We will greatly miss Professor Macri and we wish her all of the best during her retirement.
Pinigigi Professor Macri! Thank you!
Left to right: James Sarmento; Martha Macri; Cuauhtemoc Lule; Stephanie Lumsden; Angel Hinzo; Patricia Killelea; Vanessa Esquivido. Photograph taken by Professor Hulleah Tsinhnahjinnie
Yesterday, the Native American Studies Department held the retirement celebration for our beloved faculty member Dr. Martha Macri. Professor Macri (Cherokee Nation) began her career in 1988 as a lecturer for Native American Studies and Anthropology. She was a University of California President's Postdoctoral Fellow at UC Davis from 1990-1991 and joined the Native American Studies Department shortly after. Professor Macri served as the Rumsey Endowed Chair in California Indian Studies from 2007 to 2013. She specializes in Native American language revitalization, California Indian Studies, electronic data archiving, and non-alphabetic scripts (especially in ancient Mesoamerica). We will greatly miss Professor Macri and we wish her all of the best during her retirement. Pinigigi Professor Macri! Thank you!
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New to the site today: James Sarmento is a member of the Shasta Nation and a graduate student in Native American Studies at the University of California, Davis. He received his BA in Anthropology and in Ethnic Studies from CSU Sacramento. He is the executive director of the Native American Language Center and the project coordinator for the J.P. Harrington Database Project. His research focuses on language revitalization, specifically the Shasta language. You can find out more about all of our students by visiting the current students page.
UCD NAS Grad Students Lori Laiwa and Melissa Leal attended the National Breath of Life Symposium in Washington DC June 12-26. There were only 40 seats available nationwide. The goal of the Breath of Life Institute is to help Native Americans involved in language revitalization find and make use of materials on their languages that are in the National Anthropological Archives and Library of Congres. UCD Grad Student Melissa Leal shares her experience at the Institute. Ene lepa Melissa Leal. Ene Esselen-k. Nish welel cha’a. My name is Melissa Leal. I am Esselen. My language lives. These are important words for me to write but also for others to read. Esselen is a language and a people. Both have been deemed “extinct” by anthropologists, in fact, Esselen was probably the first language to be deemed “extinct” in California. Esselen is an isolate, meaning it isn’t related to any other language and it doesn’t fit in any language group. In indigenous linguistic circles we like to say that the language is not extinct but is just “sleeping” and it is my goal to wake it up. I think that the Breath of Life Archival Institute of 2011, held in Washington D.C has been a great rooster crow for the sun rising in Esselen country. Breath of Life is definitely a working conference. Each participant is paired with a mentor who is a linguist. The linguist that I worked with was Jim Bauman and he was awesome. He was very open and willing to be creative with working on the language. Esselen doesn’t have any speakers or audio recordings. Therefore, creativity and intuitiveness is important when working on the language. Every day the participants and linguists met at the National Museum of the American Indian from 8:30 am until 1:00 pm for lectures/workshops, at which point we loaded on to buses to go to places like the Library of Congress or National Anthropological Archives until 5:00 pm. Then we headed back to the dorms to do our homework. Although everyone was excited to be finding information and being able to work on their language, we were all exhausted. This was the schedule for two weeks. Unfortunately, none of the archives had any new information or material that was Esselen but three great things came out of the Breath of Life conference for me. 1. My linguist and I were able to translate a sentence that had never been done before (correctly). 2. My linguist introduced me to a great database and input all of the Esselen words into it. Now Esselen has a database and I can add and change it quickly and easily. 3. My final project included writing and then reciting a rap in Esselen which was the first for Breath of Life (and my first time rapping in public!) Breath of Life left me with great ideas for future opportunities and contacts with other “language people” all over the United States. Previously: Two UCD NAS Grad Students are on their way to Washington DC for the Breath of Life Archival Institute. Melissa Leal is a descendant of Ohlone and Esselen peoples of Monterey, California. She received her BA from CSU, Sacramento in Ethnic Studies and is currently C.Phil in Native American Studies. Her research includes the reciprocal relationship between Hip Hop Culture and Indigenous Communities. She is also interested in Performance Studies, Popular Culture, and the intersectionalities of descendants of Africa and Indigenous Americans. Melissa also works on revitalizing the Esselen language. She is a lifetime resident of Sacramento County and teaches dance, jewelry making, and classes on revitalizing indigenous languages. Learn more about her here.
UCD NAS Grad Students Lori Laiwa and Melissa Leal will attend National Breath of Life Symposium in Washington DC June 12-26. There are only 40 seats available nationwide!!
CLICK to learn more about Lori and Melissa. From the Website: Breath of Life Archival Institute The Endangered Language Fund is pleased to announce the Breath of Life Archival Institute for Indigenous Languages, Washington, DC, June 13-24, 2011 The goal of the Breath of Life Institute is to help Native Americans involved in language revitalization find and make use of materials on their languages that are in the National Anthropological Archives and Library of Congress1. Under the leadership of Lisa Conathan and Leanne Hinton, this two week workshop will allow teams of participants (Native American heritage language learners, teachers and activists) paired with mentors (experts in linguistics who help guide the participants' work) to explore the language resources in archives in the District of Columbia area. Visits to the archives will be supplemented by lectures and workshops on linguistics, language teaching and learning, and related topics. The Institute is funded by the National Science Foundation's Documenting Endangered Languages program. It will be co-hosted by the Smithsonian Institution's National Anthropological Archives (NAA), National Museum of Natural History (MNH) and National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI), and the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress (AFC). The Breath of Life Archival Institute is funded by the Documenting Endangered Languages program of the National Science Foundation . NAS Grad Student Lori Laiwa was featured in to articles discussing her research on Pomo language. Read the UC Davis "Discover What Matters" site here. Read the Campaign for UC Davis: Advancing Public Service feature here. “I believe using indigenous research methodologies, especially reclaiming and revitalizing language, is critical for reviving indigenous cultures and ensuring their longterm sustainability." -Lori Laiwa - The Campaign for UC Davis |
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Welcome to the Davis Native American Studies Graduate Student Blog. This blog was started as a place to update on all of the amazing work that is being done by the Graduate Students in the UC Davis Native American Studies Department. The Graduate Program in Native American Studies was approved in 1998, making UC Davis only the second university in the nation to offer a Ph.D. in Native American Studies. In Fall 1999, the Department welcomed its first group of students enrolled in the M.A. and Ph.D. Programs in Native American Studies.
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DisclaimerThis blog is an independent site run by the NAS Grad Students at UCD. The views expressed on this website are not the views of UC Davis Native American Studies nor the University of California Davis and/or its affiliates. |