women as keepers of the language

[Mark Sicoli]

Tammy,  It's actually this article by Barbra Meek that I was thinking of:

Barbra Meek "Respecting the language of elders: Ideological Shift and
Linguistic Discontinuity in a Northern Athapascan Community" Journal of
Linguistic Anthropology 2007, 17(1) 23-43


 "According to the Kaska Tribal Council (1997), there are approximately
nine dialects. Defining a family’s dialect is complicated. In most cases,
the family dialect is the one spoken by the mother, following a matrilineal
pattern. A woman’s husband often speaks his wife’s own dialect along with
his own mother’s family dialect (or language), and the children are exposed
to both parents’ linguistic varieties." p26


 She wasn't making the point that men don't speak correctly but was rather
reporting on criticisms community members were making on the speech
features students were learning in the school. For example, a student
learns to speak like a teacher who has different dialect features than
his/her own mother/grandmother:

"There were instances of correction as well, mostly directed at a person’s
word choice or pronunciation. Given that word choice and pronunciation were
the most salient indices of family dialects, an act of correction signaled
that a person hadn’t spoken in an appropriate ancestral variety. This
sociolinguistic correspondence also emerged in discussions about the public
schools’ Kaska language curriculum, where children were not always being
taught their own family’s dialect. Unsurprisingly, students were taught the
dialect of their teacher, and this caused some parents to complain to the
administration. Correction also appeared when a person spoke a non-familial
variety." p27

I think this is interestingly relevant to your original question, though
the thread has turned in other directions that I think are less
productive.  Surely it varies from community to community and situation to
situation who is involved with/motivated to work for language maintenance
and revitalization.

Best wishes,
Mark

On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 11:24 AM, Mark Sicoli <msicoli at alaska.edu> wrote:

> Hi Tammy,
>
> Take a look at Barbra Meek's book *We are our language: An ethnography of
> language revitalization in a Northern Athabaskan community.    *Working
> with Kaska Athabaskans in the Yukon, she describes (in part) dialect
> features that are matrilineal with "correct" speech for one (male of
> female) being their mother's and grandmother's way of speaking.
>
> All the best,
> Mark
>
> --
> Dr. Mark Sicoli
> Assistant Professor
> University of Alaska, Fairbanks
>
> Department of Anthropology
> 310 Eielson Building
> P.O. Box 757720
> Fairbanks, AK  99775-7720
> U.S.A.
> Phone:   (907) 474-6884
> Fax:       (907) 474-7453
>
>
> On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 11:13 AM, Tammy DeCoteau <tdc.aaia at verizon.net>wrote:
>
>> Does anyone know of any writing that talks about women being the keepers
>> of the language and it being the mothers and grandmothers that pass
>> language down?  There is a mother's day event at which they are asking for
>> our program to have a booth and I would like to create a handout and hope
>> to quote something.
>>
>> Tammy DeCoteau
>> AAIA Native Language Program
>
>
>
>
>
>
>


-- 
Dr. Mark Sicoli
Assistant Professor
University of Alaska, Fairbanks

Department of Anthropology
310 Eielson Building
P.O. Box 757720
Fairbanks, AK  99775-7720
U.S.A.
Phone:   (907) 474-6884
Fax:       (907) 474-7453
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