DENVER (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 22nd October, 2018) Native American tribal traditions and cultural peculiarities are getting lost because the majority of young people leave reservations after graduation, Isaac Wak Wak, a Colville San Poil Native American, told Sputnik.
Wak Wak, who now lives in Colorado, noted that he grew up in a reservation, which is located in the central part of the State of Washington, 16 miles of the Grand Coulee Dam area on the Colville Confederated Tribes Reservation. The tribal population is about 2,900 people.
"The younger people don't stay. A lot of them leave as soon as they graduate. One because there are hardly no jobs . Two because education, armed services, different individual interests outside of the reservation," he said on the sidelines of the 75th Anniversary Annual Convention & Marketplace which is taking place in Colorado and organized by the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI).
Wak Wak pointed out that young people were not interested in living in the reservations and keeping native traditions.
"A lot of young kids now, unfortunately, are into electronics, telephone, games. They are not interested in our reservations any longer ... A lot of them don't dance any more, a lot of them don't tend to be interested in what's going on in our reservations ... It's heartbreak because they are not interested in their own reservations, the language, the way of living," Wak Wak said
He also said that his reservation was engulfed in a poverty, alcoholism and drugs.
"It's a very poor area," Wak Wak added.
Established in 1944, the National Congress of American Indians is the oldest and largest non-profit organization representing US native tribes and the interests of tribal governments and communities.
