Synopsis

"Although Native American languages have been on the decline since 1492, and only twenty out of them out of many hundreds are expected to remain viable into the twenty-second century..." (Treur, 2019)

Native American culture is rooted in oral history. For thousands of years, indigenous languages developed independently and in many cases alongside a neighboring tribe. In the past 500+ years, because of Anglo expansion across the continent, the native language has significantly diminished for a variety of reasons. Often, erasing the native language was a more ‘efficient’ way of removing, relocating, or extinguishing the people of this country. 

The focus of this text set is to explore the ways in which the indigenous voice, specifically Navajo or Diné, has been reclaimed and reinforced.