The Department of Linguistics and the Center for Native American & Indigenous Studies (CNAIS) are pleased to host a discussion-formatted event titled "2019: The UN International聽Year of聽Indigenous Languages,聽and the Future聽of Native American Languages".
Wednesday, January 23
4:00pm
Clare Small 209
This talk (in discussion format)聽will feature William J. C'Hair, the Chairman of the Northern Arapaho聽Language and Culture Commission of Wyoming聽(in person), and James Sleeper, Language Lead聽for the Southern Arapaho of Oklahoma (via skype, with other adult language learners as well). The discussion will focus on potential futures for the now-endangered Arapaho language, including the goals of current documentation and revitalization programs, the scope of community engagement with these programs, and the varying attitudes within the communities towards the languages. In particular, we hope to consider the realistic limits as well as ideal futures --聽both short-and long-term --聽for the language, and the obstacles to meeting these goals.聽The discussion will be moderated by Dr. Andrew Cowell, Professor of聽Linguistics,as an effort to contextualize the issues within the broader framework of聽Native American languages.
William C'Hair is an elder and native speaker of Arapaho, and a聽long-time language activist. James Sleeper聽and the other Oklahoma participants are second-language learners. Andrew Cowell聽has worked聽extensively with both the Northern and Southern Arapaho groups over the years on language聽documentation and revitalization.