After a busy summer of many types of doings throughout Lakota country, we’re excited to be back with a new episode for the month of September. In this episode, in light of our students returning back to school, we discuss the topic of education. The speakers in this episode related their school experiences to language and tell about a time when certain schools and teachers forbid them from speaking their language. However, we also discuss how these schools have changed and many of them are now teaching the language.

All in all, we’d like to encourage all of the students working hard to earn an education, as well as acknowledge all educators who dedicate their careers to helping the future generations. There is also a plug for the Woksape Tipi - Library and Archives located on the Piya Wiconi Campus at Oglala Lakota College, please feel free to visit them to find Lakota language resources, listen to the raw interviews from this podcast, and speak Lakota with librarian, Darlene Bear Killer. 

Speakers in this episode include: Wilber Witt (Oglála), Eugene Black Crow (Oglála), Harriet Bring (Oglála), Darlene Bear Killer (Oglala), Robert Two Crow (Oglála), and Alex FireThunder (Oglála). 

Wičháho Blihélya means, “with energetic voices” in Lakota. This podcast is intended to serve three major purposes: language preservation via documentation of the Lakota language as it is spoken by Native speakers and elders, language revitalization via providing interesting and engaging content for language learners to listen to in low-anxiety environments and for teachers to use in classrooms, and finally language maintenance by providing Lakota speakers with a talk show to listen to in their first language. This podcast was made possible by Hóyeya and The Lakota Language Consortium. 

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This podcast is a free resource to share the language. If you’d like to support our efforts in providing monetary gifts for the speakers on this podcast you can donate here - https://lakhota.org/donate/

Thanks to the LLC team that worked on this episode: 

Alex FireThunder, Robert Two Crow, Shania Black Bear-Searby, Jamie Marquez-Bratcher, Jan Ullrich, and Marek Kupiec.

A special wóphila to Shania Black Bear-Searby for our amazing podcast artwork.

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