Culture Keeping and Language Revitalization with Leanne Hinton
November 19, 2022 | 5:00 pm – 6:00 pm
Join Leanne Hinton at Bart’s Books at 5pm on November 19th!
Originally published in 1994, Flutes of Fire: An Introduction to Native California Languages, Revised and Updated is an approachable, entertaining, and informative classic on Native culture-keeping, an introduction to Native California languages that appears now in a newly expanded edition spotlighting 25 years of intervening linguistic activism keeping Indigenous voice, viewpoint, and tradition alive.
Dedicated to the elders of Native California “past, present, and future,” Hinton’s accessible entry point into our linguistic inheritance, published under Heyday’s Roundhouse program, meditates on the nuance of language, the human lessons language holds, and the significance of storytelling in cultural memory. Diving into the writing systems, Bird Songs, and current efforts to pass the torch to new speakers, Hinton reveals and revels in the vital heartbeat of California’s first languages, reminding us that even with the multiplicity of our idioms and origins, we are all, in fact, part of one human family.
Leanne will be joined by fellow AICLS board member Matthew Vestuto who serves as the language program coordinator for the Barbareño/Ventureño Band of Mission Indians, the director of the Tšumaš Transcription Project, and the president of the Lulapin Chumash Foundation. There to honor Leanne will be Vestuto’s ever-growing mitsqanaqan̓ speaking community.
Register HereAbout the Speaker
Leanne Hinton
Leanne Hinton is professor emerita at the University of California, Berkeley, and a founding member of the board of the Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival. She has authored many articles and several books on language revitalization, including Flutes of Fire: Essays on California Indian Languages; The Green Book of Language Revitalization in Practice (edited with Ken Hale); and How to Keep Your Language Alive: A Commonsense Approach to One-on-One Language Learning (with Matt Vera and Nancy Steele). She has worked with AICLS to develop and implement the Master-Apprentice Language Learning Program and the Breath of Life Language Workshops, both of which have expanded throughout the US and internationally. In 2005 she received the Cultural Freedom Award from the Lannan Foundation for her work on the revitalization of endangered languages. Leanne lives in Berkeley, California, with her husband, Gary Scott, and delights in family time with their four children and seven grandchildren.
Author photo by Scott Braley.
