The 19 iteration of the Saskatchewan Indigenous Cultural Centre’s First Nation’s Language Keepers Gathering is officially underway.
The gathering is taking place at Prairieland Park in Saskatoon and according to organizers over 500 people are at the gathering with even more expected.
SICC President Darlene Brander says she is elated by the turn-out
“I imagine that we’d have a really, full crowd, but what we’re seeing behind me is a full house,” she said. “It really speaks to the testament of people who are interested and want to support language revitalization in Saskatchewan.”
Over the next two days conference attendees will learn best practices on language revitalization for the 8 Indigenous languages spoken across the province.
They will do this through a variety of keynote address and breakout sessions.
“One of the best successes, I think, is that when you’re hearing the babies two or three years old starting to speak their languages,” said Brander. “We want to be able to, at conferences like this, really motivate people and get people excited about that and then be able to go home and continue that great work.”
Brander says one of the challenges facing language revitalization in 2025 is helping support communities who have few fluent language speakers who themselves are aging.
“A fear we have is if an older person is not speaking their language anymore in the community, then what are the young people gonna do? And so so that’s where conferences like this come in to play. So because with language revitalization, it isn’t just one person alone. It’s a community that helps with language revitalization.”
A full media scrum with Darlene Brander can be found here.
(TOP PHOTO – SICC President brings opening remarks to the First Nations Language Keepers Gathering in Saskatoon. Photo by Joel Willick)