Digital Drum - Aboriginal Cultural Expression

With the support of the Department of Canadian Heritage, the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network designed a sophisticated Website last year to allow people to showcase their traditional storytelling, community traditions, music and other cultural activities.

Supported through the efforts of Executive Producer Wayne Clark, Producer Philip Djwa and a host of other talented people, the Digital Drum Website provides an interface for people to upload videos and post other multimedia content and hyperlinks.

For example, see Qallunajatut Urban part 2 to listen to watch Inuit traditional skills with an Inuit explanation and English transcript. Playing Eastern Tide: Mildred Milliea part 1, part 2 and part 3 tell the story of Mi’kmaq Native Dr. Milliea who has dedicated her life to preserving Mi’kmaq (mic). Explore these and other cultural adventures at Digital Drum.

Alaska Languages - Continuing Award for Collaboration

Last September, the NSF awarded the University of Alaska Fairbanks just over US$450,000, with Michael Krauss as principal investigator, to study 11 endangered languages in Alaska.

The languages to be studied (with Wikipedia and Ethnologue links) are: Han Athabascan (haa), Upper Kuskokwim Athabascan (kuu), Eyak (eya), Tlingit (tli), Southern Tsimshian (tsi), North Slope Inupiaq (esi), Central Alaskan Yup’ik (esu), Central Siberian Yupik (ess), Alutiiq (ems), Attuan Aleut (ale) and Kodiak Russian Creole, a language of approximately five speakers whose average age is 90 and apparently without a page on either Wikipedia or Ethnologue.

Krauss is joined by a host of prominent language researchers. Their names as well as other details of the award are detailed at “IPY - Documenting Alaskan and Neighboring Languages” as well as Veco Polar (second listing).

This blog entry was prompted by a Tundra Drums article and an EurekAlert article. The amount listed in those articles $1.2 million, and the Talking Alaska blog lists it at $1.4 million. The grant is a continuing grant, so the disparity in numbers probably reflects the way the calculation was made. (The NSF site lists three awards, totaling $1.06 million.)

To keep up with Alaskan and other endangered language issues, subscribe to  Gary Holton’s Talking Alaska blog. An article on Michael Krauss is available on Wikipedia.

Northwest Journal of Linguistics - open, online and peer-reviewed

The NWJL is an online journal focusing on indigenous languages of northwestern North America, providing peer-reviewed articles and open access. Designated as one of five hotspots in the world for language endangerment, the northwestern North America region will benefit from the exposure its languages receive in the Journal.

Started last year, the NWJL has a full editorial board including general editors Donna Gerdts, Timothy Montler and William Poser. With four issues in 2007, the Journal has handled prosodic hierarchy in Lushootseed (lut), verbal morphology in Santiam Kalapuya (kyl) and the resultive construction as well as stress in SENĆOŦEN (Saanich (str)).

Submitting authors retain the rights to their works, and they are encouraged to include diagrams and media such as sound files, taking advantage of the online format. The Journal is supported by Simon Fraser University.

Eyak Falls Silent

With the passing of Chief Marie Smith Jones on January 21, Eyak (eya) lost its last native speaker. Spoken in south-central Alaska, Eyak is its own branch of the Athabascan-Eyak language family, comprising about 20 Native languages in Alaska. She had worked extensively with Michael Krauss, a professor emeritus at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and founder/long-time director of the Alaska Native Language Center.

More about the family tree of Eyak can be found at Alaska Native Languages, which provides detailed information about Alaska language relationships. Eyak stories and recordings are available through the ANLC. Documentation including a glossary in extensive PDF files can be downloaded from Alaska Native Languages — Eyak.

News of Chief Jones’s passing was carried in BBC News, Alaska Public Radio Network, and WTOP News, among others, which provided much of the information for this blog entry.

Note about Krauss’s Native Peoples and Languages of Alaska map: In Talking Alaska, Gary Holton details how the Alaska language map (also found at Wikipedia) needs to be revised due to pejorative names and geographical problems.

Student job

Emily Bender at the University of Washington (Seattle) is looking for a student to help out with some research on Native American languages. Fluency is not required. Students need to have at least one year of study in a Native American language. A visit or two is required for orientation, but the work does not need to be performed at the UW. This is a paying position. Click on her link above to contact her for more information.

Software for Scholarship

Work is underway to better cross-analyze ancient texts using advanced software tools. This work is a collaboration called the Archimedes Project between the Dept. of the Classics at Harvard Univ. and the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science - see Scholars resuscitate dead languages.

The Archimedes Project specifically aims at learning about how the science of mechanics developed by looking at ancient texts. The outcome should be new tools that allow language data to be more accessible and languages easier to learn by computer.

One of the methods used is to examine Arabic translations of lost Greek documents and reconstruct the Greek. The software brings together a variety of tools that assist with this. One of the primary software programs is Arboreal, which allows you to annotate text using XML. (This Arboreal should not be confused with the linguistics program Arboreal that allows you to create syntax trees.)

Other tools developed include Donatus, which provides online analysis of morphology, and Pollux, an online interface providing a collection of dictionaries including Arabic, French, German, Greek, Italian, Latin and Sumerian.

This entry was prompted by the entry Reviving Dead Languages: A Promising Trend? at Alex’s Language and Society Blog.

Three news items

Doris Jean Lamar is the last speaker of Wichita: Tribal language fading away (includes a slide show in Wichita and English)

Director Conner of Tamastslikt Cultural Institute awarded money for hunting and language: Buffett Award money to be used for cultural projects

Washington Post article includes mention of Yawuru and Magati Ke (perhaps Marti Ke): At a Loss for Words

Anishinaabemowin in Press & Music

A native speaker of Anishnaabemowin who survived the residential (boarding) school with her language in tact, Helen Roy is busy promoting Anishnaabemowin at Michigan State University (MSU), a campus located centrally between three Great Lakes and both west and south of the US-Canada border.

Various names are used for the language and dialects: The course listing refers to the language as Ojibwe, which seems to be what the Ethnologue refers to as Ottawa. The Wikwemikong page uses Odawa-Ojibway. Anishnaabemowin refers to the language of the Anishnaabe, people of the Ojibway, Budawatomi (Potawatomi), and Odawa (Ottawa) tribes.

Yesterday, the Lansing State Journal published a bilingual article quoting Helen Roy in Objiwe, followed by English in parentheses. Even more exciting, their Webpage provides an MP3 (audio file) of her speaking. Try right-clicking and saving, then opening the file to listen to it.

Helen Roy has also gotten together with David Fuhst to produce two CDs: “Pop Songs Anishinaabe’amaadeg” and “Anishinaabe Nagamowinan”. They can be ordered from the Noongo e-Anishinaabemjig: Songs page.

To learn more about the classes at MSU, see the LSJ article “Native Tongue: MSU classes help Ojibwe language survive“. Also of interest to researchers, Michaelina Magnuson developed a questionnaire designed for Anishnaabemowin instructors and offers writing samples related to language education. An article on incorporating indigenous languages into major universities focusing on Ojibwe at MSU is available through AnthroSource ($6.00 for people without a subscription). The article is Redefining the Ojibwe Classroom: Indigenous Language Programs within Large Research Universities by Mindy J. Morgan.

See also the Wikipedia article Anishinaabe language and the Native Languages’ Ojibwe page for more information. Also see Language Geek’s The Ojibwe Language for language information, fonts and computer input.

Thanks to Turtle Talk for the original article that prompted this entry.

United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples

On 13 September, the UN passed its Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

While the term “indigenous” is not defined, its 46 articles affirm the right to self-determination including the pursuits of economic, social and cultural development (Article 3). Other rights include:

• Maintaining distinct political, legal, economic, social and cultural institutions while participating in those of the state (Article 5),
• Not being forcibly assimilated (Article 8),
• Revitalizing and developing their language and educate in their language (Articles 13-14),
• Redress for past injustices (Article 28),
• Access across international borders (Article 36), and
• Financial and technical assistance from the state to achieve these rights (Article 39)

With Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United States voting against, and 11 countries abstaining, the Declaration passed with 144 countries in favor.

Analysis at the Jurist: The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: Towards Re-empowerment by law professors S. James Anaya and Siegfried Wiessner.

This post prompted by an entry on the Declaration at Turtle Talk.

Pinker Lecture to Benefit ELF - Thursday

Steven Pinker will be lecturing at Harvard on Thursday, November 15, at 8:00 PM with the proceeds to benefit ELF, the Endangered Language Fund. The lecture will be on his book The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature and will be in William James Hall. Admission is $20 ($10 for students).

This map shows Kirkland Street in the lower right quarter, where William James Hall is located. A schedule of lectures by Pinker may be found at Steven Pinker - Public Lectures. Nick Emlen’s Linguist List post that was the source for this entry may be found here.