Miami tribe begins reclamation of its language with dictionary (fwd)

[phil cash cash]

Wednesday, May 4, 2005
Miami tribe begins reclamation of its language with dictionary

By Rita Price
The Columbus Dispatch
http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050504/NEWS01/505040398/1056

OXFORD - When war and relocation couldn't finish off the native culture,
the Bureau of Indian Affairs turned to linguistic genocide.

The "English Only" campaign, combined with poverty and forced
assimilation, succeeded in helping to destroy a way of life.

Yet sometimes, when Daryl Baldwin walks into the bedrooms of his
sleeping children, he witnesses the slim, stubborn promise that
remains: young lips moving in dreams, mouthing a language not heard in
40 years.

"Miami," he says proudly.

How well his sons and daughters learn - and whether they, and others,
teach their children - will determine the fate of the Miami-Peoria
language, Baldwin thinks.

In the meantime, piecing together all he can, he cobbles the fabric of a
language whose last fluent speakers died in the 1960s.

Soon, at least a partial written account will exist: The first
Miami-Peoria dictionary is to be published this month.

Baldwin joined co-editor David Costa, another linguist, in developing
the book through the Myaamia Project at Miami University. The Miami
tribe of Oklahoma and its namesake university in Ohio have a
relationship - including scholarships and academic and cultural
projects - that began during the 1970s.

Congress responded in 1990 with the Native American Languages Act, which
calls for protection of indigenous languages and sets up a grant program
to assist.

"Most of us grew up removed from our cultural heritage," said Baldwin,
42, a northwestern Ohio native and member of the Miami of Oklahoma.

"We began to ask, 'What is Miami?' Without speakers of the language,
it's hard to get a glimpse of what that means. Language is culture."

Joshua Sutterfield studies language at Miami, which he attends on a
tribal scholarship. Now 31, he also grew up without a strong sense of
identity.

"Oklahoma was more pan-Indian then," he said. "My mother is Miami, and I
don't know that she ever heard it spoken."

After four years of language classes, he said, "I'm starting to
recognize the language. My greetings and phrases are coming along
nicely, and when I call my mother, I feel a connection 800 miles away."