Imagine being told a story by your grandfather who learned the story from his grandfather. You have heard the story many times and can recite it easily, but you choose to not tell it to your grandchildren. What will happen to that story? Most likely it will die off. This is comparable to Native American tribes who have their distinct languages, but are unable to share it with their younger members. Various Native American tribes use revitalization programs to try and prevent their languages from going extinct. One of the groups that are trying to prevent their languages from going extinct are Yup’ik Eskimos. Yup’ik Eskimos can be found in Southwestern Alaska. This group of people travel by plane, boat, and snowmobile, but transportation by road to reach another village is unlikely. The inability to speak the Central Yup’ik language and share information on a large scale, may be contributing to the loss of the language. There are approximately 23,000 Yup’ik Eskimos, but only roughly 25 percent of the that number will have their children use it as their first language. The Central Yup’ik language is considered a highly-endangered language, but steps are being taken to preserve it. …show more content…
The goals of the programs vary from cultural enrichment to dual language development. It was stated in “Changing the Conversation” that the Yup’ik Language Institute was funded in 2002. Furthermore, the University of Alaska Fairbanks was awarded five United States Department of Education grants. These grants went to establish other Yup’ik language programs. One of the main goals is for these language revitalization programs to continue, but under the leadership of the Yup’ik