Ivan F. Star Comes Out
‘Winning the west’ meant exterminating a people and a language
By Ivan F. Star Comes Out
Native Sun News Today Columnist
nativesunnews.today Our Lakota language is not faring well in these modern times. As a youth, I can recall when the language was an active part of family and tiospaye life. The language was efficiently transmitted in the home and within the tiospaye for centuries. Today a steadily diminishing handful of speakers are hanging onto what is left of our once thriving language. Sadly, looking at today’s rampant incidents of single-parenthood, the nuclear family unit and the tiospaye exist only in concept. That environment which allowed the language to thrive is nearly gone. But that does not mean we can’t create that vital immersion environment which is so crucial to language revival. Our youth must hear the language continuously as opposed to 30-minutes a day, 5-days a week. We must also realize that although our elementary schools have been “teaching” Lakota language for as long as forty years, language use continues to decline. Many young adults are “learning” in a classroom situation but its use is still waning. The majority don’t even bother themselves with it. Overall, we must force ourselves to “see” that our Lakota language is in its next to last stage of existence. A while back, I predicted with one of my columns that someday, we will have language grammar books, dictionaries, and recordings galore and hardly anyone speaking it. I believe we are at that stage in our history. We have to realize that the few speakers we have are elderly and constitute a small percentage of the total population.
Read the rest of the story on the Native Sun News Today website: ‘Winning the west’ meant exterminating a people and a language (Ivan F. Star Comes Out can be reached at PO Box 147, Oglala, SD 57764; 605-867-2448 or via email at mato_nasula2@outlook.com) Copyright permission Native Sun News
Join the Conversation
