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.

Ukon I Manaina-ta

	November 30, 2012 Preserving Chamorro songs and chants: Concert highlights efforts of group By Lacee A.C. Martinez Pacific Daily News   Guam has a long tradition of family gatherings during the holidays, where prayers are said and music is sung — often in Chamorro.   These traditions, however, have been slipping away, taking the music and language with it. Through a grant from the Association of Native Americans, Pa’a Taotao Tano’ has been working to preserve much of the music, as well as the newer chants and songs sung in Guam’s native tongue. Tomorrow is your chance to hear some of that music live in concert.   Pa’a Taotao Tano’ and the ANA present a Chamorro music concert to launch a songbook and CD, “I Ukon I Mañaina-ta, Chants and Songs from Our Elders.”   The concert will feature the St. Francis Children’s Choir, EMMAUS! Choir, the San Isidro Catholic Church Christian Mothers and the Pa’a Taotao Tano’ Chanters performing the music documented and recorded in the project.   The work to perpetuate and share the songs nearly lost to the previous generations began in 2010, says Nicole Calvo, project director for Pa’a Taotao Tano’s Chamorro language through chants, prayers and song project.   Two resource tools The goal was to produce two resource tools — a musically notated songbook and a CD recording of some of the select songs from the book.   The project included a year of interviews with: manamko’ on and off island; techas, prayer leaders from the churches; and the fafanague, the dance leaders of the different guma, or houses, that fall under Pa’a Taotao Tano’. Pa’a Taotao Tano’ is an umbrella organization of 11 different dance groups of Chamorro cultural practitioners, Calvo says.   “We interviewed the manamko’ and talked to them about some of their childhood memories of some of the songs,” she says. “Many of them came back to us singing some of the secular songs and most especially the non-secular — the religious church songs from ... novenas and so forth. We kind of captured that.”   The second year of the project began the transcription of some of the songs into musical notes, for the songbook, which is comprised of some 70 songs — secular and non-secular.   Some of the music includes original compositions from musicians such as Bill Paulino and Cathy Calvo Cruz, who directs the St. Francis Children’s Choir and also worked to document the music with the project.   “We have had a couple of people who had passed away, like a woman named Bernadita Tenorio who had collected volumes and transcribed so many Chamorro songs,” Calvo says. “The family allowed us to go ahead and use her original compositions.”   Family legacy  Cruz belongs to a family that continues to share a legacy of tradition in novenas.   “My mother’s novena is a continuation from her mother’s and her mother’s mother’s traditions,” Cruz says. “We’re realizing that this is not going to continue unless we make sure it’s absolutely out there physically, not only that our families can benefit but our entire island. If we lose that, we lose who we are entirely and it’s becoming scary. If we don’t make a concerted effort to bring something from the past and make it concrete, we’re going to lose it.”   The project includes secular songs such as “Atan Jesu Kristo” and “Kantayi Gue,” as well as other songs that would have been sung in church or at novenas.   “We have a really beautiful mix of little snippets of our identity,” Cruz says. “Once you sing that, it just gives you a sense of wow — I’m glad I still sing this song.”   The project also includes original chants, many of which have come from Pa’a Taotao Tano’ creative director Frank Rabon, who’s revered as a master of Chamorro dance, Calvo says.   “Over the years, with the help of other students and colleagues, he’s written chants that go with dances and the songs,” she says. “A lot of it, we knew it was very important to capture that and musically notate it for people to enjoy for generations to come.”   If you miss the concert, you will be able to purchase the CD and songbook at the Pa’a Taotao Tano’ office in Hagåtña.   “The next part of this is to take them into the different gumas — the dance houses — and teach that to the children and youth to also learn how to sing it,” Calvo says. “Hopefully from that we’ll be teaching them the Chamorro language as well.”

Chamorro Language is "Sort of Disappearing"

Chamorro is 'sort of disappearing'
By Oyaol Ngirairikl
Pacific Daily News
September 21, 2010

About one of every two Chamorro people on Guam can understand Chamorro "very well."

However, only one in four can speak it "very well." These are just some of the results of a six-month survey of the Chamorro language on Guam revealed during a press conference last night at the Barrigada Mayor's Office.

The Chamorro Language Assessment Survey talked to more than 6,500 Chamorro people living throughout the island. It was conducted by local Chamorro culture group Pa'a Taotao Tano', which means "way of life of the people of the land" in Chamorro. The survey was conducted using a $98,000 grant awarded in October 2009 by the Administration for Native Americans, which falls under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Administration for Children and Families.

Nicole Calvo, the survey's project director under Pa'a Taotao Tano', said she wasn't surprised by the results.

"The survey shows that while a lot of people still do speak Chamorro, that it's the manamko', or the elders, who actually use the language more often, and that for our younger population, or the younger you go, the less people speak or understand," Calvo said. "I think it's kind of sad when you think of how our language, which is in my opinion the core of any culture, is sort of disappearing."

Despite the somber results, Calvo said there is hope that the language can and will survive.

"We have Chamorro culture and history being taught in public and even some private schools," she said. "But we also have programs like Hurao (Culture Camp) that does a really good job in teaching children the language, the culture and the values of the Chamorro people."

Calvo said the survey results are being sent to Guam DOE, University of Guam, Guam Community College, the Mayors' Council of Guam and various local, nonprofit cultural organizations.

"Pa'a Taotao Tano's mission is to preserve, promote and perpetuate the Chamorro culture through song, dance and chants," she said. "We're not a language education program and we're not going to start classes, but my hope is that through this survey, educational groups on island will be able to strengthen their programs in a way that helps the youth of our island a real chance at getting to know their culture."

Calvo said she's proud of how well "the Chamorro language and culture has survived over 4,000 years of colonization and oppression."

"We're still here after all this time," she said. "And, hopefully, our efforts at Pa'a Taotao Tano', when added to the efforts of other groups and individuals, will help perpetuate our language and culture so that years from now, even with the military buildup, our people can still stand proud of their culture and heritage."
Survey

The group tapped UOG professor Ron McNinch to help build the questions and evaluate the survey results.

The survey included 10 questions that asked how well Chamorros spoke, understood, read and wrote Chamorro, as well as where they hear or use the language most often.

McNinch said the 6,542 survey participants represent a little more than 10 percent of the island's Chamorro population.

"Home (and) family is what the data tells us is the key to preserving the Chamorro language," McNinch said. "What we know is that the Chamorro language is being used a lot, that's what the study verifies."

McNinch later said the determination and commitment of Pa'a Taotao Tano' to ensuring the language and the culture are strengthened is admirable.

Rose Aquiningoc, a member of Pa'a Taotao Tano' since 1999, said the group has helped her improve her knowledge of Chamorro culture, but also her comprehension of the Chamorro language.

"Since joining the group, I'm better able to understand Chamorro and I can speak a little bit more than before," she said. "I'm not surprised that the results came back with so few people speaking the language -- because I'm one of them -- but I think the project also shows that people care and people want to make sure that the language is carried on to future generations."