In Search Of America's Lost Languages !

NPR: A Road Trip In Search Of America's Lost Languages

 

The vast majority of the 175 indigenous languages still spoken in the United States are on the verge of extinction. Linguist Elizabeth Little spent two years driving all over the country looking for the few remaining pockets where those languages are still spoken — from the scores of Native American tongues, to the Creole of Louisiana. The resulting book is Trip of the Tongue: Cross-Country Travels in Search of America's Lost Languages.

 

MPR: Tribes want to regain authority in adoptions of off-reservation American Indian kids

 

Minnesota American Indian tribes and their allies in the state Legislature are seeking to plug a gap in child custody laws opened by a state Supreme Court decision last year. The court's decision derailed the common practice of giving tribal courts a role during pre-adoption and adoption for off-reservation American Indian kids. Until the late 1970s, American Indian children across the country were adopted outside their communities at very high rates. The practice had a devastating effect on tribes, as generations of youth were cut loose from their cultural identities.

 

AFP: Chile's indigenous Mapuche Indians fight for ancestral lands

 

Indigenous Mapuche Indian communities living in southern Chile are locked in a fierce battle with the state as they try to reclaim their "ancestral" lands, large portions of which were annexed at the end of the 19th century.

 

NYTimes: At Tribe’s Door, a Hub of Beer and Heartache

 

Four rickety metal shacks that line the main road in this town of maybe 10 people sell an average of 13,000 cans of beer and malt liquor a day. The nearest sizable city is two hours north. But just 240 yards north — across the state line in South Dakota — is the sprawling Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, where alcohol has been banned since the 1970s. Nearly all the alcohol bought in Whiteclay winds up on Pine Ridge or is consumed by its residents, tribal officials say. Pine Ridge is home to the Oglala Sioux Tribe and is one of the poorest places in the country, according to 2010 census data. In February, the Oglala Sioux filed a federal lawsuit against the stores, and Anheuser-Busch and several other large American brewing companies, accusing them of encouraging the illegal purchase, possession, transport and consumption of alcohol on the reservation.

An Indigenous Language With Unique Staying Power

 

Legislators on the floor of Congress deliver speeches in it. Lovers entwined on Asunción’s park benches murmur sweet nothings with its high-pitched, nasal and guttural sounds. Soccer fans use it when insulting referees. To this day, Paraguay remains the only country in the Americas where a majority of the population speaks one indigenous language: Guaraní. It is enshrined in the Constitution, officially giving it equal footing with the language of European conquest, Spanish. And in the streets, it is a source of national pride. Paraguay differs significantly even from other multilingual Latin American nations like neighboring Bolivia, where a majority of the population is indigenous. Languages like Quechua and Aymara are spoken by different groups there, but rarely by people of mixed ancestry or the traditional

 

Bolivians fight over quinoa land

 

Bolivian authorities say at least 30 people have been injured in a fight between two communities over land for growing quinoa, the Andean "supergrain" whose popularity with worldwide foodies has caused its price to soar. Oruro state police chief Ramon Sepulveda says combatants used rocks and dynamite against each other Wednesday and Thursday. A government commission was dispatched to the two high plains communities south of La Paz.

 

ICT: Oneida Indian Nation Police to Host Homeland Security-Funded Meth Investigations Workshop

 

Methamphetamine has long been an epidemic in Indian Country, devastating users, their families and their communities. To help arm the Oneida Indian Nation in its battle against the deadly drug, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Rural Policing Institute is offering a free workshop on meth investigations to the Nation’s police department on March 21.

 

American Indian tribes' casinos see turnaround

 

Gambling revenue at casinos run by American Indian tribes edged up slightly in 2010, reversing a first-ever drop in revenue the previous year and showing renewed strength as the economy improves, according to an annual report released Tuesday. The study, "Casino City's Indian Gaming Industry Report," said revenue at Indian casinos was $26.7 billion in 2010, up from $26.4 billion in 2009. In contrast, revenue at commercial casinos declined 0.1 percent and the businesses are expected to soon be overtaken by Indian casinos.

 

Tribal leaders seek 2 more senate votes for bill aimed at reducing violence against women

 

American Indian leaders say they want support from two more Republican senators for the Violence Against Women Act and they are making a big push this week to muster support for the bill, which includes measures to specifically help American Indian and Alaska Native victims. As of Tuesday, the legislation has 58 supporters in the Senate, including its sponsor Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. Although that means a majority of senators support the act, it lacks the 60 votes needed to end a filibuster should one be launched if the bill reaches the Senate floor.

 

Lakota Indians Block ‘Keystone XL Pipeline’ Trucks in Six-Hour Standoff

 

Five Lakotas on Pine Ridge Indian land in South Dakota were arrested Monday after attempting to block two tarsands pipeline trucks from entering their land. According to the Lakota activist the six-hour standoff started when the trucks refused to turn around claiming they had “corporate rights that supersede any other law.” According to the Rapid City Journal “several dozens” of American Indians were part of the blockade but a community journalist reports only five people were arrested.

Game hunt for sacred white buffaloes riles Native groups

 

A big-game hunting ranch in Texas faced a stampede of criticism this week when Lakota Indians noticed that the business was offering a White Buffalo Hunting Package for $13,500, Indian Country Today Media reported. White buffalo are considered sacred among the Sioux and some other Native American tribes and feature in their stories of creation.

 

Oregon considers banning Native American mascots

 

Angry at a halftime show depicting a bare-chested Native American boy with a target painted on his skin, Che Butler set out to force the Molalla Indians and 14 other Oregon high schools to stop using mascots and nicknames that depict American Indians. Oregon's Board of Education on Thursday took up Butler's plea for the second time, rejoining a longstanding national debate about racial tolerance and school traditions five years after issuing a nonbinding recommendation that schools stop using Native American regalia.

 

BBC: Ecuador indigenous protesters march against mining

 

Indigenous protesters in Ecuador have begun a two-week march across the country against plans for large-scale mining projects. Several hundred protesters set off from an Amazon province where a Chinese company has been authorised to develop a huge open-cast copper mine. Ecuador's main indigenous organisation, Conaie, says mining will contaminate water and force people off their land.

CNN: GPS technology maps land rights for Africa's 'forest people'

 

In the lush rainforests of Africa's Congo Basin, hundreds of thousands of indigenous people live as hunter gatherers, depending on the forest's natural resources for their survival. Yet most have no legal rights to the land that has been their home for millennia. But GPS technology is helping indigenous people map the land they call home and produce documents that can help preserve their access to the forest that is their lifeblood.

 

The Guardian: Why I'm willing to believe in Johnny Depp's Tonto

 

I knew when that picture [of Johnny Depp in character as Tonto], with a head-dress by a costume designer and face-paint by a make-up artist, surfaced, that there was going to be a stir – an uprising, perhaps – among the American Indian community's social networks. Despite the fact that Depp has played an American Indian before, in the film The Brave, in 1997, which he directed and which also starred Marlon Brando and Floyd Red Crow Westerman. Depp claimed to be part American Indian in 2011. Being an Indian from America who constantly has to pull out an ID from my tribe, I can understand the doubt. Especially when we hear the dreaded "My grandmother was a Cherokee princess" line.

 

Students pitch in to restore old Indian school

 

Armed with paint scrapers and saws, a group of University of Southern Mississippi students spent part of their spring break helping revitalize a historic Montegut building that once served as a school for Indian children. The old Montegut Indian School has survived a fire and dozens of hurricanes. United Houma Nation tribal leaders want to restore the building to be used as a cultural center and a place to house volunteers and disaster-relief efforts.

 

Oklahoma museum offers linguistics workshop focusing on indigenous communities

 

Registration is open for a linguistic workshop May 20-25 at the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History. “Oklahoma Breath of Life — Silent No More” is designed especially for indigenous people from communities that no longer have fluent first language speakers. The workshop offers five days of linguistic and language renewal immersion. Participants will learn how to find and use archived language materials and will work with a linguistic mentor to learn how to read phonetic writing, understand how their language works and how to begin the process of language renewal.