On not offending or culturally appropriating

by Michael S. Kaplan, published on 2015/04/27 14:37 +00:00, original URI: http://www.siao2.com/2015/04/27/8770668856267196393.aspx

Valued friend and colleague Roy Boney of Cherokee Nation pointed out the following article:

http://www.thelanguagedocumentationcrowd.org/blog/2014/8/14/is-learning-a-minorityindigenous-language-of-another-culture-a-form-of-cultural-appropriation

Now he specifically mentioned that he didn't write the article and that he didn't necessarily agree with all of it either. There are many reasons why I should not have an opinion on this, especially since I am not a Native American Indian person. I'll quickly give my bonafides and let you judge my right to weigh in:

• I mostly grew up in a suburb of Cleveland and have always been aware of the comical Cleveland Indians mascot;
• I was at Microsoft when they worked on and eventually released the Mapudungun LIP (Language Interface Pack) that the article refers to;
• after writing about the LIP in a blog -- Mapudungun is not a map to a dungeon  -- someone commented about the lawsuit;
• for a while I dated a Hopi lady who was once married to an Assiniboine Sioux gentleman before his death years prior;
• I created a phonetic Cherokee keyboard layout with the help of colleagues and friends from Cherokee Nation and EBCI;
• I gave one of the keynotes at a conference in Australia about Native folk there as well;
• Others on my team helped build a LIP for Mohawk that was almost cancelled because nobody wanted to decide what to call it exactly.

With that said, any time the people who own or "own" or OWN a language do not feel that they were consulted, partnered with, or appropriately involved will have a reasonable case for feeling taken advantage of, a little or even a lot.

On balance, I would hate to equate the real crimes against the Native peoples of North America or Australia or South America with some of the less serious issues the article makes hay of.

In the end, Chief Wahoo is a caricature; the Trail of Tears is a genuine issue. And there really is a serious difference between them, even if only in degree and they are on far ends of a spectrum. Equating them all to make a point runs the risk of missing the point.

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