Time is running out for the Lakota Nation. Their language, once the most widely spoken Native language in North America, is now in danger of becoming extinct. On July 11th, a group of concerned people will take the first steps of a 1700 mile journey they call "Spirit Walk" to help raise donations for The Seven Fires Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping the Lakota people preserve their culture and language by bringing elders and children together to teach their native language.

Besides raising money, the goal for the Spirit Walk, according to John LaFountaine, President of the Board of Directors, is to show the world:

what the Lakota people have given to this Nation and to humanity and the desperate situation in which their culture, their language and their way of living is at risk right now.

Less than 25% of the Lakota population currently speak or understand their native tongue and fewer than that are fluent. The Oglala Lakota College predicts that within the next generation more than 90% of the population will no longer be able to speak or understand Lakota at all. The Seven Fires Foundation believes that the imminent loss of the Lakota language has important consequences for the Lakota Nation both today and in the future. Once a culture loses its language, the loss of its cherished cultural ways is often not far behind. The impact of this on a culture is devastating.

With the right support, The Lakota language has a realistic chance for long-term survival due to the available documentation and the fact that there are still people alive who speak the original language. Because most of these people are elders, the time to act is now.

There are over 100,000 people in the Lakota Nation and the majority of them live in areas on and off reservations near the Sacred Black Hills of South Dakota. With the bicentennial celebration of Lewis and Clarke's western expedition beginning this year, awareness is growing about the current challenges facing the Lakota and other tribes whose way of life was vastly changed by the opening of the western passage 200 years ago.

The Spirit Walk starts on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in Porcupine, South Dakota and will travel through Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, and Virginia before landing in Washington D.C. in late September where the organizers will meet with government representatives and request assistance for all programs that preserve Lakota and other indigenous cultures in the United States. The walkers plan to average 20-30 miles per day, stopping in communities to share their message of hope through storytelling and music.

Seven Fires Foundation is a non-profit organization whose mission is to provide humanitarian services and preserve the ancient traditions for the generations to come. A vital part of this mission is to extend supportive services, by helping to raise support, for children, traditional medicine people and traditional cultures in need. For more information, visit their website at http://www.7fires.org, call 541-347-7801, or email Director Tammy Van at dir@7fires.org.