Indigenous language revitalization (ILR), or the act of reversing the language shift from English back to Native languages, is an essential task. Since their inception, tribal colleges and universities (TCUs) have worked to support and often lead language communities in this task. Indeed, the revitalization and preservation of Native languages is one of the core values of the American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC) and is often cited in the missions and visions of TCUs (Shreve, 2019). Since its beginning, Sitting Bull College (SBC), located on the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe (SRST) reservation, has used its institutional might to support Native language in various ways. In 2017, SBC took on a new approach to Dakota/Lakota language revitalization in order to turn a particular corner and surmount a distinct plateau. This new approach concentrated almost entirely on adult language and adult language education and was named the SBC Lakota Language Capacity Building Initiative (LLCBI).

In this article, we describe the LLCBI and its conception and activities, as well as its impacts in the community. Most importantly, we reflect on the initiative and provide key lessons learned. In the spirit of sharing with other Native communities looking to implement similar programs, we illustrate the ways we succeeded, the ways we could have done better, and the ways we continue to move forward in building adult language capacity at Standing Rock.

We, the authors of this article, are three learners of the Dakota/Lakota language and are program organizers and scholars of ILR. We also led the LLCBI. The data from this article come from auto-ethnographic accounts, various grant reports, student-participant interviews, and audiovisual recordings of language classroom exercises. While we recognize that all Native communities have their own unique possibilities and challenges in regards to language revitalization, it is our hope that in sharing this story, both its successes and difficulties, we can provide some guidance to other Native communities in their language revitalization efforts.

PREVIOUS LANGUAGE REVITALIZATION EFFORTS AND CONCEPTION OF THE LLCBI

The Standing Rock Indian Reservation straddles both North and South Dakota and is home to multiple divisions of the Očhéthi Šakówiŋ, or the “Seven Council Fires,” referring to “the seven tribal divisions speaking three distinct dialects” (White Hat, 1999, p. 2). Both Dakȟótiyapi and Lakȟótiyapi, or Dakota/Lakota for short, are spoken at Standing Rock. A survey by SRST concluded that even by 2006 there were fewer than 350 speakers of the language in the area and that most of them were of the elder generations (Archambault, 2021). SBC had been offering Dakota/Lakota classes as semester-long courses since the 1970s, but the need to train students in conversational proficiency, and to use the language in everyday contexts, was growing by the year. As Hauff (2020) describes, the early 2000s were a time of renewed energy when it came to language revitalization on Standing Rock, marked by a concerted effort from the tribal government to fund and promote language programs. For example, in 2006, the SRST Tribal Department of Education began investigating the needs and wants of language and culture teachers in Standing Rock K-12 schools (Hauff, 2020, p. 7). The tribe then partnered with the Lakota Language Consortium (LLC), a non-tribal linguistics organization, to help build a more complex and user-friendly dictionary, grammar book, and supporting teaching materials informed by research in second language acquisition (SLA) to be used in the K-12 classroom. In 2007, SBC shared in this renewed energy by hosting the first Lakota Summer Institute (now called the Dakota/Lakota Summer Institute, or DLSI) and initiating a collegiate language teacher preparation program in 2010 called the Lakota Language Education Action Program. Both programs trained educators in how to use the aforementioned materials, as well as basic language lessons (Hauff, 2020, p. 15). Further, in 2012, SBC opened the Lakȟól’iyapi Wahóȟpi, a Dakota/Lakota language immersion nest that originally served preschoolers ages two to four and now offers immersion classrooms for newborns to two-year-olds, as well as elementary education up to fifth grade. DLSI and immersion, combined with the semester-long language courses at SBC, gave shape and structure to community language learning at Standing Rock.

However, language learners, fluent speaking elders, activists, and other language stakeholders in the community were noticing that most language programming was geared toward teaching children and that it required highly proficient adults. Yet most adult programming was limited to novice learners. Olthuis et al. (2013) call this phenomenon the “lost generation” or “missing generation,” whereby one or multiple generations somehow “miss out” on intentional language programming and thus lack proficiency. While those programs certainly brought adults through and beyond “numbers, colors, and animals” (Hauff, 2020), they were not necessarily helping those novice learners grow into intermediate or advanced learners.

One LLCBI participant described previous programming: “I can’t remember how they were taught before, but it obviously never clicked. Like, I never had any idea before this program how to put sentences together.” Another participant reflected on their past learning experience: “Well, in high school, it wasn’t too, like, language-geared. It was, like, noun-geared. It’s language, but just basics. No phrases to study; just nouns and objects, places, but that’s about it. As far as I went.”

Thus we proposed the LLCBI as a way to turn a new corner in language revitalization and take a first attempt at developing intermediate learners. Funded by the Tribal Colleges and Universities Program and the Documenting Endangered Languages initiative, both programs of the National Science Foundation, the LLCBI sought to expand on existing SBC language initiatives to see what it takes to learn and teach Dakota/Lakota beyond the novice or introductory levels.

ACTIVITIES AND IMPACTS OF LLCBI

The LLCBI had three major components: instructor training in SLA, a one-year intensive adult language program called Ȟpečášni Uŋspéič’ičhiyapi, and documentation of the process and results of the program.

While DLSI provided some training in how to teach languages, opportunities at SBC were limited. DLSI courses for teachers were designed to be Dakota/Lakota-specific and easily replicable in classrooms. As such, they did not explore why certain research-backed techniques worked, nor did they provide a foundation in the study of SLA, where many of these research-backed techniques and theories come from. The first task we undertook for the LLCBI was to identify and participate in other language teaching workshops and institutes that were applicable generally to all languages. We hoped that such education would provide a theoretical foundation for the development of new and additional activities to be used in both K-12 and college classrooms beyond what was taught at DLSI. The LLCBI sent six language teachers to the Center for Advanced Research in Language Acquisition (CARLA) at the University of Minnesota for intensive summer courses, which included developing assessments for the second language classroom, using authentic texts to develop beyond communicative competencies, and using technology in the language classroom and other courses about language acquisition.

The second and largest activity the LLCBI undertook was an intensive adult language program housed at SBC called Ȟpečášni Uŋspéič’ičhiyapi. The name, meaning something along the lines of “putting everything they’ve got into their learning,” was chosen in collaboration with a fluent speaking elder employee at SBC. We often shorten the name to Ȟpečášni or Ȟpečáš. In the initial planning sessions for this initiative, LLCBI organizers and other language stakeholders in the community clearly articulated the need for a DLSI-type program that was carried out all year long. DLSI, which met for nearly six hours every day, was limited to only three weeks in the summer. And while SBC courses were offered year-round, students in those semester-long courses also met just once or twice a week. Naturally, a program that offered an increased number of guided learning hours had the potential to take students to a higher level of proficiency. Therefore, the adult program was designed to meet five days a week, for four hours each day, for nine months. As the goal was to provide instruction to adults who were beyond the introductory level of Dakota/Lakota, Ȟpečášni was attended by participants who entered the program at a novice-mid or novice-high proficiency level, as opposed to being a beginning student with very limited or no previous language learning experience. Since Dakota/Lakota proficiency standards and assessment tools are still under development in multiple communities, we approximated participants’ language ability using the standards designed by the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages as a guideline. Nine students were paid hourly and were awarded monetary bonuses for scores on various assessments throughout the school year.

Due to the importance of student interaction with fluent speakers, Ȟpečášni also invited and compensated multiple fluent speakers to join class sessions and to lead activities in various ways. Six fluent speakers from Standing Rock participated, and some participated multiple times. One fluent speaker, who has since made her journey to the other side, became a cornerstone of Ȟpečášni, participating almost weekly. Fluent speaking elders brought another needed balance to language revitalization and adult language acquisition at Standing Rock. They not only shared their knowledge of language and helped students on their proficiency journey, but they also helped close the gap that existed between generations who were learning language. With the help of fluent speaking elders, Ȟpečášni closed this gap in a kinship-based way—and we would argue a more Dakota/Lakota way. This is important because language revitalization necessitates “not just the creation of new speakers, but the re-creation of a speech community” (Rouvier, 2017, p. 107).

Most of the curriculum for Ȟpečášni had been created from scratch, yet all were informed by the designers’ evolving knowledge of SLA and its possibilities (and limits) when it comes to Dakota/Lakota language acquisition in adults. Ȟpečášni curriculum designers-teachers Nacole Walker and Elliot Bannister were able to recycle about three weeks’ worth of content from the preexisting beginners’ course taught at DLSI. Initially, most of the activities they developed were teacher-led, but as students’ confidence grew, they were able to rely on more student-led activities, group work, and independent self-study.

The final major activity involved the documentation of participants’ language acquisition and their thoughts, feelings, and reflections as their learning progressed. We achieved this through a variety of assessment types. For example, we recorded video interviews with the participants at the beginning, middle, and end of the program, using a combination of English interviews (to document student reflections on their proficiency and confidence) and Dakota/Lakota-speaking demonstrations. At the end of the fall and spring semesters, learners also took written assessments in Dakota/Lakota that measured both recognition and production. Each student also kept a blog in English in which they recorded their reflections on that week’s class. The purpose of these assessments was to both assist the students in their meta-pedagogical awareness (i.e., self-awareness of their language learning progress) and to generate a source of data for the questions we were asking about this process. These assessments were also informed by a growing understanding of what it means to learn another language in a classroom setting, as opposed to growing up with the language.

The majority of classroom activities were documented on video. Of particular importance is the video documentation of activities involving fluent-speaking elders. These videos not only provide research data about the efficacy of SLA, but also double as recordings of fluent speech that will remain invaluable to language teachers and researchers going forward. The data is archived at the Standing Rock Iyápi Program, a member of the Digital Endangered Languages and Musics Archive Network.

RESULTS OF THE LLCBI

The LLCBI sought to develop adult proficiency into the intermediate and advanced levels. This built upon the work of the Dakota/ Lakota Summer Institute and other initiatives on Standing Rock which had nurtured people’s interest in Dakota/Lakota language learning and got them started at the beginner proficiency level. While the written assessments provide some data on participants’ acquisition of Dakota/Lakota, much more extensive evidence of their progress is found in the video documentation. Participants also discussed their improvement in self-reflections. These video assessments, interviews, and reflections document that participants have better comprehension and versatility of language use, higher confidence in basic conversation, and a greater, more thorough understanding of what is needed to “get fluent” in the Dakota/Lakota language. Further, the six students who completed the program were eligible to be licensed to teach Dakota/Lakota in K-12 contexts by attaining an eminent scholar language and culture permit in South Dakota, or a Native American language/culture license in North Dakota (South Dakota Administrative Rules 24:28:09:08 and North Dakota Century Code 15.1-13-22). As one participant noted:

I do feel like this program has been beneficial in that way of learning to teach my babies different ways of saying things. Instead of just teaching them numbers and animals and stuff, because that’s what a lot of the schools here do, in general.

No one in the program emerged speaking like an elder. Nevertheless, participants left knowing how to continue learning from existing materials, and with a deeper set of study skills and stronger sense of confidence. One participant shared that “resources like our grammar book and stuff will make it a lot easier to continue to learn on my own.” Describing the changes the Ȟpečášni has brought to their life, this participant added:

Most of the Hpecášni curriculum was created from scratch, such as this activity, which identifies the various parts of the buffalo.

Every part of my life has become part of like the language, whether it’s coordinating events, or getting our elders paid or coordinating different things. I feel like it’s always been such a part of my life, but I feel more confident in things now. Because like, I would always get to speak in front of people. And I would honestly have no idea what people were saying a lot of the time and I feel like this class has allowed me to be more comfortable running into an elder.

Another participant said:

As far as the way I came through education systems, learning through books, learning through studying, reading, writing, it helps me out a lot. And that’s one of those tools that I’m kind of looking forward to, in the spring and the summer to get into my grammar book. Also, it’s given me confidence, to be able to spend time with elders, to talk to elders, to try Lakota with elders. And I feel like that’s a really important tool: confidence. Because with that, you know, kind of losing my fear of getting corrected, being scolded, or whatever.

LESSONS LEARNED

The LLCBI at Sitting Bull College did not reverse the language shift, nor did it create a critical mass of proficient adult speakers to shepherd the next generation of Dakota/Lakota speakers into the new decade. However, the LLCBI did make significant progress in terms of changing how language organizers see the role of teaching in the larger Dakota/Lakota language revitalization movement. Below are four major lessons we have learned through the process of building language capacity through the LLCBI at SBC. They are listed and described in no particular order.

Lesson one: balance the generations and focus on adults for adults’ sake. A key aspect of the LLCBI, particularly Ȟpečášni, was its focus on teaching adults for the sake of adults. In other words, the program was grounded in the idea that adults themselves should have access to language teaching and should not only have access as a part of their journey to become language teachers. While many of the participants of the LLCBI were teachers or became teachers after the program, none were required to be a teacher to enter the program. In the future, children will be the ones to carry on our languages, but it is adults, right now, who are making pedagogical, institutional, and organizational decisions. If we want language to permeate in our communities, we should help all generations access our language, not just the younger ones.

Lesson two: second language acquisition is invaluable. We need to know how to make informed decisions about how we teach and learn our languages. While direct engagement with SLA in Indigenous language revitalization research is relatively new (Ellis & Shintani, 2013; May, 2019; McIvor, 2020), and while there are some clear challenges when it comes to acquiring Indigenous languages that do not always align with acquiring other world languages, we argue that SLA education should be a central part of Indigenous language revitalization work. Even though there will not be a one-to-one match between the mainstream applied SLA and Indigenous language revitalization, we echo Steve Greymorning and others when we say we need to have a seat at the table so that we can make informed decisions about how we move forward in the teaching and learning of our languages (Berlin, 2000; Greymorning, 1997).

Lesson three: set yourselves up for success. Ȟpečášni did not continue at SBC after the first school year was completed. This is not because there were limited results. One of the biggest lessons we learned with the LLCBI was that there is a significant need for a full-time, intensive adult language learning program with full-time pay and benefits for learners, teachers, and organizers. While there have been Native American studies instructors who teach Dakota/Lakota language courses at SBC, there was no full-time position at the college dedicated to growing and developing intensive language revitalization programming for adults beyond the intermediate level. Language learning is difficult, and to combat language loss and to truly reverse the language shift, adults need to be given the opportunity to dedicate themselves, almost entirely, to the acquisition of language. They should not have to worry about taking a second job, finding childcare so that they can attend class, or having access to healthcare.

While we recognize students must be given the freedom and flexibility to learn language as a full-time job, we further recognize program organizers and curriculum designers should also be given permanent and safe positions. The program did not continue due to structural issues beyond the grant funding, insufficient resources, lack of organizational capacity, and being a mismatch programmatically. Leaders of the LLCBI were eventually employed at other institutions, serving in other capacities in efforts to fulfill personal and professional commitments to the Dakota/Lakota language revitalization movement.

Lesson four: research and report. A major lesson we learned in the LLCBI was to document, report, and share. More research in Indigenous language revitalization is needed. More documentation and analysis of projects, including unsuccessful projects, is needed. We do not need to keep reinventing the wheel. And we do not need to keep learning lessons the hard way, especially when an easier way exists.

The LLCBI, Ȟpečášni, and the various other language programs at SBC and at Standing Rock more broadly have prompted new questions, for example: How to incorporate Dakota/Lakota language into existing curriculum? How to engage with the large body of archival materials recorded in Dakota/Lakota? How to maintain tribal sovereignty over Dakota/Lakota language data? Further, the documentation of time with fluent speakers leaves an invaluable gift for those who get to work with it in the future.

CONCLUSION

What we have presented in this article represents just a moment in time. We recognize that no one-year program can fix everything, but we know programs like this one can be inspirational, lighting a fire for people to advance along the long road of revitalization. We hope that our reporting of this program, including both its strengths and weaknesses, will help other Indigenous communities build or strengthen their own language learning programs for adults.

Tasha Hauff, PhD, is a scholar, teacher, language activist, and an enrolled member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe; Nacole Walker is a member of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and is pursuing a PhD in Indigenous language revitalization at the University of Victoria; Elliot Bannister holds an MEd from Sitting Bull College and directs the Wóoyake Project for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

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