Community Cinema Vashon presents - We Still Live Here - As Nutayunean

Community Cinema Vashon presents a community screening of WE STILL LIVE HERE - AS NUTAYUNEAN - A film by Anne Makepeace - Sunday - Nov 20th - Ober Park Performance Room at 3:00pm. This 60 minute documentary film will be followed by a moderated audience discussion. All islanders with Native American Cultural Heritage are especially invited to share their experiences and knowledge of their history with Native language and cultural identity. This interesting film is appropriate for all ages and youth are encouraged to attend. All Community Cinema events are FREE. We hope that you will join us for this exceptional and seasonally significant film - as we think of our traditional National Thanksgiving Holiday.

We Still Live Here - As Nutayunean tells the remarkable store of the recent cultural and linguistic revival of the Wampanoag tribe of Southeastern Massachusetts. Their ancestors ensured the survival of the Pilgrims - and lived to regret it. Now they are bringing their language home again. On Cape Cod and Martha’s Vineyard, linguist Jessie Little Doe is reviving the Wampanoag language more than a century after the last native speaker died. By unlocking the secrets of the Wampanoag language, the community has been able to rediscover their history and culture. Now a generation of children is breathing life into what was once thought to be a lost language.

Jessie and the members of her community went on an unprecedented odyssey that would lead her to a linguistics research fellowship at MIT and the discovery of a huge trove of documents written (phonetically) in Wampanoag, including deeds, contracts, and an entire translation of the King James Bible (published at Harvard in 1663). Together with her MIT colleagues and the Wamapanoag community, Jessie achieved something that had never been done before - bringing an American Indian language back to life after many generations without native speakers.

There is an excellent resource available on line to learn more about this film, a touching personal story by the the filmmaker, and background information including early history of the Wampanoags, the Pilgrims and Puritans. To access this go to www.communitycinema.org. Under Program Tools select Film Resources then click on the picture of the film and you will be able to download the Discussion Guide. This excellent comprehensive and interesting resource includes additional information on endangered languages, status of Indigenous Languages in North America and resources.

Community Cinema Vashon happens the third Sunday of every month. To see a Calendar of Films for this Fall Season go to ccnw.tv (Community Cinema Pacific Northwest). A trailer of the film can be viewed by clicking on the picture. Please mark your calendar for our December event on December 18th which will be co-sponsored by the Vashon-Maury Island Land Trust. Look for our colorful fliers about Vashon and invite your friends to join you for these events.

For questions or to be involved please contact Jane Berg - jane.e.berg@gmail.com or 567-4532.