{"id":1279,"date":"2024-04-23T19:59:35","date_gmt":"2024-04-23T19:59:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/amycondra.com\/?p=1279"},"modified":"2024-04-23T20:17:34","modified_gmt":"2024-04-23T20:17:34","slug":"reincarnation-of-stories-new-play-to-be-performed-in-tlingit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/?p=1279","title":{"rendered":"Reincarnation of Stories: New play, to be performed in Tlingit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This article first appeared in <\/em>The Juneau Empire<\/em><\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

by Amy Condra<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Ishmael Hope\u2019s grandfather died, his family and friends gathered to pay tribute.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As they stood to share their stories, they spoke in a language that had, for thousands of years, served Alaska\u2019s Native people: They spoke in Tlingit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy dad said, \u2018Man, when an Elder gets up, and speaks from the heart, that is like soul food,\u2019\u201d said Hope.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When his own father, Andy Hope III, passed away in 2008, Ishmael Hope decided it was time to study Tlingit himself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Sealaska Heritage Institute figures from 2007, Tlingit is spoken fluently in America by only 200 to 400 people, and is considered by many to be an endangered language.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Hope, learning to speak it is a way to respect those who came before him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt truly does empower you to learn the language of your ancestors,\u201d said Hope, who grew up speaking only English. \u201cWhen you first learn a language, you think it\u2019s just another way to say something. Then you realize that the way you put together thoughts and concepts is related to the language you are using.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLanguage is alive,\u201d he added. \u201cIt\u2019s an actual living thing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My dad said, \u2018Man, when an Elder gets up, and speaks from the heart, that is like soul food.’<\/p>Ishmael Hope<\/cite><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Hope\u2019s previous plays include \u201cRaven Odyssey,\u201d \u201cCedar House\u201d and \u201cGunakadeit,\u201d which was performed at the Smithsonian\u2019s National Museum for the American Indian in Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His newest work, \u201cThe Reincarnation of Stories,\u201d opens tonight, and features four actors \u2014 Frank Katasse, Edward Littlefield, Erin Tripp and Hope himself \u2014 who will perform the story of Naatsilanei, the birth of the killer whale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They tell the tale in Tlingit, as it was once told by traditional Tlingit artist Willie Marks. While everyone in the cast was raised speaking English, they have also each studied Tlingit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt takes a long time to memorize Tlingit,\u201d Hope said. \u201cIt can be like pushing a rock up a hill! But everyone in the cast has Tlingit lines.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The play\u2019s director, Flordelino Lagundino, is also the producing artistic director of the Generator Theatre Company, which is co-producing the play with Perseverance Theatre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lagundino has collaborated with Hope before, and has also directed several plays for Perseverance Theatre and directed and acted in works performed at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Yale Repertory Theatre and The Kennedy Center.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Ishmael Hope (left), Frank Katasse and Erin Tripp rehearse for \u201cThe Reincarnation of Stories\u201d at Perseverance Theatre. (Courtesy of Flordelino Lagundino,)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

He says that an English adaptation will be performed alongside the Tlingit version.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI wanted to have Tlingit as the primary language,\u201d Lagundino said. \u201cI wanted the play performed as an Elder, a Native storyteller, would perform it, so that the audience can actually see a storyteller tell a story in Tlingit.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn theater, people often want to make things more mainstream, to \u2018aw, shucks,\u2019 it up,\u201d he said. \u201cWe want to keep it authentic.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hope agreed, but added that perhaps a more apt description of a performance of \u201cThe Reincarnation of Stories\u201d would be, \u201cnot quite authentic.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Or even, Hope said, \u201cwonderfully impure.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt isn\u2019t pure, because English is our main language\u2026 we come from a different world than Willie Marks did,\u201d said Hope. \u201cBut we have reverence for that world, we learn from that and we honor that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hope credits Richard Dauenhauer and Nora Marks Dauenhauer, editors of the Sealaska Heritage Foundation\u2019s Classics of Tlingit Oral Literature series, as being inspirations, as people who are striving to preserve and present the Tlingit language.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But even as these linguists and scholars strive to document Tlingit stories, they acknowledge that simply writing these tales down isn\u2019t enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In her article \u201cNative Tongues,\u201d published 15 years ago in Sierra Magazine, Nancy Lord wrote, \u201cPreservation, Tlingit oral historians Richard and Nora Marks Dauenhauer remind us, is what we do to berries in jam jars and salmon in cans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPreserved foods are different from thriving berry patches and surging runs of salmon, and dictionaries are not the same as speech. Books and recordings can preserve languages, but only people and communities can keep them alive.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the goals of those involved with \u201cThe Reincarnation of Stories\u201d is to revitalize not just Tlingit stories, but Tlingit cultural traditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So in this play, stories will be not only told with the Tlingit language, but also with Tlingit songs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ed Littlefield composed the music for the play, crafting a new take on classical Tlingit tunes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe goal here is to create contemporary traditional music,\u201d said Littlefield, a Seattle musician who grew up in Sitka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Everyone in the cast will be singing and dancing, said Littlefield, who will also be performing in the show; he and his fellow cast member, Erin Tripp, will be drumming throughout much of the play.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe beauty of Tlingit music, of Native music, is that everyone is involved,\u201d Littlefield said. \u201cWhat Ishmael is talking about \u2014 the language as the culture \u2014 well, the music is also a huge aspect of that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And that, said Hope, is all that they are trying to do: Create a connection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Forging that bridge between the past and the present can be challenging, notes Littlefield.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have heard Native storytellers speak Tlingit, but I haven\u2019t heard a lot of original compositions,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re very rare.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Littlefield\u2019s mother, Roberta Littlefield, has taught Tlingit language classes for University of Alaska Southeast, and conducted oral history interviews.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy mom was an archivist for a Sitka tribe, and discovered these cylinder tapes,\u201d Littlefield said. \u201cOn them were crying songs, just amazingly raw singing, from the 1900s. That has been an adventure for me, taking in all of that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lagundino is encouraging cast members to let these kinds of inspirations influence their performances<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe lens they are creating is different from the lens created by Elders, who had the Tlingit language and culture with them all the time,\u201d he said. \u201cBut to have the words live through these actors, stirs up something they didn\u2019t know was there before, that they can pass on to other people. Through their apprenticeship, the future has been enriched\u2014and they are getting closer to being Elders themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hope says that learning the Tlingit language is one of the biggest goals of his life, and he wishes that he could fully immerse himself with the language by spending more time with Elders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m serious about it, because as (Canadian poet) Robert Bringhurst says, to give up your language in order to get along in the modern world, is like giving away your grandparents.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And this isn\u2019t about race, says Hope.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s about culture, and it\u2019s about love,\u201d he said. \u201cTo me, when I say language is about love, it\u2019s about a true commitment to ancestors.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hope believes that learning more about his Native culture enhances his perspective on the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis doesn\u2019t mean I\u2019m saying \u2018no\u2019 to modern America,\u201d he said. \u201cThis makes me a better American.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This article first appeared in The Juneau Empire by Amy Condra When Ishmael Hope\u2019s grandfather died, his family and friends gathered to pay tribute. As they stood to share their stories, they spoke in a language that had, for thousands of years, served Alaska\u2019s Native people: They spoke in Tlingit. \u201cMy dad said, \u2018Man, when an… Continue reading Reincarnation of Stories: New play, to be performed in Tlingit<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1283,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,5,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alaska","category-arts","category-juneau","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1279"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1287,"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1279\/revisions\/1287"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amycondra.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}