Preserving tribal culture focus of national conference, from language to memories to science (fwd)

[phil cash cash]

Preserving tribal culture focus of national conference, from language to
memories to science
By David Stabler, The Oregonian
October 20, 2009, 6:36PM
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/index.ssf/2009/10/preserving_tribal_culture.html
~~

Torsten Kjellstrand, The Oregonian
Malissa Winthorn speaks with Phil Cash Cash during a lunch break. Cash Cash
spoke about his doctoral work as a linguist trying to understand and preserve
both the verbal and sign languages he grew up with on the Umatilla Reservation.
~~
Malissa Minthorn  stands at the back of a cavernous ballroom in the Red Lion
Hotel on the River. Blue, yellow, silver and black beads cascade over her
shoulders in a dress that her grandmother wore to weddings and funerals on the
Umatilla Reservation. 
Tuesday was opening day of a sold-out conference that has brought together 550
people from around the country with one interest in common: preserving tribal
culture. As she looks over the packed room, Minthorn herself personifies the
theme of the conference. 
"After this, I'm storing it away," she says, fingering her bright red dress.
"It's getting thin and fragile." 
Preservation takes many forms, from a simple photograph to an entire museum of
artifacts. From a jumpy film showing Bitterroot Jim  telling a bear story in
sign language in 1932 to a mat house that the Wanapum tribe had to relearn to
build on the banks of the Columbia River. 
Culture is complicated for Native Americans, and so is its preservation.
Without a record, some tribes left no trace. Passing culture down through the
generations gets more complicated by a tradition of oral history that makes
some elders suspicious of recordings and photography. 
The National Conference Tribal Archives, Libraries and Museums  is the fourth
national gathering to help preserve, archive, display and perpetuate Native
American culture. Hosts were the Oregon State Library and Tamástslikt 
Cultural Institute on the Umatilla Reservation, near Pendleton. Speakers
included library and language experts and Russell Means,  the activist, actor
and author, who led the famous standoff at Wounded Knee, S.D., in 1973. 
Libraries were a big presence at the conference. In an adjoining hall,
exhibitors offered ideas on storage and displays, creating audiovisual labs and
preserving images. 
But protecting culture is not only about objects. In a time of Twitter and
other quick communication, tribes are seeking a deeper connection to
themselves, an appreciation of culture, the very DNA of who they are. That
connection often starts with language. 
Of the 54 languages identified in the Pacific Northwest, many verge on
extinction. Only one speaker of the Wasco language is still living. Forty
speakers of Nez Perce remain. Linguist predict that within two or three
generations, no one will speak these languages. 
The four-day conference, called "Streams of Language, Memory and Lifeways,"
underscored the urgency to save tribal culture in all its forms before it's too
late.
"There are not enough words to give to tell you how important language is to
our sacred traditions," Phil Cash Cash  told the assembled group at Tuesday's
opening session. Cash Cash, a linguist who grew up on the Umatilla Reservation,
studies language in the Columbia River region. 
Language is key to helping Native Americans live their culture, he said.
"Language follows basic laws of the culture and land and earth," he said. "It's
urgent we all understand how vitally important it is that language gets
transferred to the younger generation." 
Dallas Dick,  a photo archivist at the Tamástslikt Cultural Institute, took
Cash's message to heart. "I'm feeling guilty because I'm not doing what I
should be doing. We're losing it all, and I was one of the bad kids that never
listened. I learned all the bad words." 
Signs of preservation were everywhere. In a hallway on the way to the ballroom,
attendees passed tables of necklaces, bracelets, earrings, blankets and crafts. 
Downstairs, in a session about the Wanapum, a small tribe that has lived for
thousands of years on the Columbia River north of the Tri-Cities, Angela
Buck,  director of the Wanapum Heritage Center,  talked about her tribe's
latest tool to preserve her culture: an RV. The vehicle travels throughout the
region to share displays and history with native and non-native people. "We get
around," she said. "We talked to 29,000 people last year. That may not seem like
a lot to you, but it is to us." 
In other efforts to protect the Wanapum culture, the river tribe recently dug
out canoes, made string from hemp and built a mat house from the tule  plant,
all projects new to them. The house was more than they bargained for, a process
of finding, gathering, drying, tying and building that took months to complete. 
"It was a huge project, overwhelming," said Rex Buck III,  who worked on the
house. "We can't undo things that happened, but those projects fill the gap of
who we are as a people." 
The conference runs through Thursday.
--David Stabler 

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