Makah’ in Our Community: a Dialogue Approach for Adult Learners
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i Using Qʷi·qʷi·diččaq ‘Makah’ in our community: A dialogue approach for adult learners by Maria Hita·ʔa·ʔoƛ Pascua Master of Education from the University of Victoria, 2020 A Project Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of MASTER OF EDUCATION in Indigenous Language Revitalization ã Maria Pascua 2020 University of Victoria All rights reserved. This Project may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by photocopy or other means, without the permission of the author. ii Supervisory Committee Using Qʷi·qʷi·diččaq 'Makah' in our community: A dialogue approach for adult learners by Maria Hita·ʔa·ʔoƛ Pascua Master of Education from the University of Victoria, 2020 Supervisory Committee Dr. Megan Lukaniec, Department of Linguistics Supervisor Dr. Suzanne Urbanczyk, Department of Linguistics Committee Member iii Abstract The Makah Tribe in Neah Bay, Washington, began the Makah Language Program (MLP) in 1978 as Qʷi·qʷi·diččaq 'speaking Makah' (or the 'Makah language'), which is an endangered language. Most of the MLP efforts focus on school age students although there are adult materials available and periodic adult classes offered. The goal of this project was to provide additional support for adult learners by creating Qʷi·qʷi·diččaq dialogues that occur in common places in the community, involve typical activities, and include Makah cultural views and traditional teachings. The Makah concept hi·dasubač or 'traditional preparation,' a Makah perspective of learning and practicing in order to accomplish an objective, was used as the methodology for this project; hi·dasubač involves mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual aspects of preparation, and advice on its application is included at the beginning of each of the 10 dialogues. Besides focusing on local context and activities, including cultural information, the dialogues were designed to sustain back and forth conversation and provide ways to extend the dialogue through word replacement. It is hoped that the dialogue template and design principles created in this project can be helpful in other contexts of Indigenous Language Revitalization, especially those which need additional support for adult language learners. iv Table of Contents Abstract .................................................................................................................................... iii Table of Contents .................................................................................................................... iv Acknowledgments ................................................................................................................... vi Dedication ................................................................................................................................ vii 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 1 2. Locating Myself ....................................................................................................................... 2 3. Makah Language ................................................................................................................... 12 4. Problem Statement ............................................................................................................... 15 6. Research Questions ............................................................................................................... 21 7. Literature Review .................................................................................................................. 21 7.1. Indigenous research methodologies ............................................................................... 21 7.2. Adult language learning using dialogue and conversation ............................................... 22 7.3. Adult language learning within the context of ILR ........................................................... 25 7.4. Wakashan languages ...................................................................................................... 28 7.5. Makah language ............................................................................................................. 29 8. Methodology......................................................................................................................... 30 9. Methods ............................................................................................................................... 32 10. Outcomes ............................................................................................................................ 36 10.1. Dialogue 1 – The store .................................................................................................. 37 10.2. Dialogue 2 - At the clinic ............................................................................................... 38 10.3. Dialogue 3 – The beach ................................................................................................. 40 10.4. Dialogue 4 – At a potlatch ............................................................................................. 42 10.5. Dialogue 5 - Football ..................................................................................................... 43 10.6. Dialogue 6 - Birthday .................................................................................................... 45 10.7. Dialogue 7 -Volleyball ................................................................................................... 46 10.8. Dialogue 8 – Bone game ............................................................................................... 47 10.9. Dialogue 9 - Fishing and Tribal journeys ........................................................................ 49 v 10.10. Dialogue 10 - Coffee and basketball ............................................................................ 51 11. Conclusion and Future Directions ........................................................................................ 53 References ................................................................................................................................ 56 APPENDIX A – Dialogue Template.............................................................................................. 62 APPENDIX B – Makah Dialogues ................................................................................................ 63 vi Acknowledgments I want to acknowledge my first language teachers, the late Nora Barker and the late Ethel Claplanhoo; my Makah language mentors, the late Rev. Hildred Ides, the late Irene Ward, and the late Helma Swan, who helped me on my language journey. I am also thankful for all the precious Makah Elder speakers who have since passed on, but with whom I was able to work. I am especially appreciative of the faculty in the Master’s in Indigenous Language Revitalization (MILR) and my cohort from whom I have learned so much. I am grateful for the previous people who have worked in our language program and for the linguists who have worked on our language, especially Dr. Ann M. Renker. The Makah Tribe has supported our language work throughout the years and I want to acknowledge the Makah Tribe and my co-workers in the Makah Language Program and the Makah Cultural & Research Center staff as well as my Neah Bay High School staff and students for their patience and support while I have been working toward this degree. I so appreciate how I grew up: my parents, my brothers, aunts, and uncles, growing up so close with my first cousins, and especially my grandparents Tom and Hazel Parker, who were first language speakers of Makah. Most of all, I am thankful for my husband Andrew D. Pascua, my children and their families, and my grandchildren for their continued support. vii Dedication I am dedicating this project to our children and their families who are the next generations to carry on our language and culture: jeanine, Christen, Tony, Andres and Titus. I hope you breathe life into our precious Indigenous languages to the best extent of your abilities, live the culture and pass on what you know to our grandchildren, that is, to your children and to the generations yet to come. I have an additional dedication I want to make in memory of one of my former high school Makah language students who reached an admirable fluency level in Qʷi·qʷi·diččaq: to the late Kaščuqʷay̓ upbit, 'Getter of Hair Seal' Joshua Levi Monette; you were an awesome example of living our Makah language and culture to the hilt, your passion to learn Qʷi·qʷi·diččaq was truly legendary. 1 1. Introduction This project is about developing Qʷi·qʷi·diččaq 'Makah' dialogues to support adult learners. I have included information about myself and my own language journey as a second language speaker of Makah in section 2, and background history about the Makah Language Program in Neah Bay, Washington in section 3. Section 4 identifies the problem statement, the need for more adult learning materials and support, and the lack of mother tongue speakers in our community. Section 5 is about the purpose of making dialogues to help accelerate second language learners to speak and use dialogue to promote conversational fluency. The research questions are in section 6 and the literature review is section 7 with five subcategories: Indigenous Research methodologies, adult language learning using conversation and dialogue, adult language learning within the context of Indigenous Language