Siraya update

[Heather Souter]

Taanshi, Rudy,

I am so interested in what more you might have to say about the connection
of legal identity of an ethnocultural community and current language use.  I
also would like to know if you are aware of any groups in the US that were
traditionally multilingual as the Metis of Western Canada were/are?

Eekoshi pitamaa.
Heather

On Fri, May 15, 2009 at 1:02 PM, Rudy Troike <rtroike at email.arizona.edu>wrote:

> The government response to the peaceful Siraya demonstration is sad, and
> certainly inadequately informed. It would be useful to compile information
> on precedents in the US, where tribal groups have been recognized, even
> though they had completely lost their languages. This has happened at the
> state level in California and (I think, Texas) and at the federal level.
>
> Regrettably, with the continuing dormancy of indigenous languages
> worldwide,
> ethnic identity will be less and less based on linguistic criteria. The
> argument for legal identity of an ethnocultural community should not be
> dependent on current language use. This completely ignores the historic
> basis for the claim.
>
>   Rudy
>
>   Rudy Troike
>
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