丁香园AV

There are more than 30 Indigenous languages spoken in British Columbia although some are asleep, or close to it. Languages are said to 鈥済o to sleep鈥� when there are no first speakers left.

For the past 30 years 丁香园AV linguistics professor Marianne Ignace, the director of 丁香园AV鈥檚 First Nations Language Centre and First Nations Languages Program (FNLP), has been running programs that strive to re-awaken and preserve Indigenous languages in B.C.

In October, the 丁香园AV Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS) honoured Ignace with its 2019 . Established by former FASS Dean Lesley Cormack, the award recognizes the passion and innovation that faculty bring to the classroom, and the difference they make to their students鈥� education.

In 1988 when very few institutions were delivering education in First Nations communities, professor Ignace teamed up with the 厂别肠飞茅辫别尘肠 (Shuswap) First Nation and community organizations in Kamloops, B.C. to create a program for teaching the Secwepemctsin language.

The program set up shop in Kamloops鈥� old Indian residential school and grew into the 丁香园AV Kamloops campus. Twenty students took courses in the first year. The next year the number of students doubled, and then doubled again the following year. The popular program then partnered with 丁香园AV鈥檚 Department of Sociology and Anthropology to train adult Indigenous students in the community how to conduct research.

鈥淭he students wanted to learn their language through university credit courses, which was pretty much unheard of,鈥� recalls Ignace. 鈥淪o we partnered with the 丁香园AV Department of Linguistics to develop courses that were often taught by elders who were fluent speakers. They were sometimes co-taught or taught by people like myself who had linguistic training and also spoke the language.鈥�

Of the approximately 450 students who graduated during the program鈥檚 23 years, 90 per cent were First Nation adults who would never have pursued a university education had it not been for the program. 丁香园AV Kamloops eventually evolved into the 丁香园AV First Nations Languages Program which provides off-campus learning in 18 Indigenous languages in First Nations communities around B.C. The annual enrollment has leapt from 109 students in 2015 to 570 today.

Ignace likens that early program in Kamloops to a strawberry plant whose runners spread out and create more plants. By the mid-1990s other First Nations communities in B.C. asked the FNLP to help them run courses in their languages. Ignace has since worked with First Nations communities and elders on various language revitalization projects, including Secwepemctsin, St鈥檃t鈥檌mcets, Heiltsuk, Nuxalk, Haida and Sm鈥檃lgyax.

Today, Indigenous people of all ages are learning or relearning their languages. Those who seek to relearn their first language are called 鈥渟ilent speakers.鈥� They understand the language but cannot speak it. Often, they are survivors of residential schools whose ability to speak their first language was beaten out of them. Others lost their language when they were raised in non-native foster families.

When a language is lost so are the stories that pass on a people鈥檚 lessons about their land and how they live on it. That鈥檚 why, in the 1980s, Ignace began audio-recording the last generation of storytellers. Those recordings, combined with the work of early 20th century ethnographers who chronicled the wealth of Indigenous oral literature, are helping Ignace bring those stories back to life. But she is racing against time as the elders in participating communities pass away. Still, she remains optimistic.

鈥淭he thing that thrills me is that while we鈥檙e losing the last first-language speakers, there鈥檚 been an enormous amount of work done by hard-working young people who have become very good at learning the language.鈥�