2008 Woodie Awards
Eyes toward revitalization
Melinda Christensen
Issue date: 4/23/08 Section: Life
While Zepeda is encouraged by the recognition her poetry receives, she admitted that working to revitalize endangered languages can be frustrating.
"It's not so much the degradation of the language, but it is the attitude that's out there about language," Zepeda said.
Zepeda elaborated by explaining that it tends to be the attitude of the dominant population, and that attitude speaks loudly to Indian people.
"Why speak a language that has no purpose?" Zepeda said. "You can't use it in school and it doesn't help you in finding a job."
Not only can that attitude be difficult to overcome, but also arguing for maintaining a language can be difficult.
"You can say in terms of language, it's like losing the Grand Canyon, works of art or works of music that people value… Losing a language can be like that… but the thing about language is it is part of our humanity," Zepeda said.
As Kenneth L. Hale explained in 1995 during an interview, when you lose a language, a large part of the culture goes, too, because much of that culture is encoded in the language.
"It's not so much the degradation of the language, but it is the attitude that's out there about language," Zepeda said.
Zepeda elaborated by explaining that it tends to be the attitude of the dominant population, and that attitude speaks loudly to Indian people.
"Why speak a language that has no purpose?" Zepeda said. "You can't use it in school and it doesn't help you in finding a job."
Not only can that attitude be difficult to overcome, but also arguing for maintaining a language can be difficult.
"You can say in terms of language, it's like losing the Grand Canyon, works of art or works of music that people value… Losing a language can be like that… but the thing about language is it is part of our humanity," Zepeda said.
As Kenneth L. Hale explained in 1995 during an interview, when you lose a language, a large part of the culture goes, too, because much of that culture is encoded in the language.
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