Durbin Feeling facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Durbin Feeling
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| ᏫᎵ ᏚᎥᎢᏅ | |
Durbin Feeling, 1964
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| Born | April 2, 1946 |
| Died | August 19, 2020 (aged 74) |
| Nationality | Cherokee Nation, American |
| Occupation | Linguist, educator |
Durbin Feeling (Cherokee: ᏫᎵ ᏚᎥᎢᏅ, romanized: Wili Duvinv; April 2, 1946 – August 19, 2020) was an important Cherokee Nation linguist. A linguist is someone who studies languages. He wrote the main dictionary for the Cherokee and English languages in 1975.
Many people see him as the most important person in modern times who helped save the Cherokee language. The Cherokee language is an endangered language, meaning fewer and fewer people speak it. Durbin Feeling worked hard to keep it alive.
Contents
Early Life and Learning
Durbin Feeling was born on April 2, 1946. His parents were Jeff and Elizabeth Feeling. They lived in a place called Little Rock, near Locust Grove, Oklahoma.
Cherokee was the first language Durbin learned. He started learning English when he went to first grade. When he was 12 years old, he began to read the Cherokee syllabary. This is the special writing system for the Cherokee language.
Durbin finished high school at Chilocco Indian School in 1964. This was a special school for Native American students. He then earned a degree from Bacone College in 1966.
In 1967, Durbin joined the Army. He served during the Vietnam War. While he was in Vietnam, he started writing letters to his mother in the Cherokee syllabary. He received a special award called a Purple Heart. He left the Army in 1970.
Working with the Cherokee Language
After returning from Vietnam, Durbin Feeling started his important work with the Cherokee language. In 1975, he helped write the first dictionary that translated between Cherokee and English. This dictionary is still the main book people use to learn about the Cherokee language.
Durbin continued his education. He earned a degree in journalism in 1979. Later, in 1992, he earned a master's degree in social sciences from the University of California, Irvine.
He taught the Cherokee language at several universities. These included the University of Oklahoma and the University of Tulsa. He also taught at the University of California.
Durbin wrote or helped write many books and articles about the Cherokee language. His learning materials are still used widely today. Many teachers of the Cherokee language learned directly from him.
From 1976 until his death in 2020, Durbin Feeling worked for the Cherokee Nation. He worked in their language and technology department. In the 1980s, he helped add the Cherokee syllabary to computers. This made it possible to type in Cherokee. He also helped add the Cherokee syllabary to Unicode. Unicode is a system that allows different languages to be used on computers and smartphones all over the world. This made the Cherokee language available to many more people.
Personal Life and Passing
Durbin Feeling was a Baptist lay minister. This means he was a leader in his church, but not a full-time pastor.
He passed away on August 19, 2020.
His Impact and Legacy
Durbin Feeling made huge contributions to keeping the Cherokee language and Cherokee culture strong. Because of his work, the Cherokee Nation named him a Cherokee National Treasure. He also received an honorary doctorate from Ohio State University.
Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin, Jr. called Durbin Feeling "a modern-day Sequoyah." Sequoyah was the person who created the Cherokee syllabary writing system. Chief Hoskin also said that everything being done to bring the language back is "because of Durbin." In 2019, the Cherokee Nation chose Durbin Feeling to be the first person to sign the Cherokee Language Speakers Roll. This is a special list of people who speak the language.
The Cherokee Nation is planning to build a new center for learning the language. It will be named the Durbin Feeling Language Center to honor him. The Sam Noble Museum has a special collection called the Durbin Feeling Collection. It holds many of his Cherokee language materials. This includes letters written in Cherokee by Durbin and his family.
On August 4, 2021, the United States Senate passed a bill called the Durbin Feeling Native American Language Act of 2021. Chief Chuck Hoskin, Jr. said this bill honors Durbin Feeling. He said Durbin was the biggest helper of the Cherokee language since Sequoyah. President Joe Biden signed this act into law on January 5, 2022.
Selected Works
Durbin Feeling wrote many important works. Here are some of them:
- Feeling, Durbin. Cherokee–English Dictionary. Tahlequah: Cherokee Nation, 1975.
- Feeling, Durbin. A structured approach to learning the basic inflections of the Cherokee verb. Neff Publishing Company, 1994.
- Tuyl, Charles D. Van; Durbin Feeling (1994). An Outline of Basic Verb Inflections of Oklahoma Cherokee. Indian University Press. ISBN 978-0-940392-07-6. https://books.google.com/books?id=AY9kAAAAMAAJ.
- Feeling, Durbin, ed. See-say-write: Method of Teaching the Cherokee Language. Cherokee Nation, Indian Adult Education, 2002.
- Feeling, Durbin. Cherokee Narratives: A Linguistic Study. University of Oklahoma Press, 2018.
