What constitutes "saving a language?" To scholars it may mean making sure it is well-documented. But to the people whose languages are disappearing, a language isn't saved unless people are speaking it again.
A leading American expert in language revitalisation programs around the world, Leanne Hinton, will be giving a talk about that in Canberra on 28 March. All are welcome to attend. Please register your attendance on http://reclaimingindigenouslanguages.eventbrite.com/.
“Over the last couple of decades, indigenous communities have been starting to reclaim their languages in their own way,” she writes. “The generations who have grown up without their ancestral tongues are searching for ways to learn them and use them again.
“One approach, first developed in California, is the Master-Apprentice Language Learning Program, a boot-strap language learning method where elders who know the language and younger adults who want to learn it are trained to immerse themselves in the language while leading their daily lives together.”
Dozens of indigenous communities in the United States and Canada have found this method helpful, Hinton notes.
“Now Australia is embracing the program as well. In March 2012, a grant from the Australian government will bring a team of trainers from California for a set of ‘Training the Trainers’ workshops in Alice Springs and in Northwest Australia.
“30-40 Australians, both indigenous and non-indigenous, will learn how to train and mentor Master-Apprentice teams, and will hopefully be able to train a hundred teams or so in the coming year.”
In her presentation on the 28th Hinton will report on the workshops and discuss how this program may assist Australian Aboriginal peoples in their quest to save their languages.
More at http://indymedia.org.au/reclaiming-indigenous-languages-the-master-appre...
Date and Time: Wed, 28/03/2012 - 6:00pm - 7:00pm
Location: Finkel Lecture Theatre, ANU, Canberra
Contact John Paul Janke, johnpaul.janke@aiatsis.gov.au
Comments
Aknowledge their diverse languages and communication styles
This has been like a circle as the very same subject was raised time ago. It comes up in a circular way.
There is not one Aboriginal Languague but many.
The purpose of this may need to be explained.
I have my dictionary of Aboriginal words and it's not entire as I say there's too many languages from these people. I have other works which look at linguistics and languages of peoples from Indegenous communities.
It's been tried and it's valuable to have knowledge of these languages yet for whom, and how will this lift the oppressed Indigenous peoples (not saying they all are) out of their oppressions?
Aknowledging their diverse languages and communication styles is very good,
Thanks
Paul