Chasing Voices: The Story of John Peabody Harrington

The Story of John Peabody Harrington

  • Movie
  • 2021
  • 57m
  • Documentary

For 50 years, controversial ethnographer John Peabody Harrington crisscrossed the United States, frantically searching and documenting dying Native American languages. Harrington amassed over a million pages of notes on over 150 different tribal languages. Some of these languages were considered dead until his notes were discovered. Today tribes are accessing the notes, reviving their once dormant languages, and bringing together a new generation of language learners in the hope of saving Native languages.

Play
Director
Daniel Golding
Starring
Jack Marr, Kathryn Klar, Ernestine DeSoto, Gertrude Van Fleet-Dash

Cast

  • Jack Marr

    Self - John P. Harrington's assistant

  • Kathryn Klar

    Self - Harrington biographer, UC Berkeley

  • Ernestine DeSoto

    Self - Barbareño Chumash, daughter of last native speaker

  • Gertrude Van Fleet-Dash

    Self - Mojave Elder

  • David Oechsner

    Self - Fort Mojave Tribe

  • Leanne Hinton

    Self - Prof Emeritus of Linguistics UC Berkeley

  • Richard Applegate

    Self - Linguist

  • Nora McDowell

    Self - Fort Mojave Tribe

  • Nakia Zavala

    Self - Santa Ynez Band of Chumash

  • Frank Dominguez

    Self - Santa Ynez Band of Chumash

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