Transference of the Ute Mountain Ute language has dwindled, marred by forced assimilation and elders’ deaths — but the tribe is hopeful that will change with the launch of a new spoken-word dictionary.
Our neighbors living on the Crow Reservation seem to have something that's becoming increasingly more common and concerning: a dwindling number of Crow people who can speak the Crow language.
The news of Maxine Wildcat Barnett’s Covid hospitalization in November shook the Yuchi community of Sapulpa, a small Oklahoma city named after its first settler, a Creek Native American. At 95, Barnett is the last...
Loved ones to Covid-19. Homes to forest fires. Clean air to climate change. The past year has stolen much of what sustains us. But we’re in danger of another devastating loss, just under the surface. And it’s the cultural bedrock on which our lives and identities are constructed: our world's...
Even before the pandemic, it was a race against time to preserve Native American languages across the country. COVID-19 has accelerated this. The Cherokee Nation has had more than 30 of its 2,000 fluent speakers...
Lawrence Wetsit misses the days when his people would gather by the hundreds and sing the songs that all Assiniboine children are expected to learn by age 15. “We can’t have ceremony without memorizing all of...
For years, organizers have been collecting a massive database of Crow words, comparing nuance about their meanings and translations, and seeking out as many speakers of the language as possible...
With fewer and fewer fluent speakers of the Crow language, advocates for revitalizing it hope a free online dictionary can aid people already working to bolster their skills and make learning the language more accessible.
During the 1800s and 1900s, Native American children were forced to attend boarding schools, where they were punished for speaking Indigenous languages.
Board games, picture books, flashcards and posters — all of these things are now available to Crow children in their native language, when 100 years ago, children were sent to boarding schools and punished for...
