Glen Korstrom
Northern News Services

INUVIK (Jun 05/98) - Inuvik elder Ruth Carroll has won the Gwich'in non-fiction award in the 1998 NWT Writing Contest.

But as Carroll earned praise for her literary work describing how she kept her Gwich'in language, NWT language commissioner Judy Tutcho was busy condemning the GNWT for not promoting aboriginal languages enough.

And Gwich'in, Tutcho said, is the official language most in danger, closely followed by Inuvialuktun.

"There might be a handful (of fluent speakers), maybe 20 or less and it's usually elders," Tutcho said of Gwich'in.

Speaking languages daily at home is critical to keeping them alive, Tutcho said. And this is something Carroll was fortunate enough to have when she was a child.

"At home my mom spoke the language, my father was in the hospital. My mom and everybody else around me spoke the language all the time and I grew up in a home like that," Carroll said.

During school Carroll spoke English but she said people from her native Fort McPherson worked in the school kitchen, laundry room and sewing room so she continued to hear her language.

Nobody ever told her not to speak Gwich'in.

"Nobody ever said that to me. I think some of that is just B.S.," she said.

When she returned to Fort McPherson, Carroll said her mother urged her to visit her "grandparents," or elders in town.

"What really got me back into speaking my language is that I was only using certain types of words when I talked with elders, they asked me 'What are you doing?' 'How's school?' and I said, 'It's good' or 'I'm all right.'"

Later when she translated tapings of elders' stories, her fluency increased.

"Constantly hearing the language, I think that's what really helped me," said Carroll who now hosts a Gwich'in show on CBC called Nantaii, or "Trail through the bush," in Gwich'in.

"And there were times when some of the bigger words I could start using. I could tell my friends I did this story today and it was about this. I might take a quote from somebody and some of it was funny and we laughed."

Learning Gwich'in or Inuvialuktun is important, she says, because, "You really know where you come from, who you are, more about your people (and) you understand where the elders are coming from."