Good evening.
Marsha's father was a chief in a longhouse. When she was a young girl, she would attend a lot of ceremonies, when she was available, because she went to the school for the deaf in Milton, Ontario, but that's another sad story.
When growing up in that society, as she showed you, the celebrations would carry on, much to her chagrin and her non-understanding because there was no person there to explain to her what was going on because it was spoken in the Oneida language. Even if—much like with Debbie today—there were an interpreter there, when the Oneida language was spoken, her hands would just drop and then wait until English was spoken again. That part of being that close yet so far removed from our language, our culture, our traditions, our songs and our dances has impacted Marsha a great deal.
We have five children who are deaf: three girls and two boys. We have nine grandchildren; seven are deaf and two can hear. When Marsha was a child growing up, there were many instances when she was alone. She was the only native girl at Milton, so you can imagine the treatment she got there. She was never good enough and always was looked down upon.
Look where she is today. I asked her the other day, “When you were a little girl, did you ever envision coming to show the Oneida language to a standing committee on Parliament Hill?” She said, “No, never.” But we are here today, through her commitment, her effort, her being an elder within the deaf community who is looked up to, and her strength to keep going on this route, to walk this road that no one has ever walked before.
We've travelled across Canada. Marsha is the eastern Canadian representative for indigenous deaf women in Canada. That honour was granted to her two years ago in Edmonton because they've seen the qualities that she has shown here tonight: her commitment and her love for the language and for her people.
It's like when she said shekoli a while ago. It's not evasive. It's not in your face. It's down and it's away. It's a sweeping hand gesture. A lot of our gestures are like that. We've taken from the natural world and incorporated it into what we do to be non-offensive, to encourage you to come, look and learn. We've provided those opportunities for ourselves and our family.
Our family has driven this because, like I said, the number of our people is 14. However, in our community, it might add up to 20. The Oneida has a high number of deaf people, and we've been encouraged by them. Now the hearing population of Oneida is coming through, as well, with its teachings of the language. People are saying that they can remember more easily when they use sign language, that it helps them. We can see a definite improvement in the revitalization, in the fire, the rekindling of our flames for our language.
What I was saying earlier was that shekoli is like that. That's “hello”, and the next words, when you meet someone, are sk?'na’ko: k?, and that means, “Are you well?” That's the beauty of our language. The love in our language is that almost immediately you ask a person how they are, truly, and not just how are they doing and walk away. No, it's “How are you? Are you well?” In return it is asked of you, “Are you well?”
We have come to a point where our youth are picking that up again. For a period of time I got mad at my dad, when I was younger. I said, “How come you never spoke the language to us, to my brother and me?” We had to go with our grandparents to really get an understanding of our language. I was really mad. He said, “I never wanted to teach you something another man could beat out of you.” After he said those words, I wasn't mad anymore.
That's the direct effect that colonialism has had within our people, within our families, within our structure.
Now we're regaining that back to the point that whenever anybody talks about youth, not only our youth, but other youths as well, having no respect, well, in learning that language and learning to put those words together, that teaches you respect right there. You carry that out. Elders respect you and they encourage you to learn more, because that's the way they were brought up. Their first language was Oneida. That's why it's so important that we can carry this on and Marsha can share that with her grandchildren.
I say that because she was such a lonely little girl. Now, together, we've made our own little tribe where she is not alone anymore. The strength, the compassion, the understanding, and the caring that are in our language we try to incorporate into our signs.
She showed “animal”. An animal will paw for its food, and it will paw at the ground. In American Sign Language a bear is this way; ours is this way. He will leave his mark on a tree and you'll know he's there, so you'd better watch out unless you want to meet him.
Insect, bug, in American Sign Language is this way, and ours is like this, because that will draw your immediate attention: “Oh, there is a spider on me, there is something crawling on me, and it's probably an insect.” We have tried to take our natural world and combine it into our gestures, into what we can present to Wka' niwahnya, the smallest, to Wka niwahyot, the biggest of our people.
I hope with the demonstration we have put on here today we will help you to understand that.
Yaw?’ko Thank you.