NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

I have been working for about two years now on a social studies textbook for UOG Press. This is a part of a project that aims to create locally and regionally focused social studies textbooks for each elementary school grade. In the past there have been a few different social studies textbooks, but often times they were aimed at multiple grades or were focused more on Guam History as opposed to being solid social studies texts. This project is exciting and challenging on many levels.  The grade I am working on is fourth grade, which is fortunate for me, since it is the grade when students are supposed to get their first focused taste of Guam History. It is, gi minagahet, very exciting. I get to use everything from Guam History, to Chamoru language, to legends and local parables to get students connected to the world around them and understand how to be an effective, productive and critical part of your community.  In the first two units, one thing that I have tried to use alot of are l

For those wanting to learn more Chamoru or practice their Chamoru reading, the most prolific writer in the Chamoru language remains playwright and language teacher Pedro Onedera. He has written books, poetic collections, numerous plays and regularly publishes a column in the Pacific Daily News, which is written in Chamoru with an English translation. For those at the beginning of their Chamoru learning journey, his writings might be too difficult or complex. But for those who are already at the intermediate level of learning, they are a great way to push yourself in the language and really try to engulf yourself in a Chamoru narrative or series of argumentative points.  Here is his most recent column from this week talking about håyi i gayu-ña gi i botasion guini giya Guåhan guini na såkkan.  ************************ Ti bai hu bota engkåmen yan hagas hagas by Pedro Onedera Pacific Daily News August 5, 2020 På’go na simåna na ma tutuhon i sanhalom botadot para i primeru ileksion ni’

When talking about legends many people become focused on what is true and what isn't true? What is authentic and what really happened? What can be determine from the story that is real and what isn't? These types of discussions may have some importance within a historical context, when trying to understand it from the perspective of aligning stories with a particular history or historical context. For example there are ways that you can look at the story of the Iliad from a historical perspective. There are ways you could try to draw out historical truths from it, and even if some of the details may not be real, you can nonetheless see larger societal dynamics at work in the poem. This is something to keep in mind when we look at Guam or Chamoru legends. Is that there are some ways to examine, analyze or understand them from a historical perspective, but this misses the larger point of their purpose. Legends serve a social or a culture purpose. They aren't meant to be p

Rlene Santos Steffy published the article below during the summer as part of her iTintaotao Marianas feature series in The Guam Daily Post. I was honored to be included amongst so many other older and more esteemed activist and scholars. I conducted several long interviews with Rlene, some focusing on history and others on political status. I was surprised by her chosen route for this article, focusing on my learning the Chamorro language and my relationship to my grandparents. I was surprised, but not disappointed. The quote that she used at the start of the article is very much what I continue to feel about my Chamorro identity. Namely that if not for my grandparents, I wouldn't have much of a Chamorro identity and probably wouldn't speak Chamorro or care as much about the fate of the Chamorro people. Reading this article made me sen mahålang for my grandparents. I miss them every day, everytime I use the Chamorro language. Kada fumino' Chamorro nina'siente yu'

Esta kana' bente años na taigue i Kumision i Fino' CHamoru. Ma'establesi gui' fine'nina gi 1964. Lao mas sen matungo' gui' gi duranten i 1990s', pi'ot annai ha ketulaika i dinilitreha para i palåbra "Chamorro" asta "Chamoru" pat "CHamoru." I yinaoyao put i dinilitreha muna'påra i che'cho'-ña i kumision. Maolek na i ma'pos na Liheslaturan Guåhan yan ma na'lå'la' gui' ta'lo gi lai. Lao ta li'e' kao diferentes i tano' på'go pat parerehu ha'? Kao para u ma'aksepta i kumunidåt i tinago'-ña yan i disision-ña i kumision, pat kao para u ma'embeste ta'lo? *********************** CHamoru Language Commission re-established by Manny Cruz The Guam Daily Post May 9, 2017 For the first time in nearly 20 years, the CHamoru Language Commission became a functioning body once more on Monday. The commission's first order of business: Establish an explic

Six years ago under the guidance of Peter Onedera, the Chamorro language program at UOG held a Chamorro Language Forum, in which senatorial and gubernatorial candidates were asked questions in Chamorro about pertinent island issues. It was on one hand a great success. Students asked hundreds of questions to the candidates in the Chamorro language. But on the other hand, the format of the forum made it so that candidates didn't have to speak in Chamorro, they could just respond in English. I assisted Peter Onedera with these forums both as a student and a professor at UOG, and so I found it on the one hand inspiring to see a place where the Chamorro language was the focus for political discourse. But it was also so depressing to see so many leaders and would-be leaders not even trying to speak Chamorro, even though they were given the questions ahead of time and could have prepared answers. Fast forward six years and through my Chamoru Culture class at UOG, we have decided to br

Sometimes I get depressed about the state of the Chamorro language. Whenever I am talking to an elderly Chamorro about how our language is dying and the culture is being forgotten and I see them speaking to their grandchildren in English, it makes me want to explode. Everytime I hear elders complain about the young today and how soft and weak and spoiled they are, but who allow their children to be glued to iPads at dinner or in public, it makes me want to run away. When I sit in a meeting where everyone thinks that the solution to the saving of the language lies with an app, or software, but ignores that basic fact that what we really need is just more inter-generational use of Chamorro, the speaking of Chamorro not across a generation, but rather between generations, I want to set something on fire. Whenever I have a conversation with someone who tells me that Chamorro is only supposed to be used like this, or is only meant to talk about this or that, and doesn't want to expan

I started a website five years ago titled " Fino' Chamoru na Inadaggao " meaning a forum for debating or discussing the Chamorro language. This was initially mean to be a website that would support a series of Chamoru Language Senatorial forums held during the 2010 Guam election. From October 19th - 21st that year, all the Guam Legislature hopefuls were invited to a forum where they would be asked questions in the Chamorro language and be encouraged to respond in the Chamorro language. Now as you might imagine/know, in 2010 and 2015 the overwhelming majority of local politicians, including those who are Chamorro, cannot speak the Chamorro language. Because of this, each participant was given the question ahead of time, so as to allow them time to translate the questions and prepare their answers in either English or Chamorro. Candidate were also allowed to have interpreters on stage with them, sitting behind them in case they had trouble following along or remembering w

The past week has been crazy and the lack of blog posts reflects that. Between parenting, teaching, writing, film-making, play-writing, endless meetings, interviews, and planning for a summer trip, things have been too exhausting and too hectic. I'm going to try and get back on track with my blog posts about my Nicaragua trip over the weekend. In the meantime I wanted to share this interview I did recently for an undergraduate student about the origins of the Chamorro Studies program at UOG, the program I was proud to help create and even more proud to be a part of today. **************** How did the Chamoru Studies program come about? The initial incarnation of the Chamorro Studies program was developed in the School of Education at UOG. The Government of Guam was mandating UOG to train people who were able to teach Chamorro language and culture in schools and the program was developed under Dr. Bernadita Dungca in order to accomplish that. The

The Forum on the Importance of Second Language Learning that I helped organize last week at UOG was a huge success. We had a massive crowd of students and members of the community. The comments that were made came from all types of people. Some students spoke about how important it is to requires students to take second languages because it will provide them so many long term benefits that they may not be able to perceive yet. Some community members spoke about how this idea of English-only or focusing the education at UOG on a single language was like a slap in the face to the dozens of languages that are spoken daily in Guam. Some business owners talked about the need for more languages to be taught at UOG and that more languages make you more intelligent and marketable. Some teachers talked about how students who know more than one language perform better in school than those who are monolingual. The conversation was fantastic, we stayed an hour and fifteen minutes beyond our sche