On Nov. 28, 2025, the Minnesota Wild, which is Minnesota’s National Hockey League (NHL) team, offered its first Ojibwe broadcast of a game against the Colorado Avalanche. Chief Executive Officer of the Minnesota Wild, Matt Majka, said this milestone would not only honor a major indigenous community in Minnesota’s cultural fabric, but also expand access to the Ojibwe community.
For the past several years, institutions around the Great Lakes region of the United States and Canada have introduced and promoted programs aimed at revitalizing Ojibwe (or Anishinaabemowin), an Algonquian language. In total, there are around 36,500 speakers of Ojibwe across the U.S. Canada, but only under a thousand first-language speakers. Although the language overall continues to see a decline in speakers across both countries’ populations, younger generations are increasingly learning native languages of the region as a second language, according to Canada Statistics. Additionally, the rise of social media has given a platform for the revitalization of Ojibwe.
The U.S. and Canada are both home to populations of diverse backgrounds. Nevertheless, several of these revitalization programs are open to all members of the public; regardless of whether someone has majority indigenous ancestry. Michelle Goose, an Ojibwe instructor at Fond du Lac Tribal Community College in Cloquet, Minnesota, said their institution’s course on the language was open to people of all learning levels and backgrounds. At the University of Minnesota, they offer an Ojibwe language program under their College of Liberal Arts.
However, not all indigenous nations of this continent are as enthusiastic to share their language.
In 1998, Kenneth C. Hill and Emory Sekaquaptewa published “Hopi Dictionary – Hopìikwa Lavàytutuveni” to the University of Arizona Press. Available to students enrolled at the institution and for other members of the public. On top of being a major undertaking to accurately record the Third Mesa dialect of the Hopi language, Sekaquaptewa, who is a Hopi scholar, spearheaded it.
Nevertheless, some members of the Hopi Tribe tried to halt the publishing of this work. One of the main concerns cited by members and leaders of the tribe were about sharing sacred aspects of their language to non-Hopis, even to other indigenous peoples like the neighboring Navajo. Additionally, the price of the book was said to be too high for the average Hopi tribal member. This eventually led to a compromise where the Hopi Cultural Preservation Office offered the dictionary to all enrolled tribal members at a discounted price. Copies available to non-Hopi members are sparse, and nowadays often resold at the price of several hundred dollars.
Similarly to the Hopi, many of the Pueblos in New Mexico keep the knowledge of their languages protected from outside incursions. More than a mere discrimination against non-Puebloans, these policies are a response to centuries of colonialism and cultural repression. Additionally, Pueblo and Hopi languages are heavily tied with the religious customs of these tribes, each including highly sacred vocabulary. To them, respecting who does and does not get to learn their language is to respect their spirituality; as they fight to preserve their religious traditions.
As a result, the focus of indigenous language revitalization in the Southwest has been on languages like Navajo (or Diné). At the University of New Mexico, their institution offers a course in Navajo under their Department of Linguistics and courses in Nahuatl, Yucatec Maya, and Quechua under their Latin American & Iberian Institute, both under their College of Arts and Sciences. At New Mexico State University, the American Indian Program (AIP) can help waive a student’s second language requirement if they provide proof of fluency in their tribal language.
Even still, some other Pueblos in New Mexico have opened their programs for outside observation. New Mexico State University linguistics professor Mark Waltermire spoke of a time when he took a group of his students to Cochiti Pueblo (23 miles west of Santa Fe) to see the community’s revitalization program for Keres, their native language.
“I took the students there, and we asked them if we could come and observe. And they were kind and open about letting us see,” Waltermire said. “The only requirement was that we couldn’t speak any English during the lessons, and we had to sort of make ourselves ‘invisible,’ which was a really good learning experience for the students […] now you know how it feels to not be able to speak your language and to make yourself invisible, right? That was a powerful experience for us, even for it was only for an hour and a half or two.”
Besides the Navajo, the Apache are another tribal group that is a part of New Mexico’s indigenous makeup. The Mescalero Apache Reservation is located just south of Ruidoso. Waltermire said he would encourage the funding of new programs at NMSU that can teach Navajo and Apache with tribal approval.
“We could be successful, particularly with Apache down in this area, and with Navajo as well,” Waltermire said. “Since they are closely related, you could have a wider net of students or community members that might be interested in participating. The roles for people like me, as a total outsider, would be more about facilitating linguistic planning and policy. Another amazing thing is we would recruit someone from the reservation; there are people that could happily teach it. But you would want to consult with tribal leaders.”
As of Fall 2024, 2.6% of the institution’s student population identified as American Indian or Alaskan Native.
Language revitalization is a nuanced topic. Each individual tribe approaches this issue slightly differently than the next. It is an especially complicated and loaded topic when the possibility of European Americans learning these languages arises. It could be said there is a “spectrum” with how open each nation or cultural community could be with its approach. Towards one end of the spectrum, you have nations like the Ojibwe who, while certainly not a monolith, have explored several ways to expand Ojibwe language proficiency, and are generally open to sharing that ambitious project with non-Ojibwe people. Towards the other end, you have nations like the Pueblo, who take a conservative approach to language revitalization; mostly reserved for enrolled tribal members and therefore resulting in a speaking population that is much older in age.
As much as some of us, as Americans of European descent, may agree or disagree with how certain tribes approach language revitalization, as those of colonizer descent, it is critical that we leave these policy decisions to the indigenous communities themselves. I use the word “communities” specifically. Tribal governments can and often are an active part of these communities, but it should also be said that these entities are, at the end of the day, governments, and they may not always speak for all members of the nation they represent. We should be aware and respectful of the sensitivities of these languages. To many indigenous peoples, preserving their language is an active and constant struggle, one in which Americans of European descent are not automatically entitled to be a part of, even if we are sympathetic to their cause.
The most responsible way to support is, then, to facilitate their programs, regardless of whether those of European descent get to benefit from those programs. This facilitation can come in the form of funding meant to benefit and improve these programs. Not only to pay those working hard to bring these tongues back to life, but to make the resources they provide more accessible to indigenous peoples, who are economically disadvantaged across this continent.
