Delphine Red Shirt. Photo by Rich Luhr / Flickr
How do you start to learn a Language?
By Delphine Red Shirt
Lakota Country Times Columnist
www.lakotacountrytimes.com Today, you can just about start anywhere, especially with information available on the web. That is one of the things I learned in college and graduate school, because education before that was a huge challenge for me. I struggled with English as my second language and in high school, I could sail through, with the knowledge of English I had because I loved literature. And I loved reading. That has helped me learn a language I didn’t speak at home. At home, I heard distinctly Lakota sounds, most of my life, though my years in high school. I knew the gutterals and the glottals, and all of the sounds that are so hard for students in my Lakota class at the university level, to learn. For me, for almost two decades of my life, those were the soothing sounds, the sounds I associated with home. This year for the first time, I have thought of putting all of my teaching notes into one format, to help other teachers. Being a fluent speaker, when I first entered the classroom, I was nervous. My students were kind. They still talk to me today. They see me at a powwow or event and they come and tell me that they are trying to learn more; that they are now teaching it. So, it is possible, to learn your heritage language. But how: toske? I recently decided to teach myself a third and fourth language: French and Spanish. Anyone who is Lakota knows that the French intermarried among us at the time of first contact. Our name for “pig” since we didn’t have domesticated animals was borrowed from the French. I was told that somewhere early in my blood line there was a French who married Red Cloud’s aunt and that is where all of the Red Shirt’s come from. All of those at Slim Buttes, where our blood lines come from, from our grandfathers who married full-blood Lakota women. So, French is a language I am interested in and took in college (suffered through it). Now, I want to learn it on my own time. I also wanted to learn Spanish since I hear it all the time, now. In the days before the middle of the twentieth century, the farms, ranches, and agri-business in Nebraska used to hire Lakota men. That was how many families survived the early reservation days. That was how my brother earned a living or had summer jobs. Now, they only hire Spanish speaking people while our unemployment is sky high. So, I hear Spanish more and see the influence it is gaining through all the forms, and documents for voting, etc. I decided to learn it. Since, I have noticed how instead of “tuning out” when I hear a language I don’t know, I tune in, in case I can pick up words I have learned. In reality, I am teaching myself these languages so that I can pick up better ways to teach Lakota. Where am I learning these languages? On-line, using a FREE service online that is very user friendly.
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I set a daily or weekly goal and when I remember to, I take a simple lesson. I am given some nouns in French or Spanish. Those nouns are used in sentences, and I translate simple sentences. I match words, I listen, and I often even close my eyes so I can hear it again and again. Because even though the words often appear on the computer screen with no diacritics or special marks, the sounds are different. And I want to learn through hearing fluent speakers. What will it be like to speak four languages? I don’t know, I am still struggling sometimes with my second language English. My tongue will trip over French and Spanish, in the same way but I will learn enough to know what people are saying. That is all I can hope for. In the same way that I am learning these European languages, learning Lakota should be a FREE service online or on the radio (KILI) and it should be responsibility of every speaker left on the reservation to use it daily to teach it. I urge fluent speakers to det on the radio and give simple lessons: wicincala, hoksila, wicasa, winyan in Lakota mean: girl, boy, man, woman. And a verb: mani means “to walk”. An article, “kin” means “the” or you can use “wan” meaning, “a” or “an”. A simple sentence is “Wincincala wan mani”; “A girl is walking”. You can say the same sentence using: hoksila, wicasa, or winyan. There, you learned a lesson in one paragraph, for free how to say, four sentences in Lakota. Do you want more lessons? Urge all public service outlets to teach it: newspapers, radio, public television… (Delphine Red Shirt can be reached at redshirtphd@gmail.com) Find the award-winning Lakota Country Times on the Internet, Facebook and Twitter and download the new Lakota Country Times app today.
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