New Lakota Leader Puts Emphasis on Language (fwd)

[phil cash cash]

New Lakota Leader Puts Emphasis on Language

By Susan Logue
Fort Yates, ND
29 November 2005
Logue report (Download MP3) 856 KB
Logue report (Real Audio) - Download 567 KB
Listen to Logue report (Real Audio)
http://www.voanews.com/english/AmericanLife/2005-11-29-voa42.cfm

[photo inset - Sitting Bull]

Ron His Horse Is Thunder is the newly-elected tribal leader of the
Standing Rock Lakota and a descendent of one of the most famous Indian
leaders of all time: Sitting Bull.

But growing up in the shadow of the famous Lakota medicine man who
fought to keep his people off the reservation didn't make Ron His Horse
Is Thunder, 47, special in the eyes of his peers. "I was told growing up
as a child that 'yes, yes you are a descendent of Sitting Bull and you
need to make a contribution to the people,'" he recalls.

That sense of responsibility is one of the reasons he went to law school
and why he

[photo inset - Ron His Horse Is Thunder]

decided to run for tribal chair this year. "In our tribe, your measure
in life or your status in life is measured on what you do with your own
life," he says. "So I went off and got a law degree and immediately came
home and have been working for the tribe for the last 17 years."

Eleven of those years were spent as president of Sitting Bull Tribal
College on the Standing Rock Reservation, where he initiated programs
to increase students' awareness and appreciation of Lakota history and
to provide technical assistance for business development on the
Reservation.

Now, as tribal chair, Ron His Horse Is Thunder heads a community of
18,000. About half of the Standing Rock Lakota live on the reservation
that straddles the border between North and South Dakota.

Unemployment runs as high as 76%, and the economy is a top priority for
Mr. His Horse Is Thunder, who took office on October 12. Less than a
week later, he hosted a conference on the reservation to explore
business opportunities for tribal members.

But he says, the community needs more than jobs and money; it needs to
feel a sense of pride in the Lakota language and culture. That's
especially important where young people are concerned, he says, because
suicide has reached epidemic levels among Lakota teens.

"My grandparents -- lived in extreme poverty, but they were proud of who
they were," he says. "They were proud of being Lakota. They spoke the
language. They understood the ceremonies. They understood the culture.
Poverty isn't what is causing our children commit suicide. It's being
lost in their identity."

Mr. His Horse Is Thunder says tribes rarely make their language
important in the day-to-day lives of their members and the Lakota are
no exception. "Most tribal governments meet and talk in English. In
schools, English is the primary language," he says. "In Indian schools
there are classes in Indian language - Lakota language here - but that
is the only place in the whole school where Indian language is spoken.
Street signs are written in English. Almost everything is in English."

The newly-elected tribal chair would like to see that change on the
Standing Rock reservation. "If we are going to save our languages, we
need to show our children that it has value. That it is not something
you can get by without."

Making Lakota the primary language on the Standing Rock reservation will
take some doing. Currently, only 25 to 30 percent of tribal members are
fluent. Ron His Horse is Thunder is not among them. But he made a
campaign promise to learn the language if elected, so government
meetings could be conducted in Lakota. He renewed that pledge when he
took office in October, saying if he has not learned the language by
the time his term is up, he would not seek re-election in 2009.