Sheil called Garifuna “a wonderfully complicated language” with little work done on it in terms of grammar, dictionaries or more theoretical articles, so many questions remain about how the language works.
Garifuna stories, lessons online
To listen to a National Public Radio report on “The ‘Voice’ of the Garifuna”
To hear NPR’s report about UNESCO’s declaration of Garifuna language and culture as a humanitarian masterpiece.
Click here for a website complete with Garifuna lessons and interviews with people about the importance of the language.
Students will present their work in a “Garifuna Fest” mini conference on campus on Monday, April 23. In the coming weeks and months, Palacio and the National Garifuna Council in his native country of Belize will print and distribute a Garifuna grammar book based on the students’ work for use by the general public.
The book will be helpful to Garifuna people in the Caribbean island country of St. Vincent and the Grenadines “who have lost the language completely, as well as people seeking to retrieve or learn the language throughout much of Central America and in the United States, too,” said Palacio.
“This is really very exciting for us as grad students,” said Sheil, “because it means that there is a lot we can contribute, not only for linguistics as a field, but also with this self-teaching guide we’re working on.”
UC Berkeley’s linguistics department faculty members are known for their work to document and save endangered languages. Michael, along with professors Andrew Garrett and Line Mikkelsen received National Science Foundation grants last year to support their research on endangered the languages of Western Tukanoan in Western Amazonia, and Yurok and Karuk in Northern California. The biennial “Breath of Life – Silent No More” workshop on California Indian language restoration will be held again this year on campus from June 3-9.
Michael, an anthropological linguist whose research concentrates on Amazonia and surrounding regions, said the book is the sort of thing that is becoming an increasingly common product of linguistic study, as scholars of endangered languages contribute not just to an academic knowledge base, but also to the cultures they study.
“I am happy to do my little part to help save and retrieve the Garifuna culture,” added Palacio, noting that less than 5 percent of the population of Belize speaks Garifuna and most of those speakers are elderly.
“On a personal level,” he said, “my children do not speak Garifuna, and the same goes for the majority of Garifuna people that I know in my age group. If concrete steps are not taken to retrieve the language, it will definitely be lost.”