Breath of Life Archival Institute for Indigenous Languages

The Smithsonian Institution's National Anthropological Archives is will be one of the primary research sites for the Breath of Life Archival Institute for Indigenous Languages, which will take place in Washington, DC from June 13 to 24, 2011. Participants include 32 Native American language learners representing more than 20 tribes from across the United States, and 22 linguists with expertise in linguistic analysis and language documentation. They will have access to the extensive collections of language documentation in the NAA as well as other repositories in Washington. Lead by Leanne Hinton (Berkeley) and Lisa Conathan (Yale), Breath of Life is a hands-on workshop that will train Native American community members in the use of archival materials for language revitalization purposes. The participants form teams that work together during classroom lectures, grammar workshops, visits to archives and material culture collections, and hands-on research using archival material. The Breath of Life training model was developed by the Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival, which has run the Breath of Life Language Workshop for California Indians since 1992. Breath of Life is supported by the Documenting Endangered Languages Program with additional support from: The American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, Consortium for World Cultures, Endangered Language Fund, National Museum of the American Indian, National Museum of Natural History, Native Voices Endowment, and Recovering Voices.

National Anthropological Archives