Our catch phrase is on its way.
Dear Fellow Earthlings,
Here is the second half of the very important email I sent to the Seneca nation two days ago:
Home is where the heart is! But humans are indeed beings of "the Land" -- and therefore, let us celebrate that you DO at least have a bit of your land left! As for the future, let's get your people's voices focused on both your Seneca tongue and their abilities to speak other languages. But the primary focus right now is to let me analyze how the remaining one hundred or so native speakers are doing. They need to be in good health. I am 65 years old myself -- but still enjoying good health. I hope to share my energy and health with your people. I am confident in who I am and I DO NOT hope to be a full-blooded Seneca. But I do hope to help all the Seneca people
prosper, adapt a bit if necessary, and to survive.
"And when the time arises when we will need it to justify who we are as a people, a culture and
as a nation, then they will be coming to look for it. And hopefully when they do we will still have
it."
"So it is not so much not wanting to have others learn as much as they (the Elders) want our
own people to learn it."
The above 3 lines are your words ”Gentleman 9-10” . I shall use them to guide me -- and I would ask that other Seneca also guide me even as I help you locate the primary, secondary, tertiary, and quaternary synergies of your language. For example, for U.S. English,
primary synergy is in the region of the navel, secondary synergy lies in two areas (the tip of the tongue and in surges upward through the body from the navel), tertiary synergy is located in the oral cavity, and quaternary synergy is in the middle part of the mouth for most dialects, although for New England English, it (quaternary synergy) tends to gravitate toward the front of the mouth.
"We are getting there now and have been making great strides in the last couple of years
towards having new fluent speakers, but we are just not there yet."
Regarding the above statement, I am positive that I can help you expedite the development of new fluent speakers. But time is of the essence: Just recording sound bytes and video and repeating chants are not enough. I need the Seneca Elders' help in constructing "Seneca Jingles". These Jingles that come to me are my natural talent. I cannot explain how they happen, but they do -- and they allow me to help many people realize their pronunciation dreams.
Please give this email to “Lady 9-14” and let her know that I look forward to helping her.
As for my intentions after I "learn" Seneca: Number one is I will learn only as much as you and your People wish me to learn. What I will do is teach You how to employ your bodies in the way your ancestors did to express hope, pain, love, fear, hatred, ambition, and all the other things that humans need to express. And it will be more than just words. The silent moments, the intonations, the eye contact, the body language will all be dealt with.
Beside helping you preserve and indeed bring your language back, I hope to help speakers of other languages and dialects set up Jingles programs for their languages, too. That's it, plain and simple! I just long to protect and to empower languages, cultures, plants, animals, and our Earth.
I DO NOT feel it would be respectful for me, a non-Seneca person, to teach the Seneca language to non-Seneca people. That notion is something YOU Seneca people should decide. But first things first: Please convey my feelings to “Lady 9-14” -- and may she and all the Seneca Nation take the nourishment of corn, squash, and beans and turn it into words, deeds, and success!
Through skype and the internet (and occasional visits to your Nation) I will "stick around" (as you have put it) to see how things are going. As long as my heart beats in my breast I shall have a place in it for the Seneca people!
In a separate email I will tell you what I do for a living. You see, in a few minutes, I have to work, as it is 8 a.m. Saturday morning in Japan. So I shall end the letter here. Please give me a day or two to tell you what I do for a living.
Sincerely,
Steve Walker
How fortunate I am that the Seneca are willing to have me go pay them a visit!
Steve Walker, Earthsaver and Jingles Creator
© 2013 Steve Walker, The Jingles-The Japan Foundation for English Pronunciation, Summit Enterprises.