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31.2 (Summer 2007) Rescuing Critically Endangered Native American Languages

The Last Word

This issue of Cultural Survival Quarterly focuses on one of the most critical yet little-known problems in the United States today: the rapid and catastrophic disappearance of Native American languages.

Solidarity as Strong as Silk

The island nation of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean has a fomba, or proverb, that roughly translates, “While one silk thread is strong, many woven together are stronger.”

Indigenous Rock Star Wins Lawsuit Against Aveda

Robby Romero, an Apache rock musician and indigenous rights activist whose band, Red Thunder, is a mainstay on MTV, has won a lawsuit against the cosmetics company Aveda.

In the suit, Romero claimed that Aveda failed to compensate him for its “Indigenous” product line, which Romero developed as a means to raise funds to support grassroots Native American organizations.

Declaration Held Hostage by African States

The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples is being held hostage by a group of African states that do not want to recognize that there are indigenous peoples in Africa.

An affirmative General Assembly vote for the declaration, which was adopted one year ago by the UN Human Rights Council, should have been pro forma. Instead, African states, claiming that they did not have adequate time to consider the matter during the 24-year negotiation process, sought a delay to give themselves more time to study it. A vote is expected before September.

‘Aha Pūnana Leo

I ka ‘ōlelo nō ke ola, i ka ‘ōlelo nō ka make.

In language there is life, in language there is death.

The Heart of the Matter

In the 1800s the U.S. government designated what is now Oklahoma as Indian Territory and began moving tribes from other areas to the territory to make way for white expansion. That history gives the state a unique position: it has more Indian tribes than any other state and thus more languages at risk.

Oklahoma’s unique history as Indian Territory has caused it to end up with an amazing variety of tribes and languages.

On the Brink

An overview of the disappearance of America’s first languages: how it happened and what we need to do about it.

Ho nihkânetike. (Hello friends.) My name in English is Jacob Manatowa-Bailey. I am the director of the Sauk Language Department for the Sac and Fox Nation of Oklahoma. Sauk, like so many indigenous languages on this continent, stands at a crossroads. In the next few years my tribal community will either see our language restored to a new generation or we will bury it forever in the graves of our last few elderly speakers.

Small Talk

Henry Washburn, one of the last remaining fluent speakers of Yuchi

Even though there are clear methods to revive an endangered language, they can’t always readily be applied. Unfortunately, the tribes with the most severely endangered languages are often the ones least able to implement rescue efforts.

Documentation or Implementation

When it comes to saving native languages, linguists and small native communities would seem to be natural partners. But beneath the surface, the demands of the academy and the needs of the community constitute separate agendas.

In most cases, academic study of the language produces papers that are esoteric and offer little assistance to communities.

The Language of Success

One of the poorest—and poorest performing—schools in Alabama has become the top school in the state and is now a model for schools all over the country, all because it introduced students to their own identity.

Calcedeaver Elementary School has every reason to be an abject failure. Located in the sandy, rolling forestlands north of Mobile, Alabama, it’s in a rural area with very few resources. It sits on the edge of the MOWA Choctaw reservation, and most of its students are Choctaw.

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