By Michelle Tirado
June 25, 2009

Indian tribes have really embraced technology, but when it comes to solutions and tools that can help them save their languages, their arms could not be open any wider.

As the Indigenous Language Institute sees it, there is a definite symbiosis from old knowledge and new tools. To show tribes just how harmonious this relationship can be, ILI launched, in collaboration with the University of Washington, a workshop series in 2001 called Ancient Voices, Modern Tools: Native Languages and Technology.

More than 300 Native American languages have already been lost, according to Santa Fe, N.M.-based ILA, and more than 75 of those languages went extinct over the last century.

“The Indigenous Language Institute regards the incorporation of modern technology and related training as essential and natural in our work to help bring our heritage languages from the brink of extinction,” said Gerald Hill, ILI’s president.

The series includes two four-day workshops. One teaches participants how to develop printed documents, like booklets, brochures and flash cards, using Microsoft Publisher. They also learn how to use scanning technology and create audio booklets (CDs).

The other workshop focuses on digital storytelling, which builds computer and multimedia skills to create short audiovisual stories in Native languages using digital storytelling templates. Participants get hands-on training in programs such as GIMP, Photoshop, Windows Movie Maker and Audacity, an audio software program.

Most of the tools taught in the workshops are free, usually coming pre-installed with a computer or downloadable from the Internet.

“We believe in making this process very affordable and accessible,” said Inée Yang Slaughter, ILI’s executive director.

Classes are generally small, averaging about six participants, and the cost per workshop is $400.

Up until around 2007, ILA only offered the workshops twice a year, taking it to different regions of the country. But demand grew, so much that it decided to expand it. In 2008, it began offering the workshops once per month, and all are held in an ILA classroom in Santa Fe.

A $25,000 grant received in March 2009, when the Ancient Voices, Modern Tools series was picked as the national winner of the Third Annual Verizon Tech Savvy Awards, is being used to help it expand the workshops, to ensure all who want to attend can attend.

Slaughter said, “Not everybody can come at the designated time. So, we are able to now say, ‘What is the date that works for you?’ We have a little more flexibility.”

Since its inception, more than 400 people from 113 tribes have completed the workshops. Many of them have put what they learned in the workshops to good use. Among the tribes that have sent language staff to the workshop or have hosted one are the Navajo Nation, Oneida Nation of Wisconsin, Seminole Tribe of Florida and Santa Rosa Rancheria.

Slaughter said it has been a popular course among the Navajo, particularly teachers who want to create materials, such as booklets and DVDs, and she knows they are using the tools learned.

“They have been in touch. They come back. They use this in their classrooms,” she said.

To learn more about the workshops, visit ILI’s Web site: www.indigenous-language.org. You can also check out ILA on You Tube: www.youtube.com/user/ILINative.