Our Mission
Effective September 9, 2024
The Chickasaw Online Language Arts (“COLA”) mission is to preserve and teach the Chickasaw language and culture.
The Chickasaw language is an endangered language, with only about two-dozen fluent speakers remaining as of 2024, and is listed by UNESCO as severely endangered.
Through the ages the Chickasaw language was an oral tradition. As an oral tradition, the culture is in the language and the language is in the culture. Therefore, COLA’s mission does not engage in social or political activism that is adverse to the preservation of the Chickasaw language.
COLA seeks to make the learning environment, a non-divisive, non-imposing place, to stay focused on the important mission of revitalizing the Chickasaw language. COLA will not debate or entertain unrelated topics to COLA’s mission.
Our Pronoun Policy
Effective September 9, 2024
The Chickasaw language, is an ancient language, that contains a number of emphatic pronouns, and pronominal affixes, as well as words that are exclusively used by, or to address, one of the two genders/sexes recognized by the Chickasaw language, that being male or female. Another words, the Chickasaw language contains some gender/sex specific word uses.
In order to preserve the integrity of the Chickasaw language system of communication, and avoid confusion for all students/participants/members in the academic setting of our courses/programs, staff, moderators, and instructors will refer to each student/participant/member in the singular sense, and students/participants/members are required to refer to themselves in the singular sense. Additionally, staff, moderators, instructors, students, participants and members, will refer to those with XX chromosomes as female, and those with XY chromosomes as male. New students/participants/members will be required to agree to our pronoun policy, and indicate which gender/sex they are during enrollment in any of our courses/programs.
Please note: Our staff, moderators, and instructors are not licensed medical professionals, and therefore cannot council students/participants/members on which gender/sex they should identify as, in order to participate in our courses/programs.
If a prospective student is unsure about which gender/sex they are, it is advised to resolve this matter prior to enrolling in courses/programs, by referring to one’s unaltered original birth certificate at the time of birth, or seeking out a medical professional who can perform DNA testing to determine which gender/sex chromosomes one has. Students who disrupt classes/programs by taking issue with our pronoun policy, will be regarded as acting in a manner that is counterproductive to the mission of COLA to preserve the Chickasaw language, and therefore, will be unenrolled from the courses/programs.
Thank you for cooperating with the preservation of the purity of the ancient Chickasaw language.