've helped a lot of people," he said. After ignoring the site after setting it up at Christmas, he returned to discover 1,777 hits. Akana-Gooch said the CDs are organized so that she and Beamer-Trapp act as guides, taking the student on a tour of the Hawaiian islands so they learn not only the language, but a little about the history, cultural stories, place names, music and more. The program's goal is to teach basic sentence patterns, words and phrases, and help students apply the vocabulary and build sentences for practical conversation practice. At the start of each section, music introduces each island, followed by a story about each island and a list of vocabulary words to be used in the CD. There is no English translation, so student start to recognize key words and memorize phrases right away. Beamer-Trapp said the language is still relevant in the modern world, even though there are words for objects unknown in ancient Hawaii, such as "computer" and "chemistry." Since 1996, he has been a member of the Hawaiian Lexicon Committee, "Ke Komike Hua 'Olelo," that translates modern words into Hawaiian. The lexicon has been published every two years since 1987, and projects like the Instant Hawaiian Immersion course guarantee the language will continue to grow and maintain relevance in the 21st century. From dzo at BISHARAT.NET Tue May 25 05:38:13 2004 From: dzo at BISHARAT.NET (Donald Z. Osborn) Date: Tue, 25 May 2004 00:38:13 -0500 Subject: Written Anyi (Ivory Coast / Cote d'Ivoire) In-Reply-To: <1085155882.dcfd65366cdba@www.email.arizona.edu> Message-ID: "Lives locally, acts globally" by Annie Baxter, Minnesota Public Radio May 20, 2004 http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2004/05/21_baxtera_anyilanguage/ Summer break doesn't mean vacation for professor Ettien Koffi at St. Cloud State University. He's a linguistics professor who hails from the Ivory Coast, in West Africa. Koffi's a member of the Anyi tribe. And he's spent many summers translating his tribe's oral tradition into written language. Now he's gone a step further to develop a literacy program back in the village where he grew up. Koffi is visiting the Ivory Coast to see how the program's progressing. St. Cloud, Minn. ~W As the din of college students recedes at the end of the semester, Ettien Koffi's mind is turning to another place, to the little rectangular clay huts and dusty roads that he calls home. He's thinking of his native village in the Ivory Coast, and of the literacy program he started there. The work has been a major project in Koffi's professional life, but it has deep personal roots. Koffi's father always anguished over the fact that he never learned to read and write. "My father wanted to go to school," Koffi explains. "And he would even go stand by the window at the school, and as the pupils were repeating the things the teacher was telling them, he would repeat along with them." Koffi's father never had the chance to go to school. But he made sure all seven of his own kids did attend school, including the girls. That was unheard of in their Ivory Coast village. Ettien Koffi went on to college. He later came to the United States to get a Phd in linguistics at Indiana University in Bloomington. Along the way, he studied five languages. But he always wanted to go back to the Ivory Coast and help improve the quality of life there. He knew that fewer than half the people in his Anyi tribe were literate. That mostly means they're literate in French, which is the official language of the Ivory Coast. But plenty of people in rural areas never learn to speak French, let alone read or write it. And they don't have the chance to become literate in their local African languages, because many aren't written down, which was the case with the Anyi language. So Koffi started to study the speech of Anyi speakers. And he devised a written equivalent of the oral Anyi language. It would become the basis for a literacy program. For Koffi, the benefits of literacy in languages like Anyi are simple but significant; they can include access to information about disease. "Malaria is a big problem at home," Koffi says. "You can just translate a pamphlet from the World Health Organization ... and (the villagers) can say, 'Oh, they have malaria, let's give them this or give them this.' You know, small steps. I'm not looking for gigantic steps." But there's another element to Koffi's work in the Ivory Coast. He has translated the New Testament into the Anyi language, with the hope that Christian religious practices, like Bible study, will foster the habit of reading. This part of the project isn't new to the region. There's a long tradition of missionaries who have come to Africa to teach literacy and Christianity. The legacy of those missionaries still plays out on a continent where Christianity and Islam compete for ascendancy, and local African religions are dying out. As an African-born Christian, Koffi wants to spread his faith. But he says the spread of literacy is just as important. "When we are teaching the basics, A,B,C, there is no religion in A,B,C," Koffi says. "You teach the people the ABCs, the syllables, and they know how to read, and they can apply it any way they want." Those applications could include better accounting methods for small businesses, and more profitable agricultural techniques. In addition, Koffi hopes that once people know how to write, they'll transcribe some of the local lore. Koffi will have all these goals in mind as he leaves St. Cloud and heads back to the Ivory Coast, where he'll wind his way along the dusty paths of his village, a spelling primer in hand. From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Tue May 25 16:49:33 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Tue, 25 May 2004 09:49:33 -0700 Subject: Native Community Technology Initiative (fwd pdf) Message-ID: Native Community Technology Initiative (California) Native Cultures Fund Grant Guidelines and Application Application Deadline: Aug. 2, 2004 [fyi: please take note for those working on languages in California] -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: TechnologyApplication.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 452645 bytes Desc: not available URL: From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Wed May 26 16:13:08 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Wed, 26 May 2004 09:13:08 -0700 Subject: Linking families, language and heritage (fwd) Message-ID: Linking families, language and heritage Center for Native Americans opens in Visalia http://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/news/stories/20040526/localnews/504888.html By Shannon Darling Staff writer [photo inste - Steve R. Fujimoto/Times-Delta. Andrew Hernandez, 19 months-old, left, and his brother Mathew Hernandez, 3, explore the infant-toddler room. The room is part of the Tulare County Family Literacy Program at the Owens Valley Career Development Center, 2376 W. Whitendale Ave. in Visalia. The center celebrated its grand opening Tuesday.] [photo inset - Steve R. Fujimoto/Times-Delta. Nicole Herron, 7, looks through the library-resource center at the Tulare County Family Literacy Program at the Owens Valley Career Development Center.] [photo inset - Steve R. Fujimoto/Times-Delta. Mathew Hernandez, 3, explores the school-age room.] Seventy-year-old Marie Wilcox has a simple dream, a dream in which she hears the language spoken by her Wukchummi grandparents once again. The language is dying. "It is something I feel in my heart, I want to hear again," Wilcox said. The dream came one step closer to becoming a reality Tuesday when the Owens Valley Career Development Center held its grand opening. 'The center's mission is to provide Native American Indians with cultural education, programs and opportunities. Wilcox will teach families that go to the center the Wukchummi her grandparents taught her. "[Learning the language] will help bring families together," Wilcox said. "And they will be proud of their heritage." Wilcox, a resident of Woodlake, said it is a welcome sight to see a center for Native Americans open in Visalia. The center will provide services for Native American families. Those services include Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, vocational education and family literacy. The nonprofit, federally funded center says it hopes to use welfare reform money not only to help families in need, but also to empower Native Americans with culture. "We will provide families an opportunity to strive for economic self-sufficiency," Esther Stauffer, family literacy coordinator, said. "It will also help them identify who they are and where they came from." Stauffer, a native Alaskan, said it is important for Native Americans to know their language and history. Tracy Andrew of Visalia is half Cherokee Indian. She said the center is a great place for her children. "They make moccasins and take classes on Indian heritage," Andrew said. Her children also participate in basketball, boxing, basketmaking and photography classes. The center will also have math, reading and writing tutoring, parenting classes and vocational classes, which will vary. Stauffer said the center currently serves about 65 Native American families, and that is before its official opening. There are other Owens Valley Centers in Tulare County also in Porterville and on the Tule Indian Reservation. Owens Valley Centers are also in Inyo, Mono, Kern, Kings and Fresno counties. Families gathered at the opening of the center, and Wilcox gave a blessing in her native language before they ate dinner. "Help us learn our Indian language," she said. "Help me bring my language back to me." From andrekar at NCIDC.ORG Thu May 27 16:31:04 2004 From: andrekar at NCIDC.ORG (Andre Cramblit) Date: Thu, 27 May 2004 09:31:04 -0700 Subject: Alliance Against Racial Mascots (ALLARM) Message-ID: Friends, We need your help in Sacramento on June 9!!. AB 858 is scheduled for a hearing in the Senate Education Committee at 9:00 a.m. June 9, 2004. We have just learned that Republican senators are organizing busloads of students from schools with a "Redskins" nickname to attend the hearing and oppose the bill. Please plan to join us in Sacramento for the hearing (for updates, see www.allarm.org ) and encourage others to do the same. The Native people who will testify in favor of the bill NEED YOUR SUPPORT. If you want to attend but do not have transportation, please call Juliana Serrano at 213-250-8787 ext 223. Please forward this message to others. Thanks all. Lori Nelson Alliance Against Racial Mascots (ALLARM) California www.allarm.org Alliance Against Racial Mascots (ALLARM) From cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU Thu May 27 16:41:24 2004 From: cashcash at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU (phil cash cash) Date: Thu, 27 May 2004 09:41:24 -0700 Subject: Waipa Foundation: Bringing the Hawaiian Language back to =?iso-8859-1?b?SGFsZZFsZWE=?= (fwd) Message-ID: Waipa Foundation: Bringing the Hawaiian Language back to Hale?lea http://www.kauaiworld.com/articles/2004/05/27/news/news02.txt [photo inset - Makana, the landmark mountain at Ha?ena, is more commonly known as Bali Hai due to its use as a backdrop in the movie musical "South Pacific." Returning such Hawaiian words to regular use on the North Shore is the goal of a new project based at Waipa.] By LESTER CHANG - TGI Staff Writer Members of the Waipa Foundation have secured a $53,500 grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Native Americans to revive the use of the Hawaiian language in the Halele?a district, known more commonly as Kaua?i's North Shore. Another $14,892 in matching funds is anticipated to be secured to complement the federal grant, according to Stacy Sproat-Beck, a spokeswoman for the foundation, a Native Hawaiian non-profit organization. The project sets out to ensure the "continued existence of our ?Olelo Makuahine (mother tongue) in Halele?a," Sproat said. The native tongue was widely spoken in the district at one time. The district today consists of Kilauea, Kalihiwai, Kalihikai ??Anini, Princeville, Hanalei - Wai?oli, Waipa, Wainiha and Ha?ena, Sproat said. The district boasts a population of 6,348 people, according to U.S. Census figures for 2003. Within the next few months, volunteers and staffers with the Waipa Foundation will survey the kanaka ( the indigenous people of Hawai?i) in the district. Supporting the effort will be Hanalei Hawaiian Civic Club members. The intent behind the survey is to determine how best to use and understand the native tongue. Most Native Hawaiians don't speak their native tongue because of history and because of the pressures "our kupuna faced that kept them from teaching us," Sproat said in a news release. "Today we have the opportunity to turn the tide, to learn and to speak (it) once again, to teach our children, so that they will be able to teach their children," Sproat said. As part of the project, Waipa Foundation proponents hope to interview kupuna and native speakers to learn and "malama" (take care of) the dialect, place names, mo?olelo (story) and the history of Halele?a District, Sproat said. The impetus for the project apparently materialized four years ago. During the Kaua?i Taro Festival in 2000, representatives for the Waipa Foundation surveyed members of the Halele?a community and people attending the festival, Sproat said. "Overwhelmingly, both Hawaiian and non-Hawaiian members of the Halele?a community identified Hawaiian language programs at the top of the priority list," Sproat said. A small, informal survey of the kupuna in the Halele?a district done by the Waipa Foundation in 2003 indicated that there may be just a few native speakers remaining in the community, Sproat said. The survey also revealed there are almost no "venues in the community" where the native tongue is spoken, Sproat said. Historically, the Hawaiian language varied from island to island, using different sounds, vocal patterns and expressions that led to regional dialects, Sproat said. Providing support for the project are the Hawaiian Farmers of Hanalei Inc., Hui Maka ?ainana o Makana, and the Hanalei Canoe Club. Those wanting to help with surveying work can call the Waipa Foundation Office at 826-9969. ? The Garden Island Copyright ? 2004, Pulitzer Inc.