By Isabella Urbani, Staff Writer
If you’re a high school graduate in BC, you’ve probably taken a language course. Heck, if you’re like me, you’ve been taking a language class since elementary school. But in high school, when students are establish identities, why not learn some of the languages that were historically spoken on 95% of the unceded land settlers occupy? It’s time to make Indigenous languages an option for high school students.
In BC alone, there are more than “30 different First Nation languages” accounting for “60% of First Nations languages in Canada.” Incorporating Indigenous languages into school is a critical part of Indigenous peoples’ demands for reconciliation. It’s stated in the tenth of 94 Calls to Action on the journey of reconciliation.
The power of language is made clearer by the residential school system’s desire to impose European languages. The Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages found that “although some children resisted and held on to their language, many thousands of others were unable to pass their languages on to their own children.” While this can never be made right, bringing Indigenous languages into the school system can allow Indigenous students who didn’t grow up in a household that spoke a native language the chance to experience a lost cultural touchstone.
Adding Indigenous languages to our high school curriculum not only prevents them from fading away, but also allows settlers to show appreciation for the language first spoken on the land they are settled on — it’s a way of paying homage. Exposing students to Indigenous languages is a way to enhance awareness of the breadth of Indigenous culture in the province. It’s a way to help strengthen the relationship between British Columbians and the province’s cultural history.
So if the government already has the stamp of approval from Indigenous peoples, why hasn’t anything been done yet? The province announced in March of 2022 that, starting the 2023–24 school year, all BC students will be required to take at least one Indigenous class before graduation. Courses like “Contemporary Indigenous Studies 12 and BC First Peoples 12,” in which students are exposed to Indigenous history and modern challenges, would now be required for graduation. Languages, however, still aren’t guaranteed in schools.
The government should be taking the initiative to contact Indigenous knowledge holders to help assemble a curriculum that accurately depicts an Indigenous language local to the territory a school resides on — and pay them for it. And if a non-Indigenous person is teaching the course, there should be training programs put in place to help them better understand the language and support their class. Ensuring Indigenous peoples and teachers are at the forefront of an emerging languages program will help ensure its authenticity, and elevate Indigenous voices in education.
The government and ministry of education need to understand that language is an essential component of ensuring Indigenous cultural reinforcement and longevity. In high school, we should be learning about the languages spoken on this land long before it was colonized. To simply insist that Canadians learn a language that isn’t native to the region seems a little colonial, don’t you think?
