The Race To Save The Haida Language

SKIDEGATE, QUEEN CHARLOTTE ISLANDS - FEBRUARY 20: Chief Ernie Wilson (Niis Wes) 92, poses for a photo in his home February 20, 2005 in Skidegate, one of two Haida communities in the Queen Charlotte Islands (Haida Gwaii), the Canadian archipelago south of Alaska. It is estimated that the Haida Nation has less than 65 people who speak the Haida language, and that the average age is 70 to 80. Wilson, along with other elders in Skidegate, gather daily in the Skidegate Haida Language House, a longhouse dedicated to audio recording the language. This is the elder's attempt to salvage the rapidly fading language. He is the hereditary Chief of Skedans village, long abandoned when small-pox nearly wiped out the entire Haida population centuries ago. (Photo by Farah Nosh/Getty Images)