language as property

[Trechter, Sara]

For the most part, I see Bob's point, and because language is by definition
something that is shared, the legal mechanisms of U.S. copyright law do not
seem to work to well for it. But, I would like to speak to something
linguists don't often talk about--the real selling of bits and pieces of
language that might be the impetus behind the copyright attempts.

Although linguists and academics in general do not make much money from
Native American languages,there are folks out there who do make some.  Some
of these people, regrettably, happen to be linguists although I cannot think
of a single one of these people who actually works on a Native American
language.  Have none of you ever been contacted by folks who work at
"product naming" Consulting Companies trying to get you to give them
good-sounding Lakhota, etc. words?  It's much like the folks who contact
John Koontz for Omaha-Ponca words for naming their baby, dog, etc.

One of these companies (Lexicon)presented at the LSA in San Diego to show
that there were alternative careers for linguists. I doubt this would have
been possible if the Lexicon representative weren't a well-respected
linguist from a research institution.  (I'm avoiding naming names.)
According to the folks (often graduate students from Stanford and Berkeley)
I have met who work for these consulting groups, the consulting group gets
paid anywhere from $30,000-$50,000 for a naming project.  Sometimes the name
is just something catchy-sounding in English. They don't only specialize in
Native American sounding names, any language will do, but there are a lot of
words in Native American languages the global market hasn't heard of. For
instance, the bottled water for Coca Cola is DASANI, not a Sioux word, but
taken from an Athabaskan language.

Maybe we should try to make it clearer that we realize that such
language-farming goes on, but that we don't support it(which is why I like
John K's website about Native American Names), rather than maintaining that
no one is going to make any money off of language at all.

sara trechter
-----Original Message-----
From: Rankin, Robert L
To: 'siouan at lists.colorado.edu '
Sent: 6/25/01 9:27 AM
Subject: RE: language as property



> My current dissertation research has raised an interesting issue about
> native language as property, intellectual property rights, and the
like.
> Whereas: The [_] tribe claims full and complete ownership of  [the __
> language] and its compliments of words, phrases, language system and
> future words of the [_] people,...

Our colleagues on the list have already expressed views that pretty much
coincide with my own about this issue. However, there are one or two
other
matters related to it that usually only get hinted at and gossiped about
in
public discussions. They deserve an airing.

Views expressed in the proclamation are being promulgated primarily by a
small group of White linguists and anthropologists. They are the same
ones
who tried to get Native scholars *not* to join or participate in SSILA
at
its inception 20 years ago. From the low level of scholarship evinced by
some of this bunch, I am forced to conclude that they hope to gain
exclusive
access to various languages while shutting out more qualified people.
They
also apparently seek to cover their own analytical errors and render
their
work free from meaningful peer review. I'm sorry to have to say this
sort of
thing, but I can cite specific examples.

There are additional ethical questions that I have about this small
clique.
Several years ago they were running an instructional center with the
Kickapoo tribe at Harrah, Oklahoma. It is reliably reported to me (and
others including John Koontz and David Rood) by a respected scholar from
the
U. of Colorado that the group at Harrah suffered the theft of $80,000.00
worth of computers and other office equipment but for some reason known
only
to them covered up the disappearance and declined to report it to the
FBI as
required by law. I don't know if it was ever reported, but the event
caused
me to have serious doubts about the honesty of the participants in the
cover-up (and I'm talking about non-Indians here). It was this incident
that
caused me to have Victor Golla incorporate SSILA when I was president of
that organization in 1997 (individual members or officers of
non-incorporated organizations can sometimes be held liable for actions
of
dishonest members).

Personally, I don't believe that this movement to try to copyright
entire
languages originates with Indian people; it is a product of the same
group
of non-Indian apparachiks. In the past 3 or 4 years they have been
working
through an Indian lawyer from near Tulsa whom they've coopted, but the
idea
that verb conjugations or noun declensions are "intellectual property"
originates with the non-Indians, not with the lawyer. He's just the
mouthpiece.

Like the rest of you, I don't see the courts granting copyright to
pronouns
and conjunctions. This doesn't mean the movement won't have plenty of
nuisance value for the radicals though. Nor, unfortunately, does it mean
that endangered Indian languages won't simply perish even sooner from
"benign neglect." Qualified linguists, after all, won't go where they
are
not wanted and cannot function normally, and there are plenty of
languages
in the Pacific, Africa, Asia and South America that cry out for
attention.

So the danger is not that whole languages will become copyrighted. The
danger is that the movement to do so will place the future of endangered
languages in the hands of inferior scholars and will cause their earlier
demise.

Bob

>"Whereas: the [_] tribe incorporates under tribal law the following
>decree: the [_] language is alive and dynamic,...

This is the chief problem. The languages are, for the most part, *not*
alive
and dynamic.

>Whereas: The [_] tribe shall require under this tribal law any
non-Indian
>or non-enrolled indian member to submit in an approved application form
>permission to use the [_] language in part or any part thereof, before
>they use any portion or part of the [_] language for any purpose"

I've always respected the rights of the tribe to negotiate this sort of
agreement when I was actually working for the tribe itself for pay. That
mostly applies to the Osages, for whom I did some work back about 1980.
But
if I am working with an individual who has agreed to teach me, then no
such
agreement is in place. That individual is simply practicing his/her
freedom
of expression.