Census finds fewer than a half-million Native American language speakers; majority Navajo

More people speak Navajo at home than any other Native American language, a seemingly promising 169,000 people at a time when some tribes have lost their native tongue or are struggling to retain the words of their ancestors. Evangeline Parsons Yazzie, a Navajo professor at Northern Arizona University, said the figure recently released by the U.S. Census Bureau is no surprise, but can be misleading. The country’s population of Navajos is well over 300,000. For every one who speaks the language, one doesn’t — and those are likely younger Navajos, Yazzie said.The loss of Native languages is rooted in a history that includes the federal government’s attempt to eradicate Native American culture by sending children to boarding schools and punishing them for speaking their language. “That’s one thing all Indian nations suffer from,” Yazzie said. “Youth are ashamed of that because it caused a lot of harm. They internalized it. ... Now we’re trying to turn that around and say, ‘The languages are beautiful.’”

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Indigenous dictionary released on Straddie

A short article detailing the release of an Indigenous dictionary:

"North Stradbroke Island has its own indigenous dictionary, called the Minjerribah Moorgumpin Elders-in-Council Jandai Language Dictionary. The 126-page hard cover book, compiled by The Minjerribah Moorgumpin Elders-in-Council and the Straddie Sand Mining Community Fund, was launched in Dunwich last month. It is published by GEON Group and costs $50 which includes an interactive CD, giving the correct pronunciation to words. Island elder Aunty Margaret Iselin and members of the Minjerribah Moorgumpin Elders-in-Council spent five years on the important task of saving Jandai, the language of the local Quandamooka people. "It might have taken five years to complete, but we now have a timeless record for future generations of our native Jandai language here on Stradbroke Island," she said.

"I was five years old when the two grannies at the Myora Mission decided to teach us the language. The first word they taught was 'myora' which means mission. But after we started learning the language, the authorities came and told us that we weren't allowed to speak it anymore. Now we have the dictionary, the local schools can teach Jandai."

Aunty Margaret worked with family and friends and indigenous residents to write down as many words they could remember in the language. Entries are in alphabetical order and give an English translated meaning. Aunty Margaret said the dictionary came after she found local schools were teaching indigenous languages from other parts of Australia. Mining giant Sibelco developed the Straddie Sand Mining Community Fund to provide financial support for community initiatives on the island.

Order a dictionary on 3409 9723."

Aboriginal elders reject ‘another decade of discrimination’

The Ramingining elders have called for an end to the intervention, the reinstatement of bilingual education, the involvement of elders in curriculum development, and Yolngu teachers. Elders from the remote Northern Territory Aboriginal community of Ramingining, East Arnhem, released, on November 28, a statement, saying that they “...don’t want another decade of discrimination here in Ramingining,” said Mathew Dhulumburrk, a 67-year-old Gupapuyngu man. “The government is extending and strengthening laws designed to assimilate Aboriginal people. We will not sit back and watch these attacks on our lives, our future, our culture, and our law.

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New home movies resurrect endangered Native American language

University of Minnesota Duluth education professor Mary Hermes says saving an endangered language goes beyond just enriching the people who speak it. "I think people have got to get beyond thinking it's just for the Ojibwe people, that we want to save their Ojibwe language. There's 10,000 years of human evolution and knowledge in that language," she says. With support from the National Science Foundation (NSF), Hermes is combining the skills of native speakers with video technology to help others, young and old, learn the language in the most natural way. She's doing it by videotaping short movies of everyday situations, from going to a rummage sale to planting a garden to helping out a sick relative. "Because Ojibwe isn't spoken on a regular basis, there's not a store or a rummage sale or a resort, but part of what we're doing is trying to re-envision what that would be like," explains Hermes.

Thanks to Living Languages where I first read this :)

The rest of this article + (very interesting) video can be accessed here

Fight for Nyoongar language

A QUEENS Park-based Aboriginal group is fighting to preserve the Nyoongar language. The language appears in Western Australian culture, and is featured on street signs, place names and during Welcome to Country ceremonies. However, Nyoongar Language Program interim chairman Joe Collard said such references were not understood and the language was slowly dying out.“Names like Joondalup and Dwellingup – these are our place names that have wonderful histories,” he said. “So many place names across the South-West derive from Nyoongar words, which have associated stories. We could offer these stories to people.” Mr Collard said he was concerned with the low number of fluent Nyoongar language speakers.

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Apple co-founder Steve Jobs leaves legacy in Cherokee language

The Cherokee Nation lowered its flags to half mast Oct. 6 in honor of Apple Inc. co-founder Steve Jobs, 56, who died Oct. 5 in California after a long battle with cancer. For the Cherokee Nation, its work with Apple has resulted in the adaptation of the Cherokee language to modern technology and renewed hope that the language will not only survive, but thrive. In 2003, Apple began supporting the Cherokee language by including a font and keyboard in the company’s computer operating system. 'Anything a person can do in English can be done in Cherokee in part because of [Steve Jobs'] innovations and his support of [the] language', CN Language Technologist Joseph Erb said.

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In the World: Murmurs of Mayan

Along with its stunningly accurate calendar and majestic pyramidal architecture, the Mayan civilization deserves recognition for another unique feature: its language. Mayan languages are a rich source of data for linguists aiming to develop a universal theory of language, but like many of the world’s tongues, their speakers are steadily dwindling in number. MIT undergraduate John Berman spent the past summer in a remote village in Mexico studying Chol — a Mayan language spoken in the southern state of Chiapas — in the hopes of capturing some important features of its grammar and vocabulary. Chol has several elements that differentiate it from English and other well-documented languages, including its manner of expressing possession and the structure of its nouns and verbs.

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