It’s almost naptime in the toddler room at the preschool building known as the Sasiwaans, part of a cluster of buildings on the Isabella Indian Reservation.

The lights dim, gentle music plays and classroom volunteers soothe the children to sleep. Holding a child in her arms, Jackie Ortiz sings quietly in Michigan’s oldest language.

Sasiwaans means “nest” in the Anishinaabe language once spoken widely by Michigan’s Chippewa, Ottawa and Potowatomi Indians, and the tiny children who are nurtured here could hold the future of the vanishing tongue.

“This is preservation of our identity, that’s who we are,” said Angela Peters, interim director of language revitalization for the Saginaw Chippewa tribe. “Once we revitalize our language, we revitalize our cultural teachings.”

The Saginaw Chippewa tribe has about 3,700 members today. But a survey of a sample of members done in 2005 found only two fluent speakers of the language. More.

See: Lansing State Journal

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