Award-winning videos featuring Paiute, Shoshone and Washo languages are available through the oral history program at the University of Nevada, Reno.
Among them are "Tahgum," a story of the Washo pine nut tradition (in English with prayer in Washo); "Rabbit Boss" about the Washo rabbit drive; and "That was Happy Life - A Paiute Woman Remembers."
These are available for sale at reasonable cost through the school or for check out at area libraries. For details call film maker and oral historian JoAnne Peden at 425-6365.
(Two more videos are on the way: one on the Fort McDermitt reservation, another on the people of Stillwater marshes outside Fallon).
"The native language contains the culture of the people and if the language is lost a great deal of the culture is lost with it. There are only certain ways of expressing oneself or identifying things or telling about the history that you know, and that can only really be done in that language. That's why tribes here in the Great Basin are struggling so hard to keep those languages alive."
- JoAnne Peden, film maker
and oral historian at UNR
