As heard on NPR's All Things Considered.

For nearly a thousand years the Hopi people have lived on the same three mesas, land now considered part of northeastern Arizona.  For all that while they have been speaking the Hopi language, but now everyone says the language is dying.  There are many hurdles standing in the way of preserving Hopi -- the great distances between each of the eleven villages, the distinct dialects in each of those villages, and for Hopi teens, the choice between preserving the Hopi culture or adopting a modern lifestyle.

In order of appearance: Austin Coochyamptewa, Alrye Polequaptewa, Leandra Calnimptewa, Paul Quamahongnewa, Annalese Nasafotie, Paul Quamahongnewa, Eloise Coochyamptewa, Leon Koruh, Rochelle Lomayaktewa, DeAnn Honanie.

 Special Thanks to the Hopi High School Radio and Journalism Classes.

 A complete transcipt of the story as it aired is availible after the jump...

SCRIPT

[Music]

Austin Coochyamptewa: Since the beginning we have been taught about the end. When our language dies, we are told that the world will begin dying with it.

Alrye Polequaptewa: We have a prophecy that one night lost brothers will awaken from the dead, then they’ll draw a line from one end of the village to the other. One by one they will line us up and then they will ask us “um Hopita kida, um Hopi.” Are you I’m Hopi? Can you speak the Hopi language? And if you cannot respond back in fluent Hopi, they will place us on the right side of the line. And soon after that they will cut our throats. This is what we called our Judgment Day.

[Music]

Austin Coochyamptewa: This is our school, the Hopi Junior Senior High School. Our Hopi language is dying, and me and most of my friends are struggling to speak it.

Leandra Calnimptewa: When I talk to my friends we speak English, we don’t like speak our Hopi language. Because some of my friends aren’t Hopi, others are, but they don’t really know how to speak it.

Paul Quamahongnewa: I’m just terrified that if I don’t speak, like right now. Everything I know that I’ve been doing, won’t really matter because I’ve lost my culture and my language already.

Annalese Nasafotie: It’s a scary thought that our culture is all dependent on our generation. Our culture’s dying, and there’s nothing we can do to save it because nobody wants to take the time to learn our language. It’s not going to have no significance it’s after all our elders are gone.

Austin Coochyamptewa: This problem isn’t new to our generation.

Eloise Coochyamptewa: I’m 66 years old.

Austin Coochyamptewa: Hope you stop learning our language.

Eloise Coochyamptewa: I wasn’t allowed to speak my language.

Austin Coochyamptewa: When they were punished for speaking in schools.

Eloise Coochyamptewa: You’re afraid, you’re ashamed and you’re crying and they tell you to stop crying and hit you, but how can you stop crying when they hit you.

Austin Coochyamptewa: That’s what happened to my grandmother.

Eloise Coochyamptewa: Eloise Coochyamptewa.

Austin Coochyamptewa: She stopped teaching her children.

Eloise Coochyamptewa: I regret it now.

Austin Coochyamptewa: To protect them from suffering the same humiliation that she had to endure when she was in school.

Eloise Coochyamptewa: I remember holding on to a fence, just crying, and then my dad will be dragging me to the classroom. It was so scary to sit there, that’s what happened to me. That’s why I didn’t teach my kids.

Austin Coochyamptewa: Remember the part, remember when, alright, we were sitting there doing laundry and I asked you, “how do you say this”, “how do you say that”, “what’s the word for up”, “down”, “where did you go”, things like that.

Eloise Coochyamptewa: Oh yeah. And I told him even if you can’t pronounce it right I’ll know what you’re trying to say, you know that why, I can help I can correct you I just hope you don’t die, don’t die, cuz that’s the only thing we have right now is our language and our ceremonious but it’s not too late, it’s not too late.

Leon Koruh: There’s two kind of people here. There’s one to destroy everything of Hopi even the language. And then there’s the others to preserve it.

Austin Coochyamptewa: This is Leon Koruh.

Leon Koruh: I am 48 years olds.

Austin Coochyamptewa: He is the spokesperson for the religious leaders of the Musungnuvi village.

Leon Koruh: If you wanna lose then language then you don’t learn it, you don’t speak it, you don’t teach it on to the next one.

Rochelle Lomayaktewa: I know we should speak it, but we just are like embarrassed and scared.

Austin Coochyamptewa: Lots of young people don’t want to speak the language in front of their elders because they say the elders make fun of them.

DeAnn Honanie: It’s scary when your trying to talk older people I guess because they tease a lot and we take it personally and we don’t want to speak it no more.

Leon Koruh: Sometimes the Hopi will say making fun of you should also get you to say okay I’m going to better myself, even though the children having hard time they shouldn’t stop because they’re the ones that will carry this language on it’s really no choice, unless we wanna, you know, forget who we are.

Austin Coochyamptewa: At our school there is only one student who is fluent in Hopi.

Rochelle Lomayaktewa: His name is Alrye Polequaptewa.

Paul Quamahongnewa: And everyone calls him Hopi boy.

Rochelle Lomayaktewa: Hopi boy.

Austin Coochyamptewa: Hopi boy.

Alrye Polequaptewa: (In Hopi) You never forget a language that you first learn.

Austin Coochyamptewa: The thing that makes Alrye different from everyone else is that his parents forced him to speak Hopi.

Alrye Polequaptewa: I learned the language from my parents when I was just a (In Hopi) little baby. It’s all they talk to me in was Hopi. And Hopi, it was suppose to be the first language I’ll ever learn.

Rochelle Lomayaktewa: Some people made fun of Alrye when we were younger because he had a traditional hair cut and spoke the language so well.

Alrye Polequaptewa: Number one Hopi boy coming through the door I guess they admired me but I thought they were like teasing me.

Paul Quamahongnewa: I kinda looked up to him because he knew Hopi and I started to learn words from him and I started learning and learning and learning and learning it just started popping in my head and I started getting an idea of what people were talking about.

Alrye Polequaptewa: Later on as I wondered why be like them when I can be myself and be different. And then I did that and I became a role model.

[Music]

Austin Coochyamptewa: The land of the Hopi is the center of the universe. We have lived on these three mesas for generations and all that while are people that have been speaking the Hopi language, but now everyone is saying that our language is dying.

[Music]