Treuer named winner of Ken Hale prize

BEMIDJI – Dr. Anton Treuer, executive director of the American Indian Resource Center at Bemidji State University, has been selected by the Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas as the winner of the SSILA’s prestigious 2012 Ken Hale Prize.

The prize honors the memory of renowned MIT linguist Kenneth Locke Hale, who worked on languages all over the world but began his career as an Americanist and continued to work on the indigenous languages of the Americas throughout his life. In granting the award, the SSILA looks for a person or group that exemplifies Hale’s commitment to both linguistic scholarship and service to indigenous language communities.
The SSILA awarded the prize to Treuer in recognition of his academic and community work with the Ojibwe language. He is the editor of the Oshkaabewis Native Journal, and author of nine other books.
The prize will be awarded Friday at the annual meeting of the Society in Boston and includes a cash award of $500.