Heather Armstrong | WXOW | August 8, 2019

Black River Falls, WI (WXOW) — Indigenous languages are slowly disappearing. There are 7,800 Ho-Chunk in the Wisconsin area and only 50 elders still speak fluent Ho-Chunk.

In order to preserve the Ho-Chunk language the tribe enlisted the help of a non-profit that specializes in preserving indigenous languages.

Language Conservancy is in town for two weeks conducting what they call a rapid word workshop before the Ho-Chunk language is lost.

It takes years and thousands of researchers to produce a dictionary but over just the past eight days Ho-Chunk elders have come up with more than 10,000 words.

For two weeks 20 elders will spend long days at the District 1 Community Center in Black River Falls coming up with Ho-Chunk versions of every word in the dictionary. The goal is to make sure the Ho-Chunk language lives on.

Will Meya is the Executive Director of Language Conservancy.  “With the thousands of years that this language was spoken it embedded all the culture of the people as well so the songs, the histories, the prayers…all of that was expressed through the language,” said Meya.

Henning Garvin is the Language Program Manager for the Ho-Chunk tribe and helping coordinate the project. He says people like his father, whose first language was Ho-Chunk will not be around forever.

“We’re gonna get to a point in the very near future where we don’t have our native speakers to call on to ask questions about words or how to phrase things or how to say things. Before we get there we want to try to archive and document as much of their knowledge as we possibly can so we have that to rely on in the future,” said Garvin.

Andrew Thundercloud is one of the elders dedicating their time to help build this database.  He says he is doing it for future generations and he has a message for them. “I think it’s necessary for them to know that we’re still here. You know we’re still a very viable people and we’re still here and we’re continue to be here,” said Thundercloud.

Ho-Chunk language now counts as a world language credit but it used to just be an elective in less than a handful of schools. Schools in Tomah, Black River Falls and the Wisconsin Dells offer the Ho-Chunk language to their students.