Maxzilla's Mind: Extinction of Native Americans

On the 20th January 2009, a woman whom is the last true speaker of the Native American language (Eyak) passed away. "...the spread of English and competition from the Tlingit, another aboriginal tribe, meant that she was the last native speaker.”

Alright, let's do this. Let's write something. Well, as you can see from the title, I'm going to talk about the extinction of Native Americans. It all started when I was in the waiting-room for the doctor and the radio was talking about the possibility that Native Americans and mostly their language will be "extinct" in the near future. According to a survey by US National Geographic Society, the Native American language is one of the most endangered languages in the world. I thought this was a pretty interesting thing to talk about. I know that Native Americans aren't really English-speaking people. But it has something to do with the American history.
Now, the American Indians have known a history with sad times ever since the Colombians came on their land. They practically took their land and also, because of certain diseases brought over from the Europeans that they weren't immune to, a big part of their people vanished. A lot of probably very fascinating tribes vanished as well.
How was it all before the settlers, then?

If you'd ever go to the west and look at the night sky, you would see tons of stars scrolling across above. During the day you'd see massive clouds wondering above land. It's interesting because that's how they saw how awesome and powerful the acts of nature are. That caused them to believe that we should "befriend" nature. Kind of like our primitive ancestors thought.

Because of the settlers, evolution in technology, society and demand it became hard for not only the Native American culture but also other cultures to catch up. On the radio I mentioned before, they were talking about that it would be hard for the Native Americans to say, for example, "I bought a new computer." in they language. Of course, but then they said that they didn't even have a word for "I", because they always spoke from the group, the tribe and never as "I". When I think of the word "culture" the first thing I see are images of Africa and images of Native Americans. I think that the African and Native-American cultures are great examples of the term. It's a great culture and it's sad to think of it as extinct. I think we should appreciate these cultures and certainly not forget them.

If you'd like to know more, I found this pretty good webpage about a program taking action on reviving the language:
http://www.culturalsurvival.org/programs/elc/program?gclid=COz4xtzRhqwCFcIPfAod5gvg-g

"Is there anything in the world more tragic than the loss of a human language? Whole concepts, relationships, understandings, perspectives, and information are contained in a language, things that cannot be replicated or translated. An entire aspect of humanity, developed over thousands of years goes with it. And that is exactly what is looming in the United States, where 70 of the remaining 139 Native American languages will disappear in the next 5 years..."

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