Independent news from the Indigenous Media Freedom Alliance
May 21, 2024
Press Releases

Edwin Benson: Mandan video word post #12

Jodi Rave Spotted Bear
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jodi@imfreedomalliance.org https://twitter.com/JodiRave
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A photo of Cole Brings Plenty with his cousin Candi Brings Plenty's dog stood in the center of the Memorial Park Bandshell in Rapid City at an April 14 vigil. (Photo by Amelia Schafer, ICT/Rapid City Journal)

Check it out. After a long day of yard work, I’ve created a short video with Edwin Benson, the last man alive born into speaking Mandan as a first language. Benson, 78, lives in Twin Buttes, N.D., my home community on the Fort Berthold Reservation. Mandan, or Nu’eta, is one of the endangered languages of the world. Benson has been working with community members to revitalize the language. I’m honored to share those recordings.

In this  video, listen to the word of the day: I don’t know.          Íwahaaxikosh
Thanks for being a part of the Twin Buttes Community language revitalization project. And thanks to Cory Spotted Bear and Lanny Real Bird for recording the Mandan language. In this video, Benson is pictured with Tribal Chairman Marcus Levings of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation.

Jodi Rave

Posted in Press ReleasesTagged
Jodi Rave Spotted Bear
jodi@imfreedomalliance.org https://twitter.com/JodiRave

Jodi Rave Spotted Bear is the founder and director of the Indigenous Media Freedom Alliance, a 501-C-3 nonprofit organization with offices in Bismarck, N.D. and the Fort Berthold Reservation. Jodi spent 15 years reporting for the mainstream press. She's been awarded prestigious Nieman and John S. Knight journalism fellowships at Harvard and Stanford, respectively. She also an MIT Knight Science Journalism Project fellow. Her writing is featured in "The Authentic Voice: The Best Reporting on Race and Ethnicity," published by Columbia University Press. Jodi currently serves as a Society of Professional Journalists at-large board member, an SPJ Foundation board member, and she chairs the SPJ Freedom of Information Committee. Jodi has won top journalism awards from mainstream and Native press organizations. She earned her journalism degree from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

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