People

Dr. Stacey Oberly

Dr. Stacey Oberly is newly hired as the first Ute Language Program Manager in the Southern Ute Cultural Preservation Department. She has taught linguistics at the University of Arizona, ASU, and FLC. She has worked as a Ute language, endangered languages and Indigenous cultural activist for over three decades and considers linguistic and social justice a means to building proactive and protective cultural identity and spirituality for endangered language community members.

Dr. Mosiah Bluecloud

Dr. Mosiah Bluecloud began working in Indigenous Language Revitalization in 2008 with the Sauk language department. After 1,280 hours of learning Sauk as an Apprentice and 668 hours of professional development training in Native Language Teaching Methodologies, Mosiah Became the Lead instructor of the Sauk Language. He taught community classes across three counties, a Sauk Language course at Bacone College, and two levels of Sauk at Shawnee Highschool. He left the Sauk Language department and got his B.A. in Linguistics Spring 2016, from the University of Oklahoma, and established the Oklahoma Kickapoo Language program that fall. Mosiah built the Kansas Kickapoo teacher training program, and started facilitating trainings and workshops for language departments all over the country. He went back to school at the University of Arizona and completed his Masters in Native American languages and Linguistics in Spring 2020 and completed his PhD in Linguistics in 2024. He has taught linguistics courses at the University of Arizona, American Indian Language Development Institute, and at CoLang: the Institute on Collaborative Language Research.

Dr. Ray Huaute

Dr. Ray Huaute (Chumash, Cahuilla) works with the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians in Palm Springs, California where he has helped the tribe to establish a Mentor-Apprentice adult immersion program. He holds a BA in Native American Studies from the University of California Riverside, an MA in Native American Linguistics from the University of Arizona, and a PhD in Linguistics from the University of California, San Diego. Ray has over 10 years of experience teaching languages and has extensive knowledge in the areas of language pedagogy, curriculum and assessment, and accelerated language acquisition through various immersion methods. He is also an alumnus of the American Indian Language Development Institute (AILDI) where he has served as a workshop facilitator at their annual summer institute. He is also a former participant and workshop facilitator for CoLang.

He currently serves as a board member for the Advocates for Indigenous California Languages Survival (AICLS) and co-chair of the Committee on Endangered Languages and their Preservation (CELP) of the Linguistic Society of America.

Dr. Lanny Real Bird

Dr. Lanny Real Bird has been serving as storyteller, language acquisition consultant, language instructor, assessment designer, curriculum developer, strategic planner, grant writer, and recognized spokesman and orator of the Apsaalooke for nearly 40 years. His craft is teaching, and he is a teacher of worldly educational foundations in the regional, rural, and grassroots centers in the state.