ENDANGERED LANGUAGE FUND

Native Voices Endowment ELF provides grants for eligible tribes and languages through the Native Voices Endowment: A Lewis & Clark Expedition Bicentennial Legacy. These funds come from the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial Council, which received the revenues from the U.S. Mint's sale of the Lewis and Clark 2004 Commemorative Coin. Grants through this program are available to members of the Native American tribes that came in contact with the Lewis and Clark Expedition between 1803-1806. Grants are available for work on documentation and revitalization of the languages of these tribes see below for list of eligible tribes and languages. Applicants Principal Investigators must be enrolled tribal members or employees of tribal colleges. Scholarships for academic work in linguistics or a Native language, or for Master/Apprentice programs are also available for tribal members.

The 56th iteration of the Algonquian Conference was held at the First Americans Museum in Oklahoma City, 24-27 October, 2024. This series of conferences brings together academic linguists and tribal language activists (with some attendees being both) to discuss issues in the structure and use of Algonquian languages throughout North America. There were 182 attendees, the majority of whom registered for the conference as a whole; 37 registered just for the banquet at which language activists from Oklahoma Algonquian tribes were honored. The presentations and attendance at the conference highlighted the continuing increase in the number and size of language revitalization programs, as well as the relevance of the linguistic insights into the various languages these programs support.