Keeping Chamorro Alive

Keeping Chamorro language alive
by Haidee V. Eugenio
Pacific Daily News
August 20, 2016

Chamorro speakers on Guam are dwindling.

“I speak Chamorro and I want my children and husband, all born here, to also know how to speak the language. We’re hoping to close the gap,” Kayla Lujan-Espinosa, 27, said as she cradles her 3-week-old child and looks after her 4-year-old son at a community presentation on a draft master plan for a Chamorro immersion school program.

She and her husband Rufo, 30, have three young children they want to understand and speak Chamorro. The Lujan-Espinosa family is one of many whose members are born and raised in Guam, yet many of them don't understand, much less speak, Chamorro.

“From 1990 to present, we probably lost about 10,000 Chamorro speakers,” said Jimmy S. Teria, school program consultant with the Guam Department of Education’s Chamorro Studies and Special Projects Division.

“When I heard about a proposal to have a Chamorro immersion school program, I thought this will help my family learn the language,” said Kayla Lujan-Espinosa, who's originally from Saipan, a teacher at Talofofo Elementary School.

Despite their busy schedule, the family took the time to attend a presentation Wednesday at the Yona/Talofofo Senior Citizens Center in Talofofo on a draft Chamorro Immersion Master Plan developed by the Guam Department of Education’s Chamorro Studies and Special Projects Division. The draft plan is available for public review, input and participation.

No new generation

Most Chamorro speakers, Teria said, are over age 55, so they are considered a part of the older population.

“We haven’t created a new generation of speakers,” said Teria, one of the leading proponents of a community-driven Chamorro language immersion school program. He said the program would complement existing Chamorro language programs on the island.

Teria said the data is based from the U.S. Census of 1990, 2000 and 2010, which show the number of Chamorro speakers declining from 34,598 to 25,827. He said between 2010 and 2016, thousands more have been lost, bringing the estimate to 10,000.

“According to statistics, if you don’t have a younger generation speaking the language, your language is endangered. It’s very endangered at this point," he said.

Teria also cited the results of a survey done by Pa’a Taotao Tano in 2010.

“There is an indication from the data that the under-18 group struggles the most with the Chamorro language in overall comprehension,” Teria said. 

Dying, but not dead

Rosa Salas Palomo, another proponent of a language immersion program and chairwoman of the Guam Academy Charter School Council, said the time is now to slow down or reverse the decline in the number of Chamorro speakers.

She said community involvement is a key factor in making this happen.

“The Chamorro language is dying, but it’s not dead in Guam,” Palomo said. “We want it alive. It is still viable. We want it used in every aspect of the community.”

The draft plan, according to Teria, resulted from a community survey completed in March 2016 to gauge interest in a Chamorro language immersion program. There were 164 unique respondents and 88 of those agreed or strongly agreed that they would enroll their children at a school where only Chamorro is used for teaching, learning and socializing.

Teria is encouraging families, individuals and groups interested in reviewing or providing input to the draft plan, or learn more about the proposed program, to contact him at 300-5048 or 483-3713.

How Hawaiian Language Almost Died

How Hawaiian Language Almost Died
by Jade Moon
Midweek
http://www.midweek.com/hawaiian-language-almost-died/
March 4, 2014


The first time Annie Mokiao spoke Hawaiian in school, her teacher did something shocking.
“When we used to go school, the kids – you speak Hawaiian, they slap you on the mouth. Teacher slap ’em.”

That was in the 1930s. Annie learned quickly that what was normal at home was considered shameful in the rest of the world.

“In our house,” she remembers, “my mother only speak Hawaiian, she don’t speak English.”
So Annie grew up with a severe case of cultural schizophrenia.

Namaka Rawlins is director of Strategic Partnerships and Collaboration for Aha Punana Leo, which, since 1983, has fought for the revitalization of the Hawaiian language. She says Aunty Annie’s story is all too common among kupuna.

“They were born at a time when we still had a law that said the Department of Education would only have English in the classrooms. Children were reprimanded and punished for using Hawaiian in schools. We’ve heard this from many of our kupuna.”

Hawaiian children were scolded, slapped and rapped with rulers for speaking in their native tongue.
In fact, the language of Hawaii almost died. From the Aha Punana Leo web-site:

“In 1896, education through the Hawaiian language in both public and private schools was outlawed on the model of U.S. policy towards the use of American Indian languages in education. Teachers are told that speaking Hawaiian with children will result in termination of employment. Children are harshly punished for speaking Hawaiian in school”

The lowest point, according to Rawlins, was a 1982 survey that identified fewer than 50 children who could speak Hawaiian fluently. Again from the website:

“By 1984, the community of fluent speakers had dwindled to a few elders and a tiny geographically isolated population on the island of Ni’ihau. Hawaiian language speaking children under the age of 18 numbered less than fifty. The demise of Hawaiian language was imminent.”
But the language did not die.

Initially the push for revitalization came from a handful of educators at the University of Hawaii, native speakers from Niihau, and parents. In 1983, in an effort to raise a new generation of native speakers, they created Punana Leo (which means “nest of voices”) and the first Hawaiian language preschool in Kekaha, Kauai.

Just how far has the movement come from that very modest beginning? A couple of weeks ago, the Hawaii Board of Education reaffirmed and strengthened its commitment to Hawaiian education and immersion programs in public schools. Its 2014 policy states, “Hawaii’s public education system should embody Hawaiian values, language, culture and history as a foundation to prepare students in grades K-12 for success in college, career and communities, locally and globally.”

The U.S. Census for the year 2000 shows the number of people who say they speak Hawaiian is roughly 26,000. That number is probably inflated, as the census does not ask level of fluency. Still, considering where we were in 1983, the growth is remarkable and heartening.

The ‘Olelo Hawai’i movement has become unstoppable. Today, thousands of children are exposed to the language and culture of Hawaii in public and private schools. We have access to Hawaiian language on the Internet, radio and on television.

Aunty Annie accepted the harsh lessons taught her in school, until, “When I grew up, I thought, gee, how come cannot speak our language?”

So she started speaking Hawaiian again to anyone who would listen. And that got her noticed. She was asked to become a kupuna at Maunawili Intermediate and at Ala Moana Elementary, teaching Olelo Hawaii to new generations of kids.

Aunty Annie is retired now. She may be a bit tired after raising nine children. She has more than 28 grandchildren and eight great-grandkids that she knows of. None of her own kids speak Hawaiian. But to her great joy, she can converse in ‘Olelo Hawai’i to a great-granddaughter and great-grandson who both went to immersion schools. How times have changed.

And Aunty Annie says she will never tire of sharing her knowledge.

“I want to teach anybody,” she says. “Anybody who want to learn, I’ll teach ’em. As long as I’m living, I teach.”

jmoonjones@yahoo.com
Twitter:@JadeMoon1