Last summer I visited Haida G’waii, home of the Haida people
in northwestern British Columbia. This
remote chain of islands near Alaska draws few visitors except sports fishermen
and people who love silence and stunning beauty. But there’s something else happening when I
look beyond steep mountains meeting ocean. The Haida are returning to their language.
Language advocacy, the renewing of Native languages and
thereby tribal cultures nearly extinguished by colonization, is on the rise
across North America. Visiting the Skidegate
Haida Immersion Program (S.H.I.P.) for the first time, I’m an outsider struck
by contrasts. This fishing village is small
and quiet; the S.H.I.P. longhouse is large and filled with the sound of spoken Haida. Elders and a few others wear professional
headphones, using mics to learn and share. A sound mixing board sits at the far end of the room, run by a young Haida man.
I caught Pat, pictured here, outside the longhouse taking a
break before she returned to play spoken Haida bingo.
S.H.I.P. was founded in 1998 because:
Ga ḵ’aayas gina g̱ii guudang.ngaay hlkuuxiidas
- The concern of the
elders
Ga X̱aayda Kil g̱aay
idsda sing.gwa’ad gyin
- Is that once the
fluent Haida Speakers pass away
X̱aayda Kil idsda
gaagu g̱as ga
- The Haida Language
would be lost from us
X̱aayda yahk’ii
sg̱wanang giyuu id sdaahll
- We wish to remain
true Haidas always
