In the
March issue of The
Walrus, there is an extended article on the need for, and the
complexities
of, teaching indigenous children their nation's language. The task is made
complicated
in part because many of Canada's first languages are structured differently
than are
the
languages of Europe and therefore an entirely different pedagogical approach is
required.
The
reasons why indigenous children need to be taught their grandparent's first
language within a
formal
school system as opposed to being taught by their parents and other adults in
the
community
are long standing and well known. There is no doubt that the Canadian
government's
policy,
enacted by direct and indirect agents was to assimilate
the indigenous peoples of Canada
into what
was then perceived to be the mainstream of Canadian society. Residential
schools were
designed
to be the primary tool of cultural assimilation/genocide. If only the
government
had
waited a hundred years, they would not have needed to do anything at all
thereby saving not
only
money that could have been better spent but more importantly not causing long
term
psychological
damage to countless communities.
Languages
die. That is a fact. No one speaks Sumerian or Sanskrit anymore. Only academics
and
priests
use Latin, or the language of Bede or Chaucer. Languages die out because a more
predominant
culture or language supersedes it. I can remember growing up in Quebec and
knowing
that some French speaking parents wanted to send their children to the English
school
system
not only because it was a better education but also because it would prepare
their children
to
compete in an English speaking world. The
fact that French in Quebec is the dominant
language has
as much to do with the language protection laws enacted in the last two or
three
decades of
the 1900s as it does on its natural resurgence. The increased numbers of speakers of
Gaelic or
Welsh in Great Britain are a point of pride for those individuals but do not
reflect
the
mainstream. Those languages are not used outside relatively small circles. They
frequently
appear to
be an affection as opposed to a useful addition to the human dialogue. While no
point
was made as
to the irony of it, the above article from The Walrus in discussing which Indigenous
languages
are most used in Canada, briefly mentioned that "major dialects tend to
crush minor
ones".
Not because the speakers of Cree are mean or colonialist but because it makes
life easier
to
communicate when we all speak a common language. It makes more sense to communicate in
the
language of the majority.
There is
no doubt that the early disappearance/eradication of Indigenous languages in
Canada is
a direct
result of the interference of the Canadian government in the natural lives of
whole
communities.
The harsh, abusive techniques used to punish children who spoke their first
language
within the Residential School system as operated by the various churches and
the
Canadian
government were profoundly inappropriate and more importantly - damaged the
psyche of
an entire population. But many of those languages would have evolved and some if
not
most
would have died a natural death.
I accept
that it is critically important that Indigenous communities become strong
through and
because of
their culture. I think that, because of the impact of how the Canadian
government
(and all
of those who voted for them in the 149 years since confederation), the best,
perhaps the
only way
that that can occur is for the children and grandchildren of those who were
punished
for
speaking their language get to learn it and to celebrate it. It saddens me that
our mutual
languages
did not evolve together. We could have had a language that instead of a few
place
names
basterdized into English as the only acknowledgement of there being a culture
here before
the
Europeans arrived, would have been rich in the best of both languages.
And that
affects us all.
