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Some more broken Lakota
I have randomly opened the book and there are many errors in sentence structures. This is due to the English sentence structures being applied by Lakota words. I laughed at some of the sentences and I realized it was not a laughing matter. Our ancestors have developed our Lakota language for many years. With a punch on a keyboard, words has changed the essence of our Lakota language. The new Lakota dictionary also has some of the same specific errors as the Buechel dictionary so I assume a lot of the work is just copying Buechel's work. Here are some specific examples. Wit'e means, "the moon is dead." When I was in my youth, certain activities are halted until the moon appears in the sky. After the appearance of the moon everything resumes normally. In the Buechel's dictionary, it says, "new moon." This phase in the lunar cycle is considered to be the new moon by the wasicu. In the new dictionary, this mistranslation was not corrected. The word t'o used in three different ways means, green, blue and the new dictionary missed gray. At the end of the definitions there are three words. Matho, nitho and unthopi. These words are made up. I think it is supposed to mean, I am blue, you are blue and we are blue. Someone has waaaaay to much time listening to dysfunctional cowboy love songs. With differences in orthorgraphy, mato or matho means bear in Lakota. Confusing? Yes!! In the Lakota language, numbers and math are not important. Incidentally, the number four is NOT sacred. The numbers three and ten are also not important in the Christian religions. In Lakota there are two words, numnum and tobtob. These words were confusingly translated in the Buechel dictionary. The Lakota speakers were probably not clear in their translation as they probably did not speak adequate English to explain this concept correctly. Read carefully as I explain these two words. The Lakota word numnum means two at a time. It is NOT two and two or two times two. Tobtob also means four at a time. It is NOT four plus four or four times four as we do not have a multiplier in our language. The sentence using tobtob in the new dictionary is misused and mistranslated. In the Buechel dictionary, sometimes the contributor is identified. The new dictionary should do the same so we would know who of the consultants and advisors speak broken Lakota. When I was a young boy, the Church and the BIA always told us what was good for us. The comment on what is good for us falls into that category. It seems people wrote a dictionary which resembles a previous dictionary using a different orthography. A Lakota language program has been developed and is implied the program is better than our programs. Oh those boarding school memories. We as Lakota people have become more educated and we certainly do not need to spring backwards in time and take someone's paternalistic attitude towards Lakota people. I have been critical of our Lakota language programs but I feel we can develop a program to fit our needs. Our tribal councils have a responsibility to protect our history, culture and language. This new Lakota dictionary and language program should be discussed in the tribal council halls as well as the people who are involved in teaching the Lakota language on the reservations. We as Lakota speakers have to guide the tribal councils so they can make a good law protecting our intellectual property. The economy of the country is going through a recession and the federal government is going to go through intense scrutiny on all of the federal programs. Many of the reservation programs may well be cut back including education. This program has a Lakota language program he is trying to sell to schools. I assume Lakota language program has been tested some place and he should publish these results. The program costs should be published such as testing the students, training the teachers, language materials, costs per student and the length of the program. One last thing, there is a Lakota language summit being held in Rapid City during Veterans Day a national holiday. All of America is honoring the veterans and why are they disrespecting the veterans by working on that day? We as Lakota people take pride in our service and those working people on Veterans Day certainly do not have cultural awareness of this special day for the veterans!
Hechetu yelo !!
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