<HTML><BODY style="word-wrap: break-word; -khtml-nbsp-mode: space; -khtml-line-break: after-white-space; "><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><A href="http://www.azcentral.com/news//articles/0713Zuni0712.html"><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial" size="2"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 10px;">http://www.azcentral.com/news//articles/0713Zuni0712.html</SPAN></FONT></A></DIV><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial" size="2"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 10px;"> </SPAN></FONT></P><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Goodyear man saves the Zuni language from extinction</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Puts it in writing</FONT></DIV><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 10.0px 0.0px; font: 10.0px Arial; min-height: 11.0px"><BR></P><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial" size="2"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 10px;"><B>Christine L. Romero</B></SPAN></FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial" size="2"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 10px;"><B> </B></SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial" size="2"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 10px;">The Arizona Republic</SPAN></FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial" size="2"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 10px;"> </SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial" size="2"><SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 10px;">Jul. 13, 2006 12:00 AM</SPAN></FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 10px/normal Arial; min-height: 11px; "><BR></DIV><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 12.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Arial; min-height: 14.0px"><BR></P><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">The boxes of documents were tucked away when the government found Curtis Cook on the Internet.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">The papers the Goodyear man had created with the help of seven Zuni elders had not been forgotten but were collecting dust.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">They held the origins of the written Zuni language. They represented 15 years of Cook's life and work. And now, at last, the Library of Congress wanted them.</FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"> </FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">After Cook finished some graduate linguistic studies in the mid-1960s, he set out to create a Zuni version of the Bible. But he quickly realized the language didn't have a written form. So he turned his attention to a more basic task: creating a Zuni alphabet, setting down in written form the Zuni language.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Without Cook's efforts, the Zuni language could have perished as the elders died and young Zunis forgot the tongue. Forgetting the language would have forever cut a tie between the generations of Zunis, who live predominantly in New Mexico and in Arizona east of Flagstaff.</FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"> </FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">"I became concerned that many of their old stories and the richness of their history would be lost to posterity as the elders, who were the storytellers, began to die off," Cook said. The elders were all older than 100 when Cook began his work.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">The Library of Congress' intention is to preserve the work and eventually make the traditional Zuni stories more widely available.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Cook's work has allowed the Zunis to teach their written language to children from kindergarten through high school on the reservation. The Zuni words are even on street signs, which Cook proudly notes are spelled correctly.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">By the end of this year, </FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"><I>The Curtis Cook Collection</I></FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"> is expected to be finally inducted into the Library of Congress' American Folklife Center.</FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"> </FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">During his time on the reservation, Cook also approached the Zuni Tribal Council and suggested that some of the tribe's stories should be recorded and preserved. The council agreed and eventually, about 300 reel-to-reel tapes were created with Zuni oral histories, folk tales and religious teachings.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"><I>The Curtis Cook Collection </I></FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">will include those tapes, transcriptions, learning guides and some Zuni publications.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Now at 67, Cook is the associate state director of community outreach for AARP Arizona. Previously, he was director of the National Indian Council on Aging.</FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"> </FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">When Cook talks about his time with the Zuni, known as "a friendly people," his eyes light up and seem to dance with respect and excitement.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Cook, also known as the Locust, wears turquoise Native-styled rings on his hands. In telling traditional Zuni stories, he infuses rhythmic Zuni words with English ones. To the English-speaking ear, the Zuni language seems breathy and includes many pauses that translate into meaning.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">On the reservation, Cook's constant chattering and repetition of Zuni words and phrases earned him the names the Mockingbird and later the Locust among the Zuni Pueblo, now around 10,000 people.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Language experts say there likely still are pockets of the world where some languages exist only orally.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Cook's intent was to create a Zuni version of the Bible. Other oral traditions have morphed into written languages in a similar missionary fashion, experts say.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">"Oral tradition keeps certain kinds of intergenerational contacts," said Guha Shankar, folklife specialist with the American Folklife Center. "It keeps memories alive."</FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"> </FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Without written documentation, the Zuni oral tradition could have been lost, Shankar said.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Cook's work piqued the Library of Congress' interest because he collaborated directly with native speakers in the pueblo, Shankar said.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">"The difficulty with some cultural communities is that as older speakers of the language pass away, the future generations aren't as likely to pick it up," he said.</FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"> </FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">"Then you have some suggesting that the language might not be around for future generations."</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Cook meticulously made language records, including transcribing traditional stories passed down through the generations. Cook learned these stories from several generations, including the oldest that included a handful of men older than 100 who knew these tales by heart.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">"I was concerned that all of their history would be lost forever," Cook said.</FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"> </FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">"My belief is when people get their language in writing it launches a whole new era. We take notes so we can remember."</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Cook used the International Phonetic Alphabet, a commonly accepted series of symbols among linguists, to capture the Zuni language.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">It took Cook only about six months to learn the language, he said.</FONT><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial"> </FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">He admits he's one of those people who is gifted in linguistics. He studied Latin and "ate it up."</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">The Zunis loved to see the language in print, he said. Reading became something of a novelty on the reservation. He taught a young boy to read in Zuni and soon the boy was going from house to house simply reading.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">"He became a rock star with the Zunis because he could read and the older people couldn't," Cook said.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">Cook contends that the symbols themselves aren't sacred. What is sacred is the process by which an oral tradition becomes fixed in time with written symbols and how that affects the perception of the world.</FONT></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Arial; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><FONT class="Apple-style-span" face="Arial">"It becomes sacred when you start communicating," Cook said. "I think there's something that happens when it moves from the mind to the head to the heart."</FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>