Post-colonial theology
20/10/12 05:22
We had a brief lesson in Lakota language yesterday. I am not a natural learner of languages. I struggle to remember vocabulary and my pronunciation isn’t always up to par. I think that one of the challenges for me is learning to listen to other languages. When I am in Costa Rica, for example, where I am surrounded by Spanish speakers, I gain confidence and begin to use more and more Spanish words. When I return home and my encounters with Spanish are mostly reading, my comprehension and confidence both fade quickly. Lakota is a bigger challenge for me because it is an oral language. There are a couple of different systems for writing Lakota words. The dictionary by Eugene Buechel is pretty common and not too difficult to use. I have the New Lakota dictionary by the Lakota Language Consortium. It has a lot of accents and marks over words that are difficult to memorize and so pronunciation is harder to pick up. Even simple oral lessons seem to work better than bookwork when it comes to learning a bit of the language.
Language is so important when it comes to understanding a culture. There are nuances of worldview that are built into a language. English, for example, doesn’t assign gender to many objects. Of course there are gender words pertaining to humans and animals, but other European languages assign gender to inanimate objects and speakers have to remember appropriate prefixes. Lakota has word variations, primarily suffixes, that shift depending on the gender of the speaker. It isn’t quite true to say that there is a language of men and a different language of women, but there are ways of speaking the belong to the genders.
It could be argued that there is little reason for a middle-aged person of European descent to try to learn Lakota. English is the dominant language of our culture. It is also the dominant language of the reservations. Less than 14% of Dakota, Nakota and Lakota people speak native languages. The average age of a Lakota speaker is 60 years old. It is clear that despite significant efforts to teach the language at the high school and college level, fluency in Lakota is declining and the language is on the brink of being lost.
There is an immersion preschool for 3-year-olds on the Standing Rock Reservation and plans are underway to open a day care program for children from 15 months to 5 years in Pine Ridge. Children who are immersed in a language at a very early age learn it as a primary language and retain fluency throughout their lifespan. However, it is unclear how effective the 3-year-old program will be as the children grow up and attend English-based primary schools. The simple fact that Lakota is not spoken at home creates significant challenges for teaching it to even very young children.
Our experiences yesterday weren’t primarily focused on language. English was clearly the language of our conversations. What are doing is continuing a process of gathering to speak frankly about race and racism, to discover places where we can work together, to speak out for justice and reconciliation between the people of South Dakota.
Our history is a long journey of not being kind to each other. That sentence is, of course, a radical understatement. The invasion and seizure of native lands by settlers, primarily form Europe, was accompanied by genocide. There were concerted efforts to wipe out the indigenous people of this continent. Multiple massacres left deep scars. The destruction of the buffalo herds destroyed a way of life. Boarding schools ripped children from families and stole their language, history and culture from them. Broken treaties destroyed trust. Other factors, perhaps not intended, contributed to the trauma suffered by North American native people. The advent of European settlers introduced new diseases for which the natives had no immunity. Epidemics ravaged communities. There might be some debate about whether or not smallpox was deliberately introduced to native communities there is no debate that the disease had devastating effects.
The exiling of the remnant people to reservations decreased contact between natives and non-natives. Early mission efforts by the church were accompanied by a paternalistic attempt to supplant indigenous culture with the culture of the missionaries.
The simple truth is that terrible things have been done in the name of the church. So, today, we who have inherited that legacy and who seek to continue the work of the church, have a lot of work to do to heal ancient wounds, to address issues of grave injustice, and to discover new ways of thinking bout our mission and ministry. Reverend Norman Jackson challenged us yesterday to be diligent in our work on a “post-colonial theology.”
What I have learned from nearly three decades of living in the Dakotas is that one of the most important parts of my role in the process is listening. I need to be present at the gatherings, witness the work that is done, and listen. The last thing my Lakota and Dakota sisters and brothers need from me is for me to attempt to speak for them.
Listening includes learning new words and new ways of expression. So, in my own, halting, primary and imperfect way, I am trying to learn more of the language. And, for me, the best way to work on the language is to listen to others speak and try to repeat the words myself. I don’t need to buy more books, I need to spend more time with Lakota speakers. So far, the most important book is one that I received as a gift from a wise elder in our community about fifteen years ago. Emma Tibbets dedicated her life to working with and serving native people in our area. With her husband, Rev. Percy Tibbets , she forged important bonds of service in a time when much of the rest of the community was ignoring the situation of indigenous people. From her bed in a nursing home, she gave me Percy’s copy of the Dakota Odowan – the hymnal of our Dakota churches. It is one of my most treasured possessions.
Singing the songs of faith together seems to be the best teacher of the language for an old man like me. I don’t always understand every word, but I do understand the faith and I know a lot of the words.
I think “Jack” Jackson is right. We need to develop a new theology. But the hymnody of that new theology may be the sounds of a hymnal that has been around for nearly a century.
Language is so important when it comes to understanding a culture. There are nuances of worldview that are built into a language. English, for example, doesn’t assign gender to many objects. Of course there are gender words pertaining to humans and animals, but other European languages assign gender to inanimate objects and speakers have to remember appropriate prefixes. Lakota has word variations, primarily suffixes, that shift depending on the gender of the speaker. It isn’t quite true to say that there is a language of men and a different language of women, but there are ways of speaking the belong to the genders.
It could be argued that there is little reason for a middle-aged person of European descent to try to learn Lakota. English is the dominant language of our culture. It is also the dominant language of the reservations. Less than 14% of Dakota, Nakota and Lakota people speak native languages. The average age of a Lakota speaker is 60 years old. It is clear that despite significant efforts to teach the language at the high school and college level, fluency in Lakota is declining and the language is on the brink of being lost.
There is an immersion preschool for 3-year-olds on the Standing Rock Reservation and plans are underway to open a day care program for children from 15 months to 5 years in Pine Ridge. Children who are immersed in a language at a very early age learn it as a primary language and retain fluency throughout their lifespan. However, it is unclear how effective the 3-year-old program will be as the children grow up and attend English-based primary schools. The simple fact that Lakota is not spoken at home creates significant challenges for teaching it to even very young children.
Our experiences yesterday weren’t primarily focused on language. English was clearly the language of our conversations. What are doing is continuing a process of gathering to speak frankly about race and racism, to discover places where we can work together, to speak out for justice and reconciliation between the people of South Dakota.
Our history is a long journey of not being kind to each other. That sentence is, of course, a radical understatement. The invasion and seizure of native lands by settlers, primarily form Europe, was accompanied by genocide. There were concerted efforts to wipe out the indigenous people of this continent. Multiple massacres left deep scars. The destruction of the buffalo herds destroyed a way of life. Boarding schools ripped children from families and stole their language, history and culture from them. Broken treaties destroyed trust. Other factors, perhaps not intended, contributed to the trauma suffered by North American native people. The advent of European settlers introduced new diseases for which the natives had no immunity. Epidemics ravaged communities. There might be some debate about whether or not smallpox was deliberately introduced to native communities there is no debate that the disease had devastating effects.
The exiling of the remnant people to reservations decreased contact between natives and non-natives. Early mission efforts by the church were accompanied by a paternalistic attempt to supplant indigenous culture with the culture of the missionaries.
The simple truth is that terrible things have been done in the name of the church. So, today, we who have inherited that legacy and who seek to continue the work of the church, have a lot of work to do to heal ancient wounds, to address issues of grave injustice, and to discover new ways of thinking bout our mission and ministry. Reverend Norman Jackson challenged us yesterday to be diligent in our work on a “post-colonial theology.”
What I have learned from nearly three decades of living in the Dakotas is that one of the most important parts of my role in the process is listening. I need to be present at the gatherings, witness the work that is done, and listen. The last thing my Lakota and Dakota sisters and brothers need from me is for me to attempt to speak for them.
Singing the songs of faith together seems to be the best teacher of the language for an old man like me. I don’t always understand every word, but I do understand the faith and I know a lot of the words.
I think “Jack” Jackson is right. We need to develop a new theology. But the hymnody of that new theology may be the sounds of a hymnal that has been around for nearly a century.