Native Languages & The Indian Education Act: Ep 21 of Crash Course Native American History

Key Concepts

• Linguicide: The deliberate killing of a language.
• Assimilation: The process of absorbing a minority culture into the dominant culture.
• Federal Indian Boarding Schools: Institutions established to forcibly assimilate Native American children, often leading to language and cultural loss.
• Language Revitalization: Efforts to revive and preserve endangered Indigenous languages.
• Cultural Preservation: The act of maintaining and passing down cultural heritage, including language, traditions, and knowledge.
• Kinship: The concept of family relations, extended in many Indigenous languages to include animals and non-living elements.
• Worldview: The fundamental cognitive orientation of an individual or society encompassing the whole of the individual's or society's knowledge and point of view.

The Importance of Language to Culture

Language is presented as the bedrock of culture, serving as the primary vehicle for preserving oral histories, maintaining laws, and transmitting knowledge of the natural world. Dene Elder Paul Disain is quoted as saying, "Our language and culture is the window through which we see the world. To lose it, is to lose a part of ourselves." This highlights the profound connection between language and identity.

Decline of Native American Languages

The transcript details a severe decline in Native American language fluency over centuries. Scholars predict that over 90% of all Native American languages could disappear by 2050, leading to the extinction of these linguistic traditions. Prior to the 15th century, estimates suggest between 300 to 2,000 distinct Native languages were spoken across the continent, illustrating the dramatic loss.

Language Reflecting Worldview and Values

Native languages are shown to embed cultural values and worldviews. The transcript uses English idioms like "big hit" or "home run" as a parallel to illustrate how language reflects what a culture values.

• Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe, Odawa, Potawatomi): This language features special classes of nouns and verbs for living and non-living things, underscoring a cultural concept of kinship that extends to people, animals, and inanimate objects. Robin Wall Kimmerer, a Potawatomi writer and botanist, provides an example:
  • For an inanimate object like a table: "What is it?" Answer: "Dopwen yewe. Table it is."
  • For an apple: "Who is that being?" Answer: "Mshimin yawe. Apple that being is."
• Navajo (Dine'): The word "hózhó" is discussed, representing a sense of harmony. It can be used in greetings ("Haa’íí’ní?" - "How are you?" responded with "Hózhó" - "It's good") and in concluding prayers ("Hózhó Nahasdlii" - "All is at peace again"). This demonstrates a concept without a direct English translation, emphasizing balance and harmony.

The Impact of Colonization and Linguicide

The arrival of European colonizers in the 15th century drastically altered Native American languages. The transcript identifies "linguicide" – the deliberate killing of language – as a key strategy employed by colonizers and the U.S. government to erase Native culture through assimilation.

Federal Indian Boarding Schools

A particularly impactful assimilation policy was the establishment of Federal Indian Boarding Schools. These institutions, operating from the late 19th to early 20th centuries, forcibly separated thousands of Native children from their families.

• Practices: Upon arrival, children had their clothes taken, hair cut, and were bathed in kerosene. They were given English names and strictly forbidden from speaking their Native languages.
• Punishments: Speaking a single word of an Indigenous language resulted in severe punishments, including whippings, solitary confinement, starvation, and withholding medical treatment.
• Testimonies: Bill Wright, a Patwin Indian Elder, shared his experience of losing his culture, language, and name, recounting how he could no longer understand his grandmother and had to adopt the English name "Billy" instead of his Native name, "TAH-rruhm."
• Scale of the Problem:
  • By 1900, 20,000 Indian children were in boarding schools.
  • This number rose to over 60,000 by 1925.
  • By 1926, nearly 83% of Indian school-age children attended boarding schools.
• Legacy of Trauma: Many survivors associated their languages with deep trauma, leading them to refrain from passing them on to their children and grandchildren to spare them similar pain. This generational loss has contributed to issues like higher rates of poverty, substance abuse, and suicide in communities like Alaska.
• Federal Acknowledgment: A 2024 federal report found that at least 973 children died at these schools, with the actual number likely higher.
• Shift in Control: It wasn't until 1972, with the passage of the Indian Education Act, that control of these schools began to shift to tribal authorities, but significant damage had already been inflicted.

Language Revitalization Efforts

Despite the historical trauma, significant efforts are underway to revive and preserve Native American languages.

"Never Alone" Video Game

The Inupiat people are using the video game "Never Alone" (Kisima Inŋitchuŋa) as a tool to engage a new generation.

• Gameplay: Players control a young Iñupiaq girl named Nuna who solves puzzles with her arctic fox.
• Narration: The entire game is narrated in Iñupiaq.
• Educational Component: A classroom guide has been developed and distributed with the game to every school district in Alaska.
• Focus: Unlike typical games, "Never Alone" rewards players with traditional stories from Alaska Native culture, integrating cultural elements into the gameplay.

Music and Arts

Wade Fernandez, a singer-songwriter from the Menominee Nation, is incorporating his traditional Menominee language into contemporary music, as exemplified by his song "Sawaenemiyah" ("We are Blessed").

Immersion Schools

In places like Hawaiʻi and Arizona, Native language immersion schools are fostering cultural connection and language fluency.

• Methodology: These schools encourage students to wear traditional clothing, speak their languages, and engage with their cultures, representing a stark contrast to the boarding school era.
• Positive Outcomes: Studies show that students in immersion schools exhibit better test scores, stronger cultural connections, and higher graduation rates compared to those in public schools.
• Hawaiʻi Example: Language programs in Hawaiʻi have expanded to the university level, with courses taught entirely in Native Hawaiian. This has led to a significant increase in speakers, from fewer than 50 fluent speakers under 18 in the early 1980s to over 18,000 statewide. The Native Hawaiian language is now protected by law.

Broader Cultural Integration

Native languages are also making their way into mainstream media.

• Film Dubbing: The original "Star Wars" film was dubbed in Navajo in 2012, and the 2022 film "Prey" was fully dubbed in the Comanche language.

Conclusion and Call to Action

The transcript concludes by emphasizing the critical link between language and culture, quoting Dorothy LeBeau, an Oceti Sakowin elder: "Losing the language means losing the culture. We need to know who we are because it makes a difference in who our children are." The ongoing revitalization efforts are crucial for preserving the rich linguistic and cultural heritage of Native North America, which was once diverse and vibrant. The episode ends by previewing the next topic: the Land Back movement.