Tribes reclaim languages once spoken in California

[Francis Hult]

The Sacramento Bee

 

Tribes reclaim languages once spoken in California

 

Standing before a giant mossy rock and two Tsi-Akim Maidu bark houses, Farrell Cunningham gazes skyward to find the words and spirit imparted to him as a child.

He directs his outdoor class of about 20 Indian and non-Indian students to the amber light piercing down into the forest of Nevada County.

 

"Ekim pokom epinin koyodi kakan" - "the sun is in the sky" - he says in the Mountain Maidu tongue taught to him on nature walks by a tribal elder named Lilly Baker. 

 

She died at 96 a few years back. But now Cunningham, 33, is among a small legion of speakers trying to preserve California's endangered American Indian languages.

 

Their efforts are about to get an official boost. Lawmakers are moving on a bill to create a special American Indian languages teaching credential to promote efforts to teach - and recapture - some of the nearly 100 languages once spoken by California Indians.

 

Full story:

http://www.sacbee.com/topstories/story/1944799.html

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