Spend two weeks this summer in Washington, D.C., studying your Native language, or mentoring a language advocate!
The Breath of Life Archival Institute for Indigenous Languages, funded by the Documenting Endangered Languages program of the National Science Foundation, will be held in Washington, D.C. this coming June. You can apply to attend the Institute as a participant or mentor, and spend Monday, June 14 – Friday, June 24, living and working in the George Washington University dorms for only $500! (Mentors do not pay a registration fee.) Travel assistance up to $600 is available to accepted applicants.
During these hands-on set of workshops, teams of participants (Indigenous heritage language learners, teachers and activists) paired with mentors (linguists who help guide the participants' work) will explore the language resources in archives held by the Library of Congress and the Smithsonian Institution's National Anthropological Archive.
For more information, visit http://endangeredlanguagefund.org/BOL.php
National Language Revitalization Summit 2011
Not prepared to spend two weeks in the city? Join the National Alliance to Save Native Languages and Cultural Survival for the annual Native Language Revitalization Summit during the final days of the Breath of Life DC Institute. Watch for more details this spring. Have a favorite memory or activity from the 2009 or 2010 summits? Let us know! Contact Ryan Wilson, President of the National Alliance to Save Native Languages at r_lakota@hotmail.com and Jennifer Weston, Cultural Survival Endangered Languages Program Officer at jweston@cs.org
With the 112th Congress now underway, it will be especially important that you reach out to educate your representatives this year about the value of Indigenous languages in your daily life and your tribal community; the urgency of revitalizing our languages within the next five years; and to share stories of the vital role federal support for Native languages plays in strengthening Native communities for future generations.
