The speakers begin by introducing themselves in their own languages. Fibbie introduces Délı̨nę, the community, geography, population, and other characteristics such as subsistence. She then moves to a discussion of Sahtú Dene language, and the age differences in language use. The community tries to mitigate intergenerational language loss with on the land programs for their children, both formal and informal, community-driven. Going on to the land during the summer is often lead by families, who still do a lot of harvesting on the land in their traditional regions. Ingeborg then discusses how people in Délı̨nę talk about place, from the point of view of a linguist. Tatti and Fink worked with several Elders and three youth participants to run a workshop in Délı̨nę in November 2012. The workshop had intergenerational participants work with audiovisual recording technology and Google Earth to record place name knowledge.

Abstract:

This paper highlights the benefits of a community-based approach (see Czaykowska-Higgins, 2009; Vallejos, 2014) in a language documentation project in the Dene community of Délı̨nę, Canada. It describes the collaborative efforts of a community researcher and an outside linguist to develop joint research interests and ground them with other community members in the specific cultural setting in order to benefit all parties. We first outline our project and the factors that contributed to the success of our research approach, focusing on an inter-generational workshop. We then introduce our results and demonstrate how the setup of the research brought forward crucial insights to the specific knowledge of place in Dene. 

After identifying with elders of the community historically and culturally important geographic locations, including the traditional name attached to each location, we learned from the elders the stories behind the name of each location. The deeper meanings of these stories are known to people who lived on the land but are often unknown to younger generations. We developed a methodology bringing together elders and younger generations in an inter-generational workshop and actively engaging both in the research process in order to contribute to capacity building in language documentation and revitalization. The workshop was facilitated by a community researcher and held in Dene to enable the documentation of interactional patterns and communicative practices. At the same time the outside linguist trained youth participants in language documentation methodology (eg. multi-media recording, Google Earth), which they were able to perform independently by the end of the workshop. Since many of the younger generation are not fluent in Dene, English summaries were given throughout the workshop. These summaries allowed the younger generation to follow the content of the stories while also witnessing cultural protocols. Despite the challenges of the language barrier, the presence of the younger generation highly contributed to the motivation of the elders.

In analyzing the complex relationships between an outside researcher and community researchers from diverse generations and backgrounds as well as among community researchers we conclude that it was the research set up and the reciprocal relationships, as well as the observation of cultural protocols that proved to be crucial in the production and analysis of natural, reliable and validated language materials. In giving concrete examples and reflecting the challenges of our approach this paper contributes to the theory of developing effective research approaches that engage citizen scientists from various backgrounds.

Access this Resource:

Tatti, Fibbie and Ingeborg Fink. “Towards a multi-layered understanding of place in Dene: An inter-generational and inter-disciplinary approach to Dene narratives.” Presented at the 4^th International Conference on Language Documentation and Conservation (ICLDC), 12 March 2015.