S1E6: Shkwaaj - The Last One

In this final episode of Season 1, of “Enweying - Our Sound” we reflect on our families’ journey since creating the podcast the feedback we have received since creating it and the emotions brought on with this podcast moving across Turtle Island through this “big spiders web.” We share some moments we are grateful for as we created this podcast and how it has helped us for the better moving forward as a family in our Anishinaabemowin Immersion household journey.

In saying this, by episode 6 we feel we finally have the audio down pat BUT in doing so LISTEN AT YOUR OWN WILL because Mshkogaabwid Kwe’s LAUGH will blow your eardrums out/may break speakers. We caution you at: 5:45, 12:30, 18:40, 21:38, 37:40, 50:40 minute marks.

PSA: If you do not wish to listen to us speak Anishinaabemowin, skip to 6 minutes.

Follow us on Instagram @oursound.enweying

linktr.ee/enweying.oursound

Many people have reached out to ask where they can donate or support revitalization efforts. This link leads to our Link Tree which has a Patreon as well as "Buy me a Coffee" where you can donate to our families cause and initiatives we do to support learning in the home and across our communities. Miigwech

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:00

Bojo.

SPEAKER_02 0:01

Honey.

SPEAKER_04 0:02

Welcome to Nweiging, our sound podcast. This is our podcast about raising children in Anishinaoban as second language learners.

SPEAKER_00 0:12

I'm Mashko Gabakwe, and this is my husband.

SPEAKER_04 0:15

Ozao Kijikoganu.

SPEAKER_00 0:17

Here we will be talking about stories, challenges, triumphs, and tips as we share our experiences about our household of five.

SPEAKER_02 0:26

Beat it again.

unknown 0:28

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 0:32

That's my waist.

SPEAKER_00 1:17

No way when ma cook.

SPEAKER_03 1:19

Kijate go jing nango. Kick pigo and the mooshtoon nibing go jing.

SPEAKER_00 1:26

Zom gijate go jing. Mean.

SPEAKER_04 1:33

Simtana pita.

SPEAKER_00 1:36

Go in the memwendazin buzoyan. Going in buzo see is shigo buzoyan opigo m gijate ingojing. Magi do swaning.

SPEAKER_03 1:55

Mino Gizunam de Gujing.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 2:06

Some nibina be shama shah kiung. Nango nungo dashum. Kilbe. Kilbig. Gilbe. Kobegishate.

SPEAKER_00 2:24

Gonna baj Banesi Kui Bija wok we ba. Can I budge the cast and gibjah? Pee bum say bum saying bumse ink or jink.

SPEAKER_02 2:37

Pajina se woke.

SPEAKER_00 2:39

Oh, go in on chapanese wok. Angi weed say maed say mana. We say mana.

SPEAKER_03 2:51

Mama cut.

SPEAKER_00 2:52

Pajinangi kindas o shke kedwanangi gim kan uhun Miujangi gindas or ngi abajitun zadai umijad pigajad uhijad gigamagong Shri Gunggiunendan Binish Nagwa Shogun Shogan meanwan zigame Swabi Swabi Gonjigan Gunjigan Zigame Sway Swabi Gonjigan Shogun Shogan. Abadig Bisgun Abadig Bisgun Wheel Minwa Minigwin Beesh Nan and Margan Guduaswik Gijigat Um Gijate Guj Garbajate Mienoir Winishkashtage Ying Osnago Um Jaganashi Gemakwe Gijigat Jaganashi Moing Jaganashi Pamadsuin Jinkade Ganon Jira Jinakar Jenkade What Anish Grashiki Oh Nakshake Bungi Git Chip Is It Gay Matabin Gotes Guay Yang Tenda Yang Gun Wab Dun Gun Wabadana Gujin Me Wang Gibizend War Gibizend Bash G is Gun Mean Wang Gigi Shina Doon Makomimagan Mag Going Inquis G Cia Be Gia Bin Ski A B Shini Gibi Doin Maboyan Bakushiman Coaching Gi Anscon Nobu Nan Me Dash On Web On Web Yang Coaching Mekwa Bask Jiskan Bosch Jiskan Gi Bask Jiskina Gonna Match Me Aha So Did You Wanna Recap This is Mush Gog Wit Kwe Emiline and Zao Gijogano Ando?

SPEAKER_04 6:05

Mm-hmm So we just Talk A What We Did Um Or We Talked A little Baying It Was Hot It's Hot Own and It's Humid Out And Perhaps There'll be a Thunderstorm tonight, Hopefully And Emily doesn't like Hidity and High Heat Yeah It was Cloudy We went for Walk.

SPEAKER_00 6:30

We Walked The Dog and It's Funny Cause People Long Weekend. I didn't E was the Weekend, let alone A Long Weekend Until I Heard The Fireworks. So We just Talk A little Bad Um Or I Asked Ozawa, like What Did We Do Two Nights Ago. And I figured, Well, the Kids Are Gonna Be Sleeping With Them Going Off Anyways Cause They're Pretty Loud in the City So We Jone Out There and Enjoyed Ourselves. So We're Joking A little Bad and What We Did Out There But Um I Don Did You Wanna Fill People In This Is Our Sixth Episode of Our First Season. I think It Will Be Our Final One of Season One.

SPEAKER_04 7:11

This is Our Our First Episode That We Recorded After Um This CBC article That Was Done With Emiline. They Interviewed They Interviewed Mishko Godwood Kwe And It was Real Done And Gave U Some Notoriety I guess For For Doing This And And Yeah So We're Just We're Just Glad That We're Able To Share This More With People And Our Goal Was to Get This Out To People To Hopefully Be Inspi and Be Wanting To To Do This themselves Or Wondering How The Can Support Other Families Woring This Well So Yeah I just Wanted To Say Me G Wetch again To Kate DAC for the Amazing Job That Sid Creating That Peace I wouldn't have Sounded That Great Without Her And I Also Um Yeah Just Wanted To Acknowledge The Fact That We Wor Not Expecting This To Spread So far When I Originally Got The Ema or Whatever And I Was Sitting Down Thinking About Doing The Interview I Thought Maybe It Might Hit Like 23 People 300 People Maybe At the Most And Mainly The Language Community Or The Second In Shnappin One Language Community And It Kind of Just Got Picked Up and Went Like Wildfire Across Indian Country So I Was really Not Expecting That And with That Comes Like Pros and C of Being Shared In the Limelight Which I Know Um was Gonna Happen Anyways Creating A Podcast But We Weren't Reating The Podcast To Be In The Limelight Or to Be Known Well Known Or Famous Orything Like That It Was Just To Try And Connect Us or Start Conversation Or Share Our Peace And For Me Sharing A Story Orally It just Comes World Than Me Trying To Write It Orget on Paper It's Just So Hard For My Brahma Um This Whole Journey Is Like Taking Me In places And Forcing Me To Grow A Lot And Um Yeah I've just Come To Learn That You My Brain Is Like Everybody Else Is Very And Just Learning A Love Myself As We Like Take This Journey And Walk Wit Forward Um As a Family Doing A Podcast So I Jante That Little Piece It's Really Allowed Me Yeah To Like Look At Myself and What I'm Doing And How I Feel And really Stick My Roots Into The Ground and Hold Firm And know What Is A Limiting Bief and What Is Helping Me and What Is Not Valuable To For Me To Hold Onto And What's For Me To Let Go.

SPEAKER_00 10:17

I Don't Know You Experiencing Any of That Ozawa.

SPEAKER_04 10:20

Uh For Me Um I Just I see A lot of People That Shared It and People That Are Supporting Us So It's Surprising To Me How Much It's Gotten Out There And And Yeah It Just It's Kind of Motivating To Keep To Keep Doing It And To Keep Sharing The Message And Promoting The Language And Not Just Our Language But I think All Indigenous Languages It Kind of It's Kind of Getting That Information Out There's People To Help them understand Cause I I Don't I Those Speople Don't Comet What It You know What It Takes To Do This Like To Try and Raise Children in the Language And Like They Don't Completely Under H how It Works Or What It's About And So For Safing Your Like Oh Like I Undow Or Seems Like There's a Better Undering Of Of What It Is Yeah That was Definitely The Outreach That I Was Hearing Like The Kind of Theme Which Is Part of The Reason W Decided To Like Take A Risk and Go Ahead And Do It Without You Because I know As a Team Um I feel A little Comfortable.

SPEAKER_00 11:45

Yeah, So I was really Surprised Too by the Amount of People Sharing and Supporting I was Kind of Like Wow Like That's Really Nice To Know That Many People Have Good Kind Thoughts Awesome, But You're Right, Um A lot of People I Don't Think Under The Degree of What We Wing and The Commitment of How We Wing It And When I Deced To Do The Interview I Knew That I was Gonna Be Revealing A lot of Myself To People And There's Always A Risk There And So It's Funny That You Say How It's Motivating Cause I'm Not Gonna Say It's Not There's Definitely A Pi Piece That Is Very Encouraging and Motivating Because When You Git Feedback You Wanna Go Harder, You Wanna Try Harder But I also Wanna Run and Hide And Delete It All Like Curl Up In a Corner Sometimes Because I'm Like Oh It's Out There And All These Ears A Listening and Everything And Sometimes It Can Be Misconstrued Forginashi or Whatever And That's Not The Pohind It And also Everything Else That hasn't Help I've Just Set Aside and Say That's A Limiting Bief And It's Not Gonna Help O Family Right Now So I'm Gonna Set This Over Here And just Focus On Our Family Doing The Interview and Hearing Sedback Like Forced Me To Really Take A Good Look At Myself Because Nactions That Like We Saw Were positive And Forces You Like I said To Like Dig in and Take Root Of Who You Are And What You Believe In and What You Stand For And So All We Can Keep Doing Is just Being Us Being Human Showing Up As Who We A and It Just Sort of Showed Me For A While It Made Me Um A Little Sick To My Stomach To Keep Speaking The Language Because Um Some of the Things That I've said To Me It was Ready To Speak The Language Without Um Some of There Things That Had Been Shared Win In Passing That Were Kind of Haunting Me Because You know There's a Lot of Baggage That Peary Around The Language and Protecting It And How The Feel about It and Their Rationship with It Andes Oney Different Ways And Many Different Feelings and Expressions of Feelings So For A Bit There I Jelt Ren Tot Safer The Language And So I Um I decided to Take A Little Bre Um ended up speaking English for A Couple Days Just To Get By Um Ozawa didn't Brew Amazing And I Thank Him for That Big Time I needed To Do It For My Mental Health And So That I Could Take A Step Away from That Rationship and Examine It. And once I did That I was able to Reestablish Boundaries and Boundaries and Believe That Rationship And How I could Um Create A Stron Bond, Stronger Relationship With That And Pass That Doubt My Kids. So You Know They These Things Come To Us and They Come To Us To Help U. And By No Means Am I Painting This As a Horrible Thing. It was A Gift. Um It Was A Gift Within A Gift. It was a Gift As well as a Learning Opportunity For Me And It Jade As Stronger As a Family And Put Us I think Into A really Good Place. So In saying That It Was Really Hard For Me To Be Abmit That Or Say That And Sitting Here Doing A Podcast Admitting That It Was Verd to Spees Something How about You?

SPEAKER_04 15:47

Um Yeah, I think That You know Like The Native Comments That I Saw They Weren't Anything New Like I've been In Language Learning For A few Years Now And It's Not They Weren't any Comments That I Didn't Hear Before Or Read About Before So Um But Yeah It Is You know It Can Be That's Part of The Language Learning Journey As well Is that You know Unfortunately Um We have Toal With Native Comments From From Anishinaabe people, From Indigenous People, From Non Native People As well. Although They're Nair All the Then But Um Like Everyone has their Own View How You Shoar and How You Um How You Shoach The Language And Yeah So It's Just Part Of You Just Kind of Have To Become Imune To It And That's Kind of Where Where I'm At I Hear Differents or Things That I Dree With And I'll I'll I'll Speak On It But And I Mean For Me It's Like Yeah I mean I've had some Pretty Hard Hits From People About Me Learning and How I Am I Learner But It's The Fact That We Kind of Pur Life Out There For People And People Squash It And So I'm Always Just Kind of Like Did You Even Listen To The Podcast Um To Kind of Figure What First And even T This Is Just The Drop In The Bucket So Um In Saying That Um We Can Kind Leave It There And Just You Know Know That Like That was A Part of The Reality Of Of Sharing And I Joug It was Kind of Important To Just Yeah Be Able Tell The Truth Debway Win Practice That Turtle Teaching Um You That's What We're Doing That's What We're Trying To Live Out So I Don't Feel Like I should sit behind a Screen and Hide and Say Like That's Not Were Experiencing.

SPEAKER_00 18:04

We've been Honest Util Now, So just Be Honest Who Here To Be With US And Like I said This is All About Trials and Triumphs Um Trials and Tribulation Tribulations Triumphs Tips and Advice Funny Stories Our Experces Um We Well You To Have Your Own Experience That's Why We Started This And You It's Been So Beautiful Oz Always Like We've Seen So Many Other Language Indigenous Language Um Preservers Revitalizers Learners Um Sharing This I Love Seeing That Um Did You Notice Yeah Um Okay Well I also Noticed There was a Lot of People were Like Wow This is Inspiring Me to Learn My Own Language But it wasn't An Indigenous Orendangered Language It was One That Was From So That Was also A Little Triggering In a lot of Ways So to Those That Um A Reaching Otto I Do Wanna I'm So Happy That We're Inspiring You In That Way But just To Rem That There's a Big Difference Between Indigenous Languages Such as Nishna Bem Win and Languages Such Asman, Italian Polish that have Countries And Lots and Lots of Resources and Funding and Immersion Settings So I I'm So Happy That We've Reached Hearts Uh Out There That Come from All Different Backgrounds and Cultures and Trainings of Life But Um I Do Just Want To Remind People of That Um But Yeah Lots of Really Like Seeing People In The The Cree Language Community Sharing Um Mohawk Like Yeah So It's Beh Make Maw Really Cool That Well Uh I'm Just A Language Learning Nerd In General So Yeah You Got Any If You Wanna Share Any O'View Um Indigenous Or Mother Tongue Language with Uh Please Show DM At our Instagram Because I'm Such A Nerd And I Will Uh Love To Learn Some New Stuff But Anyways Getting Back to Nishnaaben Win. We've Kind of Made Some New Developments Ew. Some New Developments Or Some New Obvations I'm Trying To Say Um With The Kids Latin I Don't NOF You've Noticed Or Not Um Oh So We'll Get Into Like Have You Noticed Any Any Big Changes Within Sasoyaje or Zodai in the Last Since We Dast Recording Which Was Probably Um Sasoyaje At least I Notice He's saying He's Trying To Repeat A lot of Words That Are Very Big Compared To Zodai Who Didn't Use Like Three Or Four Words At a Time Um Or Syllables I Should Say And then The English Words That I've Heard Hat are Words That We've Never Used So I know He's Visited My Parents Like a couple of Times And The On English Phrases I've Heard H are Things That They Had said Obviously Because We Don't But Um Like Wouldn't Even Be Really Something That I Woe In English anyways So Um Like Gazogin Is One Um He Doesn't Say It With Hoth Open He goes Like Mm Mm Mm Right And He Like Ani He says Ani But He'll Go Mm And He'll Say Eh And He'll say Ka Right? Like He has Very Nishnapin Women They're All Like Little Hums, You know?

SPEAKER_04 21:59

I Noticed With Um Like Earlier With Zodai when she was Younger Was That I Joug Okay We'll Just Speak and She'll J Start Speaking But There was a Poe We had To Slow Down and Say Each Syllable For the Word For Her to Pronounce X. Like We had to Slow Down and Say Word Um And then She Would Repeat It After That Whereas My Initial Thoughts Maybe Because We Don't Hakers Around Like Surrounding Her That Srounded Her.

SPEAKER_00 22:46

But Snick just Picking It Up On Her Own Like Just Saying Words We had To Kind of Slow D and Reunce the Syllables And So I'm Kind of Wondering How That You Know As Saswe Aje He's Gonna Start Talking Soon So He'll Be Um I'll I'll I'll Wonder H if He'll be Are Because Just Physically He's Uh Developed Quicker Than Zadai Like In Terms of Like He's He Crawled Earlier and He Started Walking Earlier So I'm Curious To see What His Um His Voice Or His U Like If He Starts Talking Earlier And You Know How That W How That's Gonna Look Well It's Funny That G mentioned You know Having Speakers Around Cause Like I know That That's The Hard Part of Isolation And Um Social Distancing And the Fact That We Don't Have Speakers Nearby Anyway So we Can't Even Like Do U Social Dance We'd have to Travel Somewhere Unsafely And You Do Something And With Kids It's Just Not Ial So Um I'll just Kinda Talk A Little Meeting Between Zod I and A Speaker At Her At Her Daycare Or Childcare Center Um There Like Weekly Meetings That Were Happening Since The Like Weekly Online Lessons Since The Daycare was Closed And With Lockdown and Everything And Um I had To Leave Both So I Really Doubt That You Know The The Amazing Guy Uh Person Helping Her is Listening But I was Crying In the Kitchen I had to Leave Ozawa with Her Cause It was So Wonderful Um In the Beginning We Noticed Like There was a Little English Um And That Was the Fine I Ever I Really Pieced It All Toget That When You Switch A number of Times In One Sentence Uh Between English and Nishnabim When She Gets Verused Like She Doesn't Kage You Wanted to Speak In She Doesn't Know Which One To Rond In She Kind of Gets Stuck On How Like What Do I Do With This Kind of Like I know What They're Both Called Kind of What Do I I know Both of these I Don't Rego From Here Um And So Then It Switched To The Language And there was a Lust Nish Nabin One Being Us and All of Audien It Jarts Moving and Flying And She's Reinning To Imitate The Sounds And He's Laughing And Rezying Like Yes She's Responding Yes She Understand Everything He's saying And She's You know Some of the Ronses Were In English But then After About Five Minutes I think Maybe Five Seven Minutes Then It was All Nishna Bin Win All Nishna Bin Win And then I'm Just Crying In the Kitchen Because I'm Like It's Just Been So L'Ice A First Language Speaker S with Her Daughter and Spoke. I Don't Like Did She Ever? Like I Don't Even No She's Ever Reacted Because Like She's Never Really Been On Board You know Like Consciously You know She She's only Made That Jump In the Last Year Yeah, Not Lately Like Within The Past Year So She hasn't really Bect With A First Language Speaker With Just Like Like One On One Or Just Immersion What Just That Person You Like And Interacting Back and Forth.

SPEAKER_04 26:36

So That Was Leg I was just Crying Because I'm Like Imagine Hasy I'm Gonna Get Upset Now I Don't WH Imagine How Easy If We had Just A Bunch of Speakers Around Oh Man Yeah You Go Yeah So It was Kind of Like The Responsibility On Us was Taken Off Our Should For Those Like That Half Hour 20 Minutes And it was just Nice To see Her Like She could understand everything You said And it was Um He was From Uh The Speaker's From Wiki And So Just They She Under Because Yeah So I'm just Crying O Here No Big Deal Guys So Yeah It was Good To Have Kind of Like Okay We're N we're Not Shouled With That Responsibility Of Taking Her On Or Taking Her On But Taking On the Language Like Passing That On To Her Well It's Like It's Even Better Because She's Receiving Like The Real Language You know Yeah She's Getting Like The Real The Real Sounds, You know And she Count Everything And There's Like A Few And So She's Be a Few Classes with him Um Yeah And so She's Picked Up A little Bore Like Just Understanding the Language And Another Thing I Guess That I Noticed Was Um So JP Our Friend JP John Paul Chalikov Uh Sorry I got YP Niganabe As I know He's A Musician So He's Created Some Songs and Language And Some Really Go You Good Quality He's plays Guitar So Really Good Quality Music So And it's on YouTube And there's a V just Released Of Yeah Like A Puppet Oring This Number Song That He Created And Zadai was really Into It Well S Sasway Aje too He really would just Watch It Yeah Stop And Watch It And I Can I Wanna Listen Too Like I'm Not Banging My Head Against The Wall Listening To Like Like You Can On So Many Like Children's Style That Was I Noticed And She was Really Into It So That Like Things Like Crazy Like She's She's Trying To Read The Numbers and Say Them At the Same Time But It's Mouthful For Her That She's Trying to Go Pidget Pizza Sweat Bidget Pizza Sweat There's So she's Going Pidget She's Trying to Get It But She Quite Get It Yet But She's Reading The Numbers on the Screen and Doing At the Same Tim And I'm Like Man This Is Like Education It's Going On This Is So Go. Yeah. So that's just another thing that's kind of and all those videos online that that are in the language only, that's what we um try and show them. Um and so that that's kind of a newer one that that she's really into. And it kind of it helps her to see things from somebody else or be interactive with something else that's not us. And I think that's another thing that is helpful when when learning a language, to see something else that's or someone else that's that's speaking in the language.

SPEAKER_00 30:42

Yeah, we even have our own choreography to one of his his other songs, uh Becca Bimosen.

SPEAKER_04 30:50

Yeah, created a little dance to that to his other song that that he created. But yeah, so yeah, it was when she was interacting with with um our teacher at the daycare, he he I think he noticed that she understood what he was saying. So that's when he switched into just using the language.

SPEAKER_01 31:15

Sorry, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 31:17

Yeah, so then he that's when he just used the language the rest of the his little lesson there. And yeah, so for her it was like um it was confusing when when it was like okay, this this is a this wasn't the lesson, but I'll just say, oh, this is a Dalban, this means car. And then she was just kind of confused, okay. What do I say? Do I say car or do I say Dalban? And so um and then when it was just in the Nishina Baimu and because she could understand uh what he was saying, it the whole lesson moved along more smoothly and it was just good for for everyone. I think it it probably helped the the speaker as well to notice that and to be like, oh I can do it, like I can do this lesson this way. Um so I think it kind of opened up his eyes as well, like, oh I don't need to use English, I can just use the language.

SPEAKER_00 32:23

Yeah, it was all just like flowing really nicely and it just for me it was just really healing, it was just what I needed, like from the days that we had had earlier to that, and um like I think I said to you that morning, I'm like, I feel like you know, Chimanadel just came and c gave me a big hug and just said, you know, we got ya, because it was just all organically just kind of unfolded, and um a lot of times we're encouraged not to read or write the language. And I've spoke I spoke a little bit about this in the interview, and that's that like our mouths have to practice, like there's from from being a child, you first you are hearing sounds, you're hearing your m your parents in in the womb or or people when you're in the womb, and then when you arrive here, you hear the sounds all around you, but then you get older and you begin listening to those sounds and trying to differentiate, you know, what are what is this, what does this mean, what is that, you know, and then from there you begin to understand, oh, this is what this means, this is what that means, this is okay, like I know what they're saying. And that's usually where you know most learners start to feel like confident, okay, I'm starting to understand like what this person is saying, and then what happens next um for children is they begin experimenting. So look at Saswaja, he's like, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, you know, goes again inside of his mouth. Um, he's practicing, you know, moving and getting his his vo voice ready and what's that gonna sound like and what does that feel like? Like there's a whole process to that, right? And as learners, we don't get an opportunity to really just like go ahead and practice and to constantly get that constructive criticism or that validation of that's right or that's not right, and this is how you do say it. And so for me to guarantee that I know I'm speaking the words grammatically correct the way a speaker would, it would be to have a book that has stories r that were told by first language speakers and then translated into English if it has a translation, because that's the other part. When you have these stories, I've noticed that in picture books that I read to my daughter, I can always tell, and I'm beginning to be able to tell like who's translating to, but I can tell, you know, this was a story that was completely written in English and then translated into Nishnaabe M1 because it's you know their mouth is moving in this square, but that's not really how that person's how that person's doing, you know, it's not an actual square. Or he said, she said, he said, she said, asked him, he said, asked him. Like we didn't are.

SPEAKER_04 35:22

And that's it's not saying like the speakers don't know what they're doing. No, no, no, no. They don't know how to speak the language. So what we're like what I noticed is even the top like people who've been teaching for a long time and know how to write the language very well, for some reason they'll still um go into like when translating, and I see this among other like all speakers, it's like it's hard for fluent speakers to translate from English into the language um if it's written down, and they'll follow more of the English kind of way of speaking. So like the word kiddo, like he or she is saying something in in a lot of English stories or kids stories, you know, it said, you know, it's used a lot like oh bear said this, uh, and then the fox said, and then and then bear said.

SPEAKER_00 36:32

And then replied.

unknown 36:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 36:34

And then so then you'll get a lot of like, oh geekado, like he said, she said. Oh geekado, moco, geekado, wagush, geekado. So then you'll see a bunch of geekedos in the story. Whereas if you hear um just a speaker to speaking naturally in the language, you don't hear a lot of geekedos like you hear it here and there, but just but that's just one example of of when you can kind of tell that the story was written in English first and then translate it into the language.

SPEAKER_00 37:13

Yeah, so I mean, I can't say don't I get no how know how all the books are written and blah blah blah, but I know that if there are stories that are like stories from or old stories from here, it like if you if there's stories that have been said and then written and translated and transcribed, I find those ones are easier for me to sit down and read.

SPEAKER_04 37:37

From recordings.

SPEAKER_00 37:39

Yeah, sorry. Exactly. Plug in here. Um But it's easier to to read those stories that have been um transcribed from recordings and when I say like read your kids to bed or read yourself to sleep or read it out out loud, it's practicing that last part of speaking and comprehending compra like comprehension of a language is one thing, speaking a language is the next, you know, or is an is another thing. And I think that the last step is figuring out how to be comfortable practicing and applying, and that's what we're doing here in this immersion setting, right? Like practicing and applying everything we learn as we learn it, because we're losing every day is it is a moment for us to learn Nishinaab and when every moment is an opportunity to listen to a recording or to listen to you know something something that's um being shared on YouTube by a fluent speaker, and then the opportunities that we have to actually go and see those people, we we've you know made sure that we've used up our time well using the resources that we do have at home.

SPEAKER_04 39:04

And it's not like there's a lot of resources out there, so it's not like I can say, oh, I just want resources in my dialect or where we're from. We don't really have that choice because there's so little resources like books. So uh we have books from all over wherever, you know, whatever's closest to our you know um writing system, I guess. So we're using double vowel, but we have books like from Minnesota that were created out there, and then Minnatoulan Island, and yeah, so just all over. And for me when I read um I'll try and follow whatever's said in the in the book or whatever's written, but I'll also kind of change certain words that maybe we use here or that's more uh familiar with myself or with our kids that we use. So like some books that we have, um they have like day day for father and mama for mother. Um so and then we use noose and then gusha. So whenever I'm reading, I'll just change that wherever it says day-day. You know, I'll say noose or yes, and gusha for mama. So thing little things like that I'll I'll change. Um but other times too, I don't know. I might ness not necessarily know a word to use differently, so I'll just uh read what's what's written there.

SPEAKER_00 40:53

Yeah, and I do the same thing when I'm reading Well, I'll I'll just say specifically when I'm reading um Zada to sleep. Like I'll usually sit in a chair with her and read her um rocker and read a story while she's laying in my arms and um a couple of tips for anybody out there who wants to do the same or is finding that a helpful idea of being able to practice. Um so I start at I should just demonstrate it for you now. Um I'm gonna run upstairs and grab a book and just do it. Yinky beep scubby ja zhe. So I'm back and I grabbed a book. I shouldn't have grabbed one. It's a Robert Munch, so we know of course that it's English written transcribed. Um I like to, like I said, read books that um are in we already talked about this. So I'll just show you um kind of how I do this, and this for me is like how I kind of gift cadence to my kids. Well, this is usually by the time they're already sleepy, but I'll read the page and the first time through to just it's gonna be rusty, I'm gonna make mistakes, it's not gonna sound great, it's gonna be um broken, um, choppy, so I just read it through, just kind of like you read through a test. You know, you read through the test and then you write the test. So I read through it, then I go back to it. This time around I'm just again getting my mouth muscles moving. I'm not like focusing too much on um, you know, where the mistakes are and da da da da da da. By this time my daughter's like, you know, um starting to get tired, so I will generally stop flipping pages and pick one page that has a lot of letters on it. That way the flipping of the pages isn't waking up my daughter or the child that I have, and um, I can just focus on going back to the top of the page. Then I do this exercise and I call it like an add-on and take off exercise, and it's so I start at the top of the page and I've been reading, and when I make a mistake, that's when I stop and I go back to the beginning, and that's so that not only am I going to the word that I've made the mistake on or that I think that I've made the mistake on, but I also get to practice everything up until then, and in saying that I get to practice a cadence.

SPEAKER_04 43:26

So, I mean, I wouldn't suggest doing this if you are like really just beginning, it's it's more of like you wanting to begin to apply it a more moving from novice into intermediate level, but it's just a way to to have your words flow more like a phone speaker rather than because when we're learners, we're still thinking about how what am I gonna say next, and even if we're telling a story, like even myself, I'll like have to pause or I'll make a mistake and I'll pause, think about okay, how do I say that right and then go back. Whereas when we have a story that we're reading, we're able to just kind of flow through it if we're able to read it, if we're at that level of being able to read.

SPEAKER_00 44:14

Show you, I'll demonstrate it now. Although this is the whole point I'm gonna sound, you know, a little bit ridiculous, so Ningo Anam See, okay, ningo aname Ningo Anamat Anamjiga Anamijat. I've never heard that word. Ningonam chigot Mamagi kido mina Shime We bitigo nimsh Gawe Wepa Nimshak widi nbegamik Ga win kido Matthew Gi Nimshaki Gidam Wat O Abit Maji Biganok Ga Gadam Wat Nin A Nabyan Gawin we gina ma sin orine kidon Ningo anami jgo anami jigat Ningo anami jigigut that's it. Ningo anami gitigut. So finally, here we are. I don't know how long that's taken me, right? But finally now you can kind of hear I'm starting to get a cadence. Ngo anami Oh here we go. N'go anami gitja gut. Mamagi kid dominawa. Shime, we bit the goshin. Oh yuck uh yawat nimsuk. So st I still don't really sound like I know what I'm saying because it sounds really choppy. Like I keep practicing and practicing, I'll begin to re recognize what the words are saying and begin to oh, I know what O means.

SPEAKER_04 45:55

Yuck, I kinda So I think too, as a second language learner that because the writing system isn't a set spelling system, it's just a s a system to follow the sounds. There's no standardized spelling in Anishinaabame 1. So resources like the dictionaries or the online dictionaries, and then books that are written, they'll be in double vowel, but there might be slight differences in in writing the words and how depending on the level of or how well this the person that wrote the book, um, even the syllables might be separated differently. So as a learner, we kind of you kind of have to adapt almost to each resource that's made uh to to say the words correctly. And yeah, so that's kind of one challenge that you might go from resource to resource and they might have the same words spelled a little differently, like a G might be a K, or vice versa, or um things like that. So you would you kind of you get used to it and you just that's just kind of one of the things learners you have to deal with.

SPEAKER_00 47:22

Yeah, and I don't know, I'm not trying to be like toxic positivity over here, but I think that that's like it's a pain, but it's a it's a skill because like now it's I know like I'm struggling through that, but it's a lot easier for me to be able to adapt when I'm reading now because I've just like learned so many ways of reading and knowing that it's the sounds that matter, which is why I'm like I'm not like yes, we should be writing and learning or writing and reading everything. No, it's just like an added way of helping us get more efficient quicker so that we can begin passing down the language, and then when we are there and we are efficiently and there's enough of us passing the language on, then we can kind of worry about the way in which we do it. I feel like there's just too much of an urgency right now to worry about, you know, doing it the way we would have done it 400-500 years ago. I just don't think we're in the place of the time with the resources to be able to do it that way, and so if we can try our best to just gather what we can and pass it on, then we're in a little bit of a better spot than focusing on only sitting and listening for hours and hours and then not really being able to do anything with that or take that or move any way forward with it, you know. Um, I just it feels almost like um like yeah, like the urgency is just is too great. Um I would love to just be able to sit and listen and learn that way. Um, we just aren't being given the the privilege to be able to do that with the situation that we're all in right now. So also while you read um books from different places, I also don't think it's a necessarily bad thing if you're reading materials from all over and are learning five different ways to say one word. I only had to learn Nishnabin one that way, and that's how I know I sound like ridiculous half the time because I'm using different words from different dialects with different like even if anything I am saying is right, I know that the dialect is probably not there, or you know, the sub-dialect is not there. Um and that's just because of I've had teachers from everywhere with different personalities, with different ways of speaking, and for me, it's just like wow, now I can understand that many more people. I don't can't I don't only know one community, one way of speaking. It's not a thing to look down at or a thing to to be mad at. I don't think, um, and I'm not looking down at anyone who speaks one dialect or one subdialect or is from one community and is only spoken. Like that's wonderful, preserve that. That's unique, that's beautiful. We need those those people who who who have that gift of of that way of speaking, and just saying that if that's all you have right now, I don't think it's a thing to be ashamed of or something something to be discouraged about because now I can go to this community or that community, and I kind of know, you know, those five words from here, or make sure I don't use we do call over here, and make sure I use, you know, um not emotion over here, you know, like it's just giving me a light in that sense. Um, so yeah, again, I'm not trying to be positively toxic or toxic positivity over here, but it's it's nice to put a spin on that because um I know I talk really funny what I the stuff I do know, but comprehension-wise, it's great. I can understand a lot of a lot more of a variety. You strop on a lot more cost.

SPEAKER_01 50:55

I'm just kidding. Well, it's be whatever I really want to listen to, and it's not even more.

SPEAKER_00 51:04

Like I would never like you know, like be disrespectful, but I'm I will totally sit behind the plant and listen to you cows just talk if you if you let me.

SPEAKER_04 51:19

Yeah, that's just kind of our reality is that we just have to take the resources, so like even for like when we were talking earlier about the videos that we have on YouTube or that are on YouTube made by other people, you know, they're from all over the place, and we just we have them on because it's still Nishna Baimun, it's still Ojibwe. So uh we're we learn from the videos as well, but it's also you know giving it's giving our kids variety of the language in different ways and different different environments of whatever the you know different contexts of using it, of however the person has used it. And I think that's what ultimately there needs to be more of, and I think people will start making more of our videos that are more just an Ishna Baimon only directed at children, or I guess directed at anyone, but uh I think that you know people are starting to notice more that you know when you use the language more that it's easier to stay in it rather than to go back and forth.

SPEAKER_00 52:33

And yeah, um all when all is said and done, um I have no expectations that either my kids I like don't expect them to go into the world and go into language work, like they can have their own, you know, passions and um dreams. But who's to say that if Mozawa and I try our very best and uh give them everything that we got and provide what we can, who's to say that they won't take that, pick that up, and go themselves and learn it after that? Um I won't ever put that expectation there that I expect them to do that, but who's to say that they won't go out and do that on their own? And I know that as a mother, I've done my job, I've done everything I could possibly could with the background that I have, with the resources that I have to give my kids that. And so I guess in our final episode of season one of you know, what is a season in a podcast, and what is a podcast, and what is this, and what is life, and you know, um this pandemic has been really, really, really hard, and um for ourselves, we just want to take a little bit of a break before I'm back in school, and uh we hope that maybe we can have a season two. Um no promises yet, it'll depend on demand and everything as well. Um, but yeah, that our final word kind of insane or at least for me is that you know, even if I do this all wrong, it doesn't really matter what people say because my daughter can, you know, pick it up herself and go on. And if you're gonna judge her for doing that, I'm not too worried. Um, I feel like everyone out there who may be feeling the same insecurities or the same way, just know that I'm here supporting you, was always here rooting for you, we love you, and we're here to, you know, do nothing but encourage you to try your best. And um if you don't speak your language or you haven't picked that up yet, that doesn't mean um you're any less by any means. That's not our message either. It's just that if you are trying, like we really uh do support you and created this to create a better community for all of us. So um I don't know if there's anything you'd like to say before we we head out.

SPEAKER_04 55:11

I'll just say that even if you have kids that are that are a bit older and you feel like it's too late, I don't think it's too late for you. But you just have to use the language like every day and just make it normal, just normalize it as um every s every time you see a bear, it's not a bear anymore, it's a makwa. Or and you don't you know like I don't mean you have to go You don't have to ex explicitly say like no say makwa Like just when you're when you're talking like naturally like you know every day like Bomby Goabin or uh Miguel or Mishin like give me shin you shin you like or me shinwe um give me that or you know ma john Yeah umbe jada like just normalizing it every day and then just using that I think that will that that makes it kind of it makes it alive it makes it what it is It makes a connection to your real life It's daily you know it's not uh a subject at school it's not a subject in online uh webpage it's you know your everyday life it's not a Zoom class you know all of these things we need that help us of course but in order to really connect to it you need to use it and connect connect with it daily Yeah so we encourage you to build that relationship or find that relationship or discover that relationship or whatever it is we're here and yeah Gegwa Anchikan Jinishnabe moyen Gegwa Anchikan Jinishna Bemyan