More than 100 people were welcomed back to in-person events at Dorothy Ramon Learning Center with a reception followed by a lecture by Dr. Sean Milanovich on the Treaty of Temecula. (Pat Murkland Photo)
Thank you to all who came on May 2, 2022, to our first in-person event at Dorothy Ramon Learning Center in more than two years, due to the pandemic. We are so honored by your support.
Singing and dancing to a traditional bird song during the reception on May 2, 2022, at Dorothy Ramon Learning Center. Kim Marcus (in mustard-colored shirt) sings with Center President Ernest Siva seated next to him, and event speaker Dr. Sean Milanovich to the right.
A special thanks indeed goes to YOU. Our crowd — and what a wonderful crowd it was — defined what Dorothy Ramon Learning Center is all about. These are people from all walks of life, Native American and non-Native American. Especially important to us is the unity of all people in supporting the work to save and share Southern California Native American cultures, languages, history, and traditional arts.
This is exemplified in our very name:
1. Dorothy Ramon
She represents those Native American Elders, brought up knowing their languages and cultures, who are willing to share this knowledge.
“What would inspire Dorothy Ramon, a feisty little old Indian lady, to keep talking for over a decade in her native language, Serrano, to me, Eric Elliott, a somewhat geeky white guy?” Eric Elliott asked in 2004.1 “Mrs. Ramon … spoke Serrano, and she was Serrano. Mrs. Ramon also understood and wanted everyone else to understand that the real, millennia-old history of all Americans, whether we are Native Americans or not, has been passed down orally from generation to generation, not in English, but rather in the Indigenous languages of this continent. She knew the Serrano language version of American history and wanted it documented in writing before it was too late.
”You see, Mrs. Ramon knew full well she was the last person who thought, muttered to herself, yelled, laughed, dreamed, and did just about everything else under the sun in Serrano first,” Eric Elliott explained. “Sensing in her heart of hearts that her people’s very identity was defined by their language, Mrs. Ramon took decisive action: She talked and talked to me in Serrano.
“It is very hard for us English speakers to imagine what it must be like in Mrs. Ramon’s shoes, to be the last fluent (pure) speaker of a language, and to be the last one to remember American history as she learned it, not in school, but on her mother’s and father’s knees. I know that if I die tomorrow, legions of other people will still know how to end the phrase, ‘One if by land, two if by ...’
“But stop for a minute and imagine the quiet terror that Mrs. Ramon must have felt when she realized that, upon her death, countless Serrano words and idioms, as well as her people’s history of her America, might forever vanish from the face of this Earth, unless she acted now. Mrs. Ramon is no longer with us and that is a great loss for all Californians. Thank God she didn’t go quietly.”
Dorothy Ramon helped save the Serrano language and many cultural memories in her final years. After she died, her nephew, Ernest H. Siva, and his wife, June, formed the Learning Center in 2003 to carry on and expand her work to all of Southern California.
From left, singing on May 2, 2022: Ernest Siva, president of Dorothy Ramon Learning Center; Kim Marcus, the Center’s 2021 Dragonfly Award winner; and Sean Milanovich, who gave the Center’s re-opening lecture about the Treaty of Temecula. (Pat Murkland Photo)
2. Learning Center
Vibrant collaborations and teachings
The essence of who we are and what we do, as we define it, here at the nonprofit Center led by Elder Ernest Siva (Cahuilla-Serrano):
“We are not a museum; we don’t collect artifacts and focus on the past. Instead we save and share Native American cultural knowledge now and for the future. By considering traditional teachings and cultures, languages, history, and arts, we bring honor to our ancestors and to Creation itself. These cultural identities are alive; through vibrant collaboration with tribal and other communities, we gain accurate information and nurture what otherwise might be lost.”2
So thanks to all for this powerful and strong continuum.
Dr. Sean Milanovich lectures on the history of the Treaty of Temecula.
What a joy it was to be “in-person” again. A special thanks to the Rupert Costo Endowment of University of California, Riverside, for the delicious food; to the Costo Endowment and San Gorgonio Pass Historical Society for co-sponsoring the lecture by Dr. Sean Milanovich on the Treaty of Temecula, and of course thanks, Dr. Milanovich! Thanks also to our 2021 Dragonfly Award Winner, Kim Marcus (Serrano-Cahuilla), for your traditional blessing and joyous songs, and to all who participated. Again, thanks to all! We look forward to our next cultural in-person gathering. Meanwhile we continue to save and share Southern California cultures, languages, history, and traditional arts through our News from Dorothy Ramon Learning Center right here every week. Please join us!
We welcome your EMAIL. Thank you from Editor Pat Murkland, May 4, 2022.
Eric Elliott, “Your language and your history,” in Dorothy Ramon Learning Center’s Heritage Keepers newsletter Vol.1, Number 1, © 2004.
Part of the Dorothy Ramon Learning Center mission statement, serving Southern California since 2003 as a 501c3 nonprofit.