How the Okanagan Nation is trying to save its Indigenous language

The Nsyilxcen language is considered an endangered Indigenous language, as there are less than 150 fluent speakers left alive in the Okanagan Nation.

Now the En’owkin Centre in Penticton is trying to change that.

“We don’t have enough fluent speakers right now, so every time we lose an elder, we’re losing a lot of who we are,” said board member Sharon Lindley.

A three-day workshop is underway to teach young people their native language through stop-motion animation.

“We try to use the technology as a way to get them to interact and learn part of the language in the story,” said program facilitator Shane Kruger.

The Nsyilxcen language is not the only one in danger of disappearing.

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According to the First People’s Cultural Council (FPCC), a B.C. Crown Corporation dedicated to revitalizing aboriginal languages, there are 34 First Nations languages in B.C., and 93 dialects that are spoken.

B.C. is home to more than 50 per cent of all Indigenous languages in Canada, according to the FPCC.

The most recent First Nations Languages Report, released on Aug.1, found only three per cent of Indigenous people in B.C. identify as being fluent in their mother tongue.

That’s fewer than 4,200 people and a decline from 4.1 per cent to 3 per cent since 2014.

“Without our language, we’ve got nothing,” said elder Pauline Gregoire Archachan, who is one of the rare fluent speakers in the Okanagan.

“I grew up with the language and it’s important that young people should learn it.”

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The loss of language stems from colonization and the residential school system.

“Some of them would say, it was beaten out of us,” Lindley said.

Now the powers that be are trying to right a wrong.

Earlier this year, the B.C. government announced $50 million to preserve Indigenous languages while the federal government plans to recognize them as a constitutional right.

Lindley said action needs to be expedited before it is too late.

“We need to do it a lot quicker than we’re doing it now, because we’re losing our elders at a regular rate,” she said.