Volume XI Spring 2000 Issue #3
Honoring Native Languages,
defeating the shame
By Marjane Ambler
E lohe mai ia makou, I ka ÿolelo kupa o ka ÿaina…. (Hear us as we speak the Native language of the land.) Na makou, na pua lei o Hawaiÿi…. (This is what we are doing, little children who are like the flowers of Hawaii's lei garlands.)
The children’s faces warmed the room as they sang, embraced in their parents’ and teachers’ arms. Their song was part of a language workshop at the World Indigenous Peoples Conference on Education in Hilo, Hawaii, which many tribal college representatives attended in 1999. The children’s immersion school in Hilo is taught entirely in Hawaiian until the fifth grade, when English is introduced an hour a day. Listening to their voices, one felt they could accomplish anything, and standardized tests have proven that indeed they can; immersion school students equaled their peers in most areas and received even higher scores in mathematics. They were proud to be Hawaiian. Their pride and their potential filled the room like tropical sunshine.
Across the nation, many Native communities are striving to restore and preserve their languages, and tribal colleges and universities are leading these efforts in their communities. For some of the tribal colleges, the success of the Hawaiian language restoration has been an important model. Through their efforts, language advocates hope to also improve academic performance, family and community interactions, and even physical health.
Many forces have colluded to weaken and destroy Native languages, but the most effective has been humiliation. The U.S. government forbade use of “barbarous dialects” in the schools in the late 1800s, and education continued to be a tool of assimilation for many decades. Language advocates encounter the scars of such policies in their communities constantly today. Albert White Hat’s older sister opposed his participation in cultural activities on the Rosebud Reservation, saying, “Dancing will send you to hell!” Kenneth Ryan visited a cousin on the Fort Peck Reservation who ranted and raved against his language work. Later, she tearfully explained that as a child, she had been caned for using the Assiniboine language, and she wanted to protect him. Lakota language advocate Cecilia Fire Thunder uses healing ceremonies to free the tongues of people too ashamed to “remember” their Native language. In many cases, these feelings toward the language have led to hating their own skin color.
When the schools punished students for using their Native languages, they also created a deep distrust of education, which persists today in many communities. Doris Leader Charge, who has taught the Lakota language and culture at Sinte Gleska University in South Dakota for 27 years, once felt this way. As a girl, she was punished at school when she tried to help the younger, Lakota-speaking students understand the teacher’s instructions. “I thought that was what education was—punishment,” she said.
Offering a safe place
How do the colleges fight the shame? How do they create an atmosphere where children and adults want to converse in their Native language? The tribal colleges utilize various approaches, as described in this issue. The successful programs all share a common characteristic with the immersion schools in Hawaii: They offer a safe place where children and adults are honored for using the Native language, not shamed.
This is not easy in the United States where the airwaves constantly bombard us with English. When northern Europeans turn on their television sets, they hear programs in Danish, Swedish, German, and English on different channels. Young and old understand the importance of knowing several languages there. In the United States a century ago, tribal statesmen often spoke three or more different languages, including Spanish or English. However, English has always been the language of power in this country. Language knowledge is no longer honored; many mainstream public schools have stopped requiring any foreign languages. Anyone in the world who does not know English is considered ignorant by many Americans.
During World War II, the United States military recognized the value of diversity. We utilized soldiers who spoke Navajo, Lakota, or Comanche, and the German and Japanese intelligence forces were not able to break their code. At the same time that R.C. Gorman (the Navajo artist) was being punished for speaking Navajo at school, his father, Carl Gorman, was serving as a Navajo codetalker in the Marines.
Knowing diverse languages is important to the country, to the tribes, and to the individuals. Without the language, ceremonies cannot continue; children cannot communicate with their grandparents; and adults cannot voice their prayers. Some attribute their tribes’ social disintegration to the loss of their language and culture. “Our moral imperatives are in the language,” said Alan Caldwell, director of the College of the Menominee Nation Culture Institute in Wisconsin. On the Blackfeet Reservation in Montana, teachers at the Head Start have noticed that children with behavioral problems have been transformed by their experiences in immersion school. By connecting them with their language, the Head Start instructors link the children with their traditional values. The Winnebago Tribal Diabetes Project Director believes that Little Priest Tribal College’s language classes help improve physical and mental health.
Native languages differ from English not just in the words used but also in the concepts conveyed. The common Navajo greeting, Yá’át’ééh, is much more than “Hello, how are you?” To the Diné people, it means, “Everything is good between us,” according to Frank Morgan of Diné College. Many common expressions have spiritual connotations, according to Blackfeet Community College language instructor Marvin Weatherwax, as discussed by Paul Boyer in this issue.
Reconstructing a culture
In groundbreaking research, Blackfoot language scholars at Red Crow Community College in Alberta are using words and phrases to reconstruct their culture. In the process, they are healing themselves, according to Duane Mistaken Chief’s article in this issue. For example, by studying the word Ainna’kowa (to show respect), they learned Ainna’kohsit!—to respect themselves.
Tribal colleges and universities have been exploring different approaches for decades; teaching Native languages is part of their central mission. On the Blackfeet Reservation, a stunning 450 people are exposed to the language each year through classes and camps. Fort Peck has two immersion Montessori schools (see TCJ, Vol. IX, N.4). Little Priest Tribal College involves both parents and children in immersion classes one weekend per month in Nebraska. In Michigan, Bay Mills Community College provides a three-year summer program for Anishnabe instructors, who take their talents back to the communities throughout the Great Lakes region. The College of the Menominee Nation provides an apprenticeship program to train language teachers (TCJ, Vol. X, N.4).
In most cases, the tribal colleges must create their own curriculum materials. Sinte Gleska University instructor Albert White Hat wrote a book on the Lakota language (TCJ, Vol. XI, N. 1); Bay Mills students are creating instructors’ manuals; and Salish Kootenai College puts its language materials on its website. Little Big Horn College instructor Dale Old Crow has created a 10 chapter-ethnography on Crow songs, accompanied by recordings, to be used in his class, “Music and Dance of the Crow Indian.” These publications provide a lasting legacy.
As Dr. Richard Little Bear points out in his article, good intentions are not enough to save the languages. Not all teaching methods work, and teachers must revise their methods accordingly. Speakers sometimes humiliate the learners, adding more shame to the many obstacles.
While Native communities must do the language restoration work themselves, outsiders must provide resources to help support their efforts-- and avoid creating artificial barriers, such as English-only laws. To test the effectiveness of their teaching methods, they need consistent financial support over many years, not small, two-year grants. While many government agencies and foundations encourage math and science programs, few support Native languages. The tribal colleges need both. The W.K. Kellogg Foundation provided a generous, four-year grant of $850,000 to support language efforts at seven tribal college communities in Montana, but the grant period will be over soon.
Gradually tribal colleges are creating places where languages are safe. A place where the language is honored is a place that education, too, becomes honored. By recognizing Native languages, they recognize Native people, leading to self-esteem and academic success.
Marjane Ambler is the editor of Tribal College Journal. For more information, see Lydia Whirlwind Soldier’s “Lessons from the Boarding School,” TCJ, Vol. IV, N. 4. See also Vernon Finley’s “Designing a cultural leadership program,” TCJ, Vol. IX, N. 2.