NATIONAL: National Indigenous Languages Survey Report 2005 (fwd)

[Mia Kalish]

I think Daniel made a very good point about how the what is signified by
"heritage language" (I tend to call this "the target") changes depending on
where you are standing. (English spoken in England is an Indigenous
Language, while in Wales it is not, and if England had colonized Wales, it
would be a Colonial Language). 

What I hear in this message is the idea that what is signified by the term
chosen should be constant across all times, places, languages and speakers.
Was there an objection to the fact that "in Australia, . . . it usually
refers to immigrant minority languages such as Greek, Italian, Lao and
Arabic, rather than to Indigenous languages"? 

"Nation" has a lot of connotation here (in the U.S.), because the Tribes who
have received federal recognition are independent Nations. There are no
terms without connotations; Barthes wrote the book on this. The questions
are really about how terms are chosen, applied, used, and referenced. 

There is a debate going on in one of my classes about the terms Latina/o and
Chicana/o. The professor is white, from LA, and he thinks the terms that
should be used are what is currently in the literature. The people in the
class to whom the terms might apply are resisting this. They think that for
people who are not in the culture to apply terms is inappropriate. They want
the right to name themselves, and they don't believe they should be
overridden. The professor is desperate for a "single term" to name "all
these people". I, of course, am siding with them :-) I drew a line in the
sand that essentially said that if you don't know Anzaldua inside and out,
you probably shouldn't be participating in the debate. (Anzaldua discusses
the issue in very fine detail, while others what a quick, simple label so
they can get on with extracting and applying characteristics for the
category). 

Maybe applying a generic term is an attempt to minimize . . . to hide,
dismiss, make less important something that to many people is crucial. The
window opened on this point when I tried to place "English" into a category.
What's English in the US? For some people, it is the "Heritage Language,"
the language of their uncolonialized forebears. For others, it is the
"Colonial Language," that which was forced upon them when the English
colonized the North American continent, and beat out the French and Spanish
for colonial "rights". (Might makes Right, you know). 

In the class I mentioned previously, we are reading a book about how
identity is related to "length of time in the US". This is a particularly
interesting view of US history, which customarily begins in whatever year
that was when Columbus planted the flag for god and king - or was it Queen -
Isabella of Spain. This particular version begins right after the Treaty of
Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848, when the US snatched the Southwest from Mexico.
What we see in the perception is that there was no 1848, there was no Treaty
of GH, there was no time when this was Mexico. Mysteriously and
miraculously, "The Border Was Established" (fanfare please); "Mexicans"
became "immigrants", and now, people are studying "identity formation on the
border" 'as if' that border had been cast in concrete at the time of the Big
Bang.  . . . And almost no one thinks this is weird. Almost no one looks at
how the political changes - and scarily enough, attendant physical changes,
in case no one has heard about some expensive, impractical idea to build a
fence along the border to curtail traffic by all those "nasty immigrants" -
to resume, how these political and physical changes affect the people. No
one has asked, How does this change look in the eyes, minds and hearts of
the people? It's more like, Quick! Apply this label, so we can get on about
identifying the category. 

 . . . so I guess in summary, there is a lot more to naming than picking a
label. And I suspect if we scratch a little deeper, we will find the ideas
of "who is human," popularized by Galton and cronies, informing the process,
as for example in the battle we have had here about "Indian Mascots". 

Mia    

-----Original Message-----
From: Indigenous Languages and Technology [mailto:ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU]
On Behalf Of Anggarrgoon
Sent: Thursday, February 02, 2006 8:27 PM
To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
Subject: Re: [ILAT] NATIONAL: National Indigenous Languages Survey Report
2005 (fwd)

Heritage language is also used in Australia, but it usually refers to 
immigrant minority languages such as Greek, Italian, Lao and Arabic, 
rather than to Indigenous languages.

Mia Kalish wrote:
> We might suggest First Nations, which also has about it the recognition 
> that the people speaking the language where the first to occupy a 
> particular locale, and that the dominant language is one of colonization.
> 

Yes, but 'nation' is also a term with connotations, and in Aboriginal 
Australia there is a lot of tension between an 'Aboriginal' identity and 
a clan or group identity, particularly for younger people who may have 
multiple identities. 'First nations languages' in an Australian context 
would underplay an 'Aboriginal' identity. As I understand it, 'First 
Nations' languages in Canada is tied to a particular federation, and 
does not include all the Indigenous languages of Canada.

> 
> I don't think anyone is saying that the languages of the people who were 
> on this continent first are "part of our national heritage". Part of our 
> problem here has been the establishment of the belief that the First 
> Nations now exist only in the Smithsonian. Reports still come in about 
> people who are surprised to find out that there still are "real, live 
> American Indians".
> 

I thought we were talking about Australia, and I don't have a problem 
with the phrase that Kemp used about Aboriginal languages being part of 
our heritage. I took it as meaning that they are part of the ingredients 
in the 'cultural melting pot' that contributed to what Australian 
society is today. That is true, and it's all too often forgotten.

Claire