The life was taken out of the language a generation ago, she says, when the schools banned it and people could be punished for teaching it to their children. Of 170 people in the village, there are now 60 speakers. I speak it, but only to the elders. I didn't speak it to my children when they were young. I regret that in some ways.
Every conversation here comes back to the caribou.
A young village official, Roland Tripp, sits in front of one of the council's computers. We need cash, of course we do. But our caribou are a lot more important to us than money. And if the oil companies come to the refuge, we will lose the caribou. Many people told me they send dried caribou meat to their exiled relatives.