Washoe class tries to save dying language

Melba Rakow tells her small group of students to think Washoe.

"Leave English at the door," said Rakow. "Don't apply English in the class. Your mindset changes if you start thinking in Washoe."

There could be as few as 10 native Washoe speakers left and Rakow is one of them. She teaches a Washoe language class at Western Nevada Community College and uses a phonetic approach to teach students the only language she knew for the first five years of her life.

"Most indigenous languages are melodic but you lose it when you translate it into English," Rakow said.

"The (Washoe) language is flowing. Even today, it's losing its connective flow. You need to add connective sounds - it's something that's lost but it's coming back."

Rakow said she would like to see Washoe preserved as a spoken language.

"My goal is that it will snowball - that others will hear it and pick it up," she said.

Washoe is a language isolate - a natural language that doesn't descend from an ancestor common to any other language. Washoe is traditionally a spoken language. That added to its fluid characteristics makes it endangered.

Washoe people lived along the Truckee and Carson rivers and at Lake Tahoe. They spoke Washoe differently depending on where they lived.

The government's efforts in the last century to assimilate the Washoe people into the general, English-speaking, population further kept the language's chances of survival slim.

"Children were taken away from their families to go to boarding schools and some were shipped to Arizona to be assimilated," said Rakow.

"In boarding school, you went to church, dressed in the uniform, couldn't speak the language or perform ceremonies. The girls' hair was cut - you were supposed to forget everything you were taught."

Rakow said many people suffered from what is now called post-traumatic stress disorder, although a few tough ones survived the separation from their families.

"In 1920, they thought we were a genocided people," she said. "We weren't allowed lands and they wanted us assimilated, but we fooled them - we're still here."

She said Washoe has to be spoken to survive as a language.

"You can't learn it and put it away - you have to use it," Rakow said.

One way the Washoe language is still used is in the baby-naming ceremonies. Until they're given their formal names, children's names could change depending on what they do or look like. Rakow said she started her life named after a baby chick for her lack of hair.

"But if you pass away, you have to have a name," she said. "They have to know you on the other side or you're in limbo. We have to see what they are before we name the kids. Sometimes the parents name them and sometimes others."

Dresslerville resident Danny Wyatt teaches basket and hand game classes, tutors children in Woodfords and also helps in the community college's Washoe language class.

"You know your language is dying when you stop making up words to fit the language," said Wyatt.

He gives the example that the word for "remote control" in Washoe is "remote control."

Western Nevada Community College counselor Dick Kale said being Washoe is not a requirement to take the class - that it's an attempt to make people aware of both the Washoe language and culture.

"This class is offered as college credit and will apply to social studies," said Kale. "It meets requirements and we hope to build on it. The (Douglas County) school district gives credit for this language program.

"UC Berkeley has made language tapes and the tribe has put a lot into the program," he said.

"Otherwise the language would be gone," said Rakow. "Most people don't speak it."

"We have to try harder or in the next 10-20 years, that's it," said Wyatt.

Babies are formally named in baby-naming ceremonies, but until then, their names could change depending on what they do or look like.

Rakow said she started her life named after a baby chick for her lack of hair.

"But if you pass away, you have to have a name," she said. "They have to know you on the other side or you're in limbo. We have to see what they are before we name the kids. Sometimes the parents name them and sometimes others."