Language can be revived (fwd)

[phil cash cash]

Language can be revived
expert

Kerry Benjoe
The Leader-Post
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
http://www.canada.com/reginaleaderpost/news/city_province/story.html?id=4571fcbe-177b-4402-ab20-303eabe8eb46

Brent Galloway says bringing a language back from the dead is not
impossible.

Galloway, a professor at the First Nations University of Canada, has
been working at reviving aboriginal languages since the 1970s.

His work in preserving languages has become even more important since
the recent cut in federal funding for aboriginal languages.

Galloway's interest in languages began while he was pursuing his
doctorate at the University of California in Berkeley.

He continued his work after leaving Berkeley and soon found himself in
the Vancouver area, working with different aboriginal groups. He was
successful in helping to re-establish the Helkomelem language for the
Sto:lo Nation.

Galloway is particularly proud of his contribution that helped bring the
Nooksack language back from the dead. It was through salvaged field
notes and field notes that he gave back that the once-dead language was
revived.

Galloway said his work in aboriginal languages caught the attention of
the First Nations University of Canada -- then known as the
Saskatchewan Indian Federated College -- in the mid-1980s. He accepted
a position there and became the department head. He is no longer the
head of the department but is still working in the department and his
interest in preserving aboriginal languages has not diminished.

Galloway believes preserving any aboriginal language is possible and is
important for people to pursue. He's spent decades working towards
saving endangered dialects and says there are four essential steps:
Preserving it, developing a means to teach it, teaching it, and
ensuring there are places to use it.

Galloway has plans to continue his work with preserving languages after
he retires from teaching in a couple of years. He said developing
dictionaries and grammar systems are essential components to saving and
recording languages. Once a language has a good dictionary of about
3,000 words, people can work to reviving it.

He said the biggest factor that contributed to the demise of aboriginal
languages was the residential school system. Many parents in fear of
having their children punished for speaking their traditional language
opted to teach them only English. Galloway said parents thought it
would also help ensure their children were more successful in life.

"You could actually be raised as a bilingual speaker and be brighter and
be as good as anyone else, better than most," said Galloway.

He believes the cut of $160 million in federal funding for aboriginal
languages announced last month will have a detrimental effect on
language preservation in Canada. Galloway calls the recent cuts
short-sighted and notes that the FNUC passed a resolution urging the
government to restore the funding.

"If (the government) is serious about saving the languages and keeping
them alive, (it) has to put some serious funding behind it too," he
said.

Galloway said bands depend on that funding to pay for the necessary
work. When a linguist is writing a description of a language they
typically pay the language speaker for their time because the speaker
can't afford to just drop everything.

"To be really successful and wide-spread (they) do need the funding," he
explained.

© The Leader-Post (Regina) 2006