NO REST FOR THE AWAKE - MINAGAHET CHAMORRO

  Lulai continues to speak more and more Chamoru about more and more things.    In her third year, I've been  encouraging her more and more to start responding in Chamoru by playing games, providing commentary in Chamoru to movies or videos she was watching on YouTube, telling stories in Chamoru, reading books.    At first most of her Chamoru was blooming in the areas where I was prompting it.    I would say "nihi ta hugåndo este" and she would start speaking Chamoru in response to the idea that Chamoru has to be used for the game we are about to play.    But in the last week, and in particular since her younger sister has arrived, she has started to use Chamoru more and more organically and unprompted, telling stories in Chamoru that she starts herself and even creating her own games in Chamoru that she now invites me to play.   To give you a good example of the language growth in her, take this character, Lotso from the film Toy S...

English is my mother tongue, in the sense that it is the language that I grew up with and speak most comfortably. It is my first language. It is however not my favorite language, not the best language and certainly not i mas takhilo' para Guahu. I am a non-native speaker of the Chamoru language as I learned to speak it when I was 20 years old. It is natural for me in some ways, but still unnatural in others, primarily when talking about things that are difficult in general to express in a Chamoru lexicon. This is not only something that I struggle with, but as the Chamoru language has become more and more limited in how and where it is used, many people find themselves constantly switching to English since a potential part of their conversation is something few people have actually used the Chamoru language to convey. What makes speaking, thinking and writing easier is if the topic fits easily within some existing framework or lexicon for carrying meaning. If that framework...

Every time I start a new round of my free Chamoru classes, especially since I moved them onto zoom, I always start off by talking to the students about why I offer these classes in the first place.    I always tell them that I didn't grow up speaking Chamoru, or that I only knew less than 10 Chamoru words until I was 20 years old (unless you count food words). During the zoom class orientation last month I told the students the six main words I learned in Chamoru growing up, and that if I said one of the few words they know, put a "biba" in the chat.    I listed off to many giggle and smiles in the zoom boxes: "dåggan...tåke'...fa'fa'...do'do'...mugo'...susu..."   When I glanced at the chat after going through a list mainly of body parts and bodily functions, I realized that more than a hundreds bibas had been typed into the chat.    I continue to offer these free Chamoru classes, primarily because I feel compelled to, in order to honor t...

Ever since I first began learning Chamoru my interest in Chamoru music has continually grown.  I grew up sometimes hearing Chamoru music, but couldn't understand it and didn't really connect with it.  But from the first time that I sat down with my grandmother at the dining room table and had her help me translate the CD "Chamorro Yu'" from Johnny Sablan, kinenne' yu'. I have been hooked.  To this end I have been collecting Chamoru music, whether in CD, cassette or vinyl form.  I've collected whatever I can from newspapers, magazines and scholarly sources related to Chamoru music.   I have also been fortunate enough to sit down with many musicians and talk to them about their experiences and why in a world where English dominates, they chose to record and release music in Chamoru. Last month I was very very luck, gof suettettette, to be able to pick up the album "Ai Saun Diroga" by Chamolinian II while searching for Chamoru music online.   Fr...

After almost 13 hours of labor, I am excited beyond words to introduce all of you to Lulai Lumuhu Perez Bevacqua. Lulai means to fish on the reef by the moonlight. Lumuhu is an ancient Chamoru month, it was documented to mean “the time to return” or “to resume one’s path.” Desiree moved back to Guam last year to reconnect with her island and learn Chamoru. This name holds special significance, since her return home allowed us to meet. Perez is from Desiree’s family and is “Familian Boño.” She's also Familian Pepero as well. Bevacqua is my family and although we have roots elsewhere as well, we are from the Kabesa and Bittot families of Guam. Lulai has one of those matan bihu mångnge faces, that make you feel torn between pinching them to vent out the magoddai or take her hand and sniff it “manginge’” style to show her respect. She looks like fresh new life, paopaopao yan pao'neni lokkue' and also looks like my grandfather at the same time. Sen magof ham på’go ya in agradede...

One of the earliest Chamoru translations of an American pop song I ever did.  I came across it recently while I was searching on some old external hard drives.  It is to the tune of the Coldplay song "Clocks"which came out in 2002.  I remember I had started translating the song, working to come up with some basic lyrics.  I was hindered in my translation by the fact that the title frankly, gi minagahet was weird or sucked in Chamoru.  Clocks, didn't make sense in Chamoru. It may barely make sense in English for the song gi minagahet.  "Reloh siha" mungga yu' nu enao lol.  This was very early in my Chamoru learning journey, I was functionally fluent, but still making mistakes all the time and my Chamoru sounded like it was stiff and dry, straight out of a grammar book, because I lacked the basic organic feeling of being part of a language community.  The ways that emerge sometimes for an individual, a family, a village, a people to build off of the...

No one ever fully knows a language, and that is always an interesting way of reminding people that a language is, first and foremost, a social organism. It connects people. It exists to connect and express connections.  But as no one ever fully knows a language, it means that even those who use it everyday are always still learning in the language. There is always more to know, as a language is always belong what a single person can know or do. One way that I have continued to learn and grow in the language is by translating songs from English, regularly into Chamoru. At this point, I've translated hundreds of pop songs, rock songs, hip hop songs, country, punk, alternative, emo, ska, at this point just about any genre you can imagine, I've probably translated at least one song from it, into the Chamoru language.  Sometimes I try to keep the original intention and metaphor of the song, other times I completely abandon it. Sometimes even the tune of the song itself, its flow ge...

Rlene Santos Steffy published the article below during the summer as part of her iTintaotao Marianas feature series in The Guam Daily Post. I was honored to be included amongst so many other older and more esteemed activist and scholars. I conducted several long interviews with Rlene, some focusing on history and others on political status. I was surprised by her chosen route for this article, focusing on my learning the Chamorro language and my relationship to my grandparents. I was surprised, but not disappointed. The quote that she used at the start of the article is very much what I continue to feel about my Chamorro identity. Namely that if not for my grandparents, I wouldn't have much of a Chamorro identity and probably wouldn't speak Chamorro or care as much about the fate of the Chamorro people. Reading this article made me sen mahålang for my grandparents. I miss them every day, everytime I use the Chamorro language. Kada fumino' Chamorro nina'siente yu...

For several years I have been assisting Siñora Rosa Palomo and Professor Gerhard Schwab who are my colleagues at the University of Guam with the development of an amazing, new, free language learning website built around the learning of the Chamorro language. Humuyongña i na'ån-ña " Learning Chamorro ."  After years of tirelessly working on building the site, it was launched last week. A Pacific Daily News article about it, was picked up by USA Today and shared several thousand times on social media. The website would not be possible without the love labor of GuamWebz and Rhaj Sharma. Some media on the launch can be found below. Sen magof hu na put fin in baba este na website. ********************** Date: March 12, 2017 We take this opportunity to thank everyone of you for registering and continuously visiting our website. All of us together have visited our website more than 1.7 million times. It is your continuous encouragement and support that has kep...

2017 Chamorro Language Competition Celebrates Storytelling, Launches New Chamorro Learning Website  Mangilao, Guam: On March 13-14, 2017, the Chamorro Studies Program in the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Guam will hold its annual “Inacha’igen Fino’ CHamoru,” or Chamorro language competition.  Each year, hundreds of students from both private and public schools throughout the Marianas gather to compete against each other in categories that test their knowledge of speaking, reading, writing, and singing in the Chamorro language. The theme for this year’s competition is “I Fino’ CHamoru: Ta Hungok, Ta Li’e’, Ta Sångan, Pues Nihi Ta Mantieni!”: "The Chamorro Language: We Hear, We See, We Speak, So Let’s Hold On to It!”  The first day of the competition will take place on Monday, March 13, from 2 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. in the CLASS Lecture Hall and feature categories for individual contestants. On th...

My two PDN columns on the need to protect language learning at UOG. If you aren't familiar with the issue, please head to this website UOG Language Drive , to learn more and sign the petition. If we combine both online and paper signatures, we have collected over 1500 and are still working on getting more! ************************* Protect Language Learning at UOG Michael Lujan Bevacqua Pacific Daily News December 30, 2016 At present at the University of Guam, each undergraduate student is required to take two language classes (eight credits total) as part of their General Education or GE requirements. UOG offers courses regularly for Chamorro, Japanese, Tagalong, Spanish, Mandarin, French and can also offer courses in Chuukese and other Micronesian languages upon request. UOG is also home to the Chamorro Studies Program, of which I am a faculty member and this program is unique in the world in terms of focusing its courses on the history, language and culture of t...

Un apå'ka na taotao, i na'ån-ña si Paul Zerzan, sigi ha' umalok gui' gi gasetan Guåhan na esta måtai pat esta taisetbe i Fino' Chamorro. Esta ha na'bububu meggai na taotao guini giya Guåhan yan gi sanlagu lokkue'. Estague diferentes na kåtta ginen i PDN ni' kumokontra i taihinasso na tinige'-ña. ************************ Our Language Isn't Dead Yet by Michael Lujan Bevacqua Pacific Daily News 11/3/16 My column this week is written in response to Paul Zerzan’s op-ed  on Oct. 29 dealing with the death of the Chamorro language. Men with the same complexion and attitudes as Zerzan have long felt it their right to determine the life or death of things related to indigenous people in the Pacific. For Chamorros, these sorts of pronouncements are common. We have been struggling against them for centuries and only recently realized that just because a man with a flag comes to claim us, it doesn’t mean he discovered us. Just because a man...