Hearing Our Call:Addressing Language Loss while Educating the Youth.

(“San Felipe Pueblo.” Home San Felipe Pueblo, 2022,)

Armstrong, Jeannette. SHARING ONE SKIN. greenresistance.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/armstrong-1996-sharing-one-skin.pdf.

In the Article "Sharing One Skin" Jeannette Armstrong’s article “Sharing One Skin” is an article about her lifestory. Armstrong tells us about her Identity and responsibilities. Jeannette comes from the Okanagan, a part of British Columbia as she tells us about her family and what words in Okanagan she refers to while explaining the meaning. She then tells us the importance of being spiritual within her community. Only when someone connects with themselves can they be connected towards the land and its creatures around it is what she tells us in the article and how each person in her community each has a role to play in when it comes to the community. In San Felipe we are taught the rights to grow on the land can only be if you take care of the duties that are given to you by the tribal leaders. In this case each member of my community has a duty to fulfil and that is keeping the land clean and well maintained. Jeannette mentions spiritual self and that stuck with me because growing up my dad always told me to pray to the sun every morning when I get up and everyday before school I do so just so I can be ready for the day that is presented before me. 

Oaster, B. ‘Toastie,’ and B. ‘Toastie’ Oaster. “How Place Names Impact the Way We See Landscape.” High Country News, 24 Jan. 2024, www.hcn.org/issues/54-5/people-places-how-place-names-impact-the-way-we-see-landscape.

The Article "How Place Names Impact the Way We See Landscape" In the next article “How place names impact the way we see landscape” the author Toastie talks about how places hold significance and importance and the names given to them are very important. Each place earns its name and is a story to be told to the younger generation. Giving a name to a place holds special power and a deep meaning to the people that are giving said name to it. Replacing the original names with a different person or anything random is deemed disrespectful to the people and is often shamed or loses the power it was once bestowed with. The same could be said with any indian name especially in our communities each name is given to you for a reason and they each hold a significance to who you are. My Indian name is named after a river bird the Swallow which are fast and are connected to water which in keres would translate to Si’Si’Kah. It is disheartening when I hear my English name rather than my indian name at home because what i was taught is that your indian name is your most important name at home but in public your english name is a placeholder its another part of your identity and what the people above chose for you. 

Rethinking Schools. “‘And Then I Went to School’ - Rethinking Schools.” Rethinking Schools, 22 June 2021, rethinkingschools.org/articles/and-then-i-went-to-school.

The story "And Then I Went to School" is about a Man from cochiti pueblo The next article is about a man from cochiti pueblo Joe Sunia. The article's name is “And then I went to school” . Within the article it talks about how Joe lived a comfortable life with his grandma in Cochiti. After he attended school his life began to change as he was used to living a traditional lifestyle rather than how the western way of life was. He wanted to go back to living the way he was before but his family encouraged him to pursue an education and so he had to find a way to adapt between his two lifestyles, western and traditional. Language played a big part because at school he was forced to speak english rather than his language which was keres and overtime he adapted to speaking english more than keres. I believe it's true that we all have to sadly experience going to a school where English has to be a placeholder for you in order to achieve your education.  

Growing up in a household where everyone in my family spoke keres it was a comfortable setting but until I went to school everything changed and with that my journey through speaking english came to be. After a while my moo’moo told me a story on how they used to take kids to SFIS in order to erase their language and identity and it was only until the pueblo governors took over that many languages started to slowly come back to life. Boarding schools took a lot away from families. Some who lived in that era still think the government will punish them for speaking their language and that's how language loss started to become a big issue. 

Another act that was passed to erase native languages was the indian religious crime codes of 1883 and this was an act which gave the Indian agencies the authority to stop any ceremony they deemed as “unholy” or immoral and this was another way to get rid of our language as songs are sung in many of our ceremonies.

The last thing I found was about the Esther martinez act of 2006 and this is a big win for us natives as she fought to keep tewa alive and president bush passed an act in her name which provided funding for native revitalization efforts/programs that were present during this time. This goes to show that no matter what native languages can never be fully destroyed they will always find a way to stay alive within communities and even with this act still many communities face language loss because of lack of teachers or interest within the youth. 

The first article I indeed looked up was about elders implementing VR into school systems so students can learn about stories and sacred places to the Northern Arapaho. This article stuck with me because it's the first step towards native languages being used with modern technology and if this can happen then it can surely be used for good within certain communities. It’s important that kids understand their sacred places because it's what is taught between grandparent to grandparent mom and dad. Modern technology is what is popular nowadays and nowadays there is no more face to face talking unlike the old days no one sits at the table talking anymore. 

Many Mexican native communities face problems with language because of the state language which would be Spanish and it would conflict with their own teachings like writing and speaking. MAny of the youth are influenced by Spanish as that's what they hear at their age rather than their own language and due to this many schools in the Chichimeca community have had older more fluent students record tapes of stories in their language and have given them to teachers so the youth can learn. Due to this some but not all have retained full productive language capacity. With a bilingual program present students should be able to keep learning their language over time and as a result the communities of Mexico have been able to strive and hopefully keep their languages from being endangered. 

Next takes place in Sweden with the Sami people of north and south sami and the sami people have been given help by their own government due to Sweden recognizing that the sami people should be included in their national heritage and so they provided the SLC or sami language centre a task to find new methods of keeping the sami language alive and so far a woman who has earned her masters at the sami University of applied sciences she ended up developing a new method called the language circus and this is a very effective method due to it being able to help adults regain their language of sami. As of currently she is on the works of trying to find an effective method for kids in the north and sami regions something that will be more fun and interactive for the children. 

My next article will take place in Okinawa Japan with the Ryukyuan people and this one was hard to look at. As of today not many speakers are left which has put the language at being endangered and possibly extinction if not solved soon. The Ryukyuan people were taught at a young age to speak their language and as of today only grandparents and adults speak the languages not many kids speak the language like the adults. Due to no bilingual education present there is no way to help the Ryukuan people and some even say that in order to revive the language it has to be decolonized which is a big issue as some don’t even want to try at all to decolonize the language.