Post by Okwes on Jun 21, 2006 20:16:23 GMT -5
Indian languages meeting focus
By MARY PICKETT
Of The Gazette Staff
billingsgazette.net/articles/2006/06/16/news/local/55-language.tx\
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<http://billingsgazette.net/articles/2006/06/16/news/local/55-language.t\
xt>
Language is so bound up in culture that the loss of
American Indian languages is a loss of an important
part of their speakers' identities.
Linguists working to preserve the Siouan family of
Indian languages will meet in Billings on the Rocky
Mountain College campus Friday through Sunday.
The Rev. Randolph Graczyk, pastor of St. Charles
Parish in Pryor and a linguist, is organizing the
annual meeting of the Siouan and Caddoan Language
Conference.
Fifteen to 20 people are expected, and many of them
are university and college professors and graduate
students. Several members of the Crow Tribe will
attend, including Lanny Real Bird, who teaches the
Crow language at Little Big Horn College in Crow
Agency. Linguists will present reports on technical
research during the meeting, Graczyk said.
On Saturday, the group will travel to Little Big Horn
College and visit the reservation.
When Graczyk came to the Crow Reservation in 1970,
nearly all residents spoke the Crow language.
"To be more effective, I decided to learn the
language," he said.
Realizing that he needed more training, he took time
off in the 1980s to get a Ph.D. in linguistics with an
emphasis on the Crow language at the University of
Chicago. He doesn't consider himself to be fluent in
Crow, but can understand and speak it.
During Sunday Mass at St. Charles, he reads a Bible
passage in Crow.
Parishioners have told Graczyk that hearing the Bible
reading in Crow, even though they are fluent in
English, has a profound meaning for them.
Although most adults on the reservation still speak
Crow, fewer children do, Graczyk said.
There are many reasons for that, including the
pervasiveness of English on television and among
children's peers.
To reverse that trend, Crow is taught in reservation
schools. Among Northern Plains Indian tribes, Crow has
endured better than most tribal languages.
Some linguists coming to the Billings meeting work
with languages that only have a handful of speakers
left. In those cases, linguists want to preserve as
much of the language as possible.
Others are working to strengthen a language by
creating teaching materials for classrooms.
Crow reflects its culture, as other American Indian
languages do.
For example, the Crow language technically does not
have a word for "cousin," Graczyk said. Your mother's
sister's children are called brother or sister. Your
father's sister's children are considered clan aunts
and uncles, although that's an over-simplification of
the concept expressed in the language.
If Indian languages are struggling to survive,
interest in them is growing in the United States and
in other countries.
One linguist, who works with the Lakota language, is
coming to Billings from England. Another, who is
researching the Winnebago language, is from Germany.
Siouan is a family of about 20 languages that are
descendent from Proto-Siouan that dates back 3,000 to
4,000 years. Siouan includes the Crow and Lakota
languages.
By MARY PICKETT
Of The Gazette Staff
billingsgazette.net/articles/2006/06/16/news/local/55-language.tx\
t
<http://billingsgazette.net/articles/2006/06/16/news/local/55-language.t\
xt>
Language is so bound up in culture that the loss of
American Indian languages is a loss of an important
part of their speakers' identities.
Linguists working to preserve the Siouan family of
Indian languages will meet in Billings on the Rocky
Mountain College campus Friday through Sunday.
The Rev. Randolph Graczyk, pastor of St. Charles
Parish in Pryor and a linguist, is organizing the
annual meeting of the Siouan and Caddoan Language
Conference.
Fifteen to 20 people are expected, and many of them
are university and college professors and graduate
students. Several members of the Crow Tribe will
attend, including Lanny Real Bird, who teaches the
Crow language at Little Big Horn College in Crow
Agency. Linguists will present reports on technical
research during the meeting, Graczyk said.
On Saturday, the group will travel to Little Big Horn
College and visit the reservation.
When Graczyk came to the Crow Reservation in 1970,
nearly all residents spoke the Crow language.
"To be more effective, I decided to learn the
language," he said.
Realizing that he needed more training, he took time
off in the 1980s to get a Ph.D. in linguistics with an
emphasis on the Crow language at the University of
Chicago. He doesn't consider himself to be fluent in
Crow, but can understand and speak it.
During Sunday Mass at St. Charles, he reads a Bible
passage in Crow.
Parishioners have told Graczyk that hearing the Bible
reading in Crow, even though they are fluent in
English, has a profound meaning for them.
Although most adults on the reservation still speak
Crow, fewer children do, Graczyk said.
There are many reasons for that, including the
pervasiveness of English on television and among
children's peers.
To reverse that trend, Crow is taught in reservation
schools. Among Northern Plains Indian tribes, Crow has
endured better than most tribal languages.
Some linguists coming to the Billings meeting work
with languages that only have a handful of speakers
left. In those cases, linguists want to preserve as
much of the language as possible.
Others are working to strengthen a language by
creating teaching materials for classrooms.
Crow reflects its culture, as other American Indian
languages do.
For example, the Crow language technically does not
have a word for "cousin," Graczyk said. Your mother's
sister's children are called brother or sister. Your
father's sister's children are considered clan aunts
and uncles, although that's an over-simplification of
the concept expressed in the language.
If Indian languages are struggling to survive,
interest in them is growing in the United States and
in other countries.
One linguist, who works with the Lakota language, is
coming to Billings from England. Another, who is
researching the Winnebago language, is from Germany.
Siouan is a family of about 20 languages that are
descendent from Proto-Siouan that dates back 3,000 to
4,000 years. Siouan includes the Crow and Lakota
languages.