麻豆精品

Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for 麻豆精品 Newsletter

A drum circle sang songs of victory. A smudging ceremony wiped away the tears. And Crow tribal elders spoke in Aps谩alooke (Crow language) about the next generation that has yet to be born.

The early June celebration at Little Big Horn College wasn鈥檛 just the culmination of a years-long project to capture the words and culture of the Crow people, it was also a testament to saving the words that had been buried deep in many tribal members鈥� memories, preserving them and making them live again.

On Friday June 3, at a three-hour ceremony, The Language Conservancy, an Indiana-based group focused on preserving languages, especially indigenous tongues, unveiled the 鈥淐row Dictionary,鈥� a massive collection of nearly 850 pages that documents the language and is the first major collection of the language published since 1975.

Not only is the dictionary more user-friendly and modern, it doubles the number of collected words from 5,500 to more than 10,000 鈥� a huge accomplishment for saving a language that had been on the decline, but has recently seen a turnaround as language immersion programs grow on the reservation and a popular phone app has digitized the dictionary.

In many ways, the songs and speeches weren鈥檛 just a celebration of the dictionary鈥檚 arrival, they were a victory against time itself.

鈥淔or other languages, you can go somewhere else in the world to still hear them being spoken,鈥� said Jacob Brien, whose Crow name is Ishkooch矛ia Chiiakaamn谩ah. 鈥淏ut this is the only place in the world where you can learn about this and hear it.鈥�

Estimates range on how many people speak Aps谩alooke, but many peg the number around 2,000.

Brien is a student at Rocky Mountain College who is spending the summer at The Language Conservancy. His goal is to become a linguist to help preserve the Crow and grow the number of Crow speakers. Even at 19 years old, he understands 鈥渨ithout our language, we won鈥檛 have our culture.鈥�

He鈥檚 spending the bulk of the summer in Bloomington, Indiana 鈥� a long way from southern Montana. He鈥檚 learning the software and how to continue building upon the Crow dictionary so that when the succeeding editions come out, the number of words will grow and the definitions will become even more precise.

He鈥檚 listed in the acknowledgements, and explains that he had a direct part of helping to write the definitions of kinship, which are different in the Crow culture than in many American families. For example, your brother鈥檚 children are considered your children, too. And your mother鈥檚 brothers and sisters administer discipline and guidance, leaving parents to fill a more nurturing role.

鈥淭o be listed next to the names of some of my heroes is a huge honor,鈥� Brien said.

Brien is happy that the language programs, including in-school immersion, are growing in popularity. Even as he was growing up, he said that many teachers just assumed the kids could speak and understand Crow. He said he knew a few words, but had to learn much of the language in middle and high school.

He said the language isn鈥檛 necessarily difficult, but it requires memorizing a lot of compound words, made up of phonemes, or letter/sound combinations that stand for certain words that are put together. For example, the Crow word for coffee, bilishp铆tisshe, is a compound word that translates literally to 鈥渂lack water.鈥�

The effort to preserve the language and print the dictionary was done through the help of nearly 100 volunteer Crow speakers using a method that was invented nearly a century ago called 鈥渞apid word collection.鈥�

Bob Rugh, a staff member at The Language Conservancy, helped lead the technical process and trains linguists. He explained that groups of four to six Crow speakers broke out into groups. Each group took a common word (there are 1,800) and were encouraged to think of as many Aps谩alooke words related to that English word as possible. From there, they were able to build a more expansive Crow language word list. In the process, many older, lesser used words were collected and preserved.

Shawn Real Bird, the economic development director of the Crow nation, told the crowd of more than 100 people not only would the dictionary help preserve the language, but it would give the future a vocabulary of its own.

鈥淭his will maintain the language for our children, our grandchildren and those not born yet. It will give them words for our sun dance, our pipe ceremony, our fasting ceremony,鈥� Real Bird said. 鈥淭his will hopefully be the beginning for an associate鈥檚, a bachelor鈥檚, master鈥檚 and even Ph.D., so I want you to take this and pray about it in whatever ceremonies you use.鈥�

Janine Pease, who has been a towering figure at Little Big Horn College and a key force in developing the Aps谩alooke language programs, was honored for her work.

鈥淟anguage is a gift from the creator,鈥� she said. 鈥淭hese words honor the people who are here and all the others who said them. They were said by people in 1700. They were said by people in 1500 and in 1200. They are voices from our long distant past.鈥�

She rejected the notion that Aps谩alooke has been coopted by English because its vocabulary is too old and not robust enough to describe more modern concepts.

鈥淲e own our world, and we name our world. People have said that we need English in order to make it work, not so,鈥� Pease said. 鈥淲e don鈥檛 live in someone else鈥檚 world, we live in ours.鈥�

is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Daily Montanan maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Darrell Ehrlick for questions: [email protected]. Follow Daily Montanan on and .

Did you use this article in your work?

We鈥檇 love to hear how 麻豆精品鈥檚 reporting is helping educators, researchers, and policymakers.