Written by Megan Cassidy

The Digital Archive of Indigenous Language Persistence (DAILP) is a project rooted in language but more specifically, the transmission of language. DAILP collects manuscripts containing Cherokee syllabary, meticulously translating their content to English. The digital edited collection, Cherokees Writing the Keetoowah Way, contains translations of eighty-seven Cherokee syllabary documents! “With only about 2,000 native Cherokee speakers, many of whom are in their 70s or older,” DAILP’s manuscript translations serve to connect Cherokee speakers to learners by translating the words and stories of the Cherokee people.  

Pored over by teams of students, linguists and Cherokee community members, the translation of Cherokee manuscripts is only possible through intense collaboration. The translators and editors, who tend to the intricacies of the texts in their untranslated state, play an integral part of this effort to document and practice the Cherokee language. Editors introduce the translations collected in these pages, describing their lasting importance and framing them in Cherokee lifeways and history. Through this transformation, the untold stories of the Cherokee people are formed in vivid detail and lost words are rediscovered! 

As co-editors with Ellen Cushman, Rachel Jackson and Ben Fry helped make the Cherokees Writing the Keetoowah Way project come to life.

Jackson also communicates her appreciation for the written component of this project. As fewer Cherokee people are able to speak or write Cherokee, practice with the written form of the Cherokee syllabary can be lost through time. Having a digital space dedicated to the preservation of the written syllabary is, according to Jackson, “innovative and game changing.” 

Ben Fry, assistant professor of American Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and citizen of the Eastern band of Cherokee Indians, also appreciates what this project means to the greater effort to preserve indigenous language. Fry notes this project’s potential to help create “more pedagogical materials for the classroom.” Arguing that this collection opens up new opportunities for linguistic “data analysis” and research of the Cherokee language’s “word order,” Fry believes the translations of these numerous manuscripts serve as educational materials to further spread knowledge of the Cherokee language! Cherokees Writing the Keetoowah Way is a project that actively aims to preserve language in a digital and accessible way, focusing on the written syllabary of the Cherokee people to continue learning and teaching the language. Through the collaboration of editors who deeply care about the Cherokee language, DAILP aims to provide “sustained exposure and accessibility that any scholar, student or any interested community member who can have access to at any time.” In this way, DAILP creates a digital community space for anyone to learn from and read stories unique to the Cherokee people that they can “relate to and respect.”

Citations:

DAILP, dailp.northeastern.edu/home/credits/ Accessed 7 Nov. 2023. 

Mello-Klein, Cody. “To Save Cherokee Language, a Digital Tool Shares Tales of Standing Rock and Big Snake with the Next Generation.” Northeastern Global News, 6 July 2023.