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During the National Conference of Librarians Serving Blind and Physically Handicapped Individuals, in Manhattan Beach, California, April 30-May 4, 2000, there will be a "Focus on Native Americans" breakfast colloquy, May 4, 8:15-9:00 a.m.. Dan Boyd, regional librarian of the South Dakota Braille and Talking Book Library, and Ruth Nussbaum, librarian, NLS Reference Section, will be moderators. Please feel free to bring handouts you think may be appropriate to this meeting. Ruth Nussbaum will also present a report on her recent attendance at two national conferences dealing with Native American health and accessibility issues.
The National Digital Library, Library of Congress, recently announced its latest addition to the American Memory historical collection: the music of the Omaha tribe. "Omaha Indian music includes forty-four recordings made by Francis La Flesche and Alice Cunningham Fletcher between 1895 and 1897, as well as recordings made by staff of the American Folklife Center at the 1983 Omaha harvest celebration pow-wow and the 1985 Hethu'shka concert held at the Library of Congress." Included in this collection are interviews with members of the Omaha tribe that provide background information about the songs performed, field notes, tape logs, photographs, and related publicity material. This collection can be found on the Internet at <http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/omh.html>.
The Omaha tribe presently has 4,950 members, with approximately half living on the reservation located in Macy, Walthill, and Rosalie, Nebraska.
The Smithonian's National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) has just published a new magazine devoted to the collections within the museum. The quarterly features a calendar of events and exhibitions, a guest essay, and a children's section. American Indian is available from NMAI, 470 L'Enfant Plaza SW, Suite 7103, Washington, DC 20560. A subscription is included in membership ($20).
The U.S. Education Department in conjunction with the American Indian College Fund is developing a $10 million program with tribal colleges on reservations to train 1,000 new teachers over the next five years. Tribal colleges and nearby universities are to work together to provide courses so that teachers' aides in reservation schools, most of them Indians, can earn the state credentials needed to become teachers. Teacher training has been a priority of the tribal colleges since their founding thirty years ago, and this program will build the capacity of the tribal colleges to train more teachers.
Updated December 24, 2002
