Kiwat Hasinay means Caddo home. We are working to keep the Caddo language and oral traditions a cultural home for Caddo people.

The Caddo people are an ancient confederacy of the Haish, Hainai, Yona, Kechai, Nadaco, Nasoni, Kadohadacho, and Natchitoche tribes. These groups originally spoke separate languages, albeit mutually intelligible; however, the current trend is towards one single language, as so few fluent speakers remain. In addition to everyday speech, the Caddo people have a ceremonial speech, preserved in song and prayer.

Caddo people originated in Louisiana and settled throughout Louisiana, Texas, and Oklahoma. Place names such as Nacogdoches and Natchitoches are Caddoan in origin. In fact, the name Texas comes from the Caddo word, tayshah or "friend."

Today Binger, Oklahoma is the capital of the Caddo Confederacy, as well as the home of the Caddo Heritage Museum and the Kiwat Hasinay Foundation.

< Randlett Edmonds, photo by Carol Swindell

What does KHF do?

We assist the Caddo people in language and oral traditions preservation by:

• providing language classes
• creating immersion language-learning situations
• producing learning materials such as dictionaries, phrase books, song books
• recording elders speaking Caddo, singing Caddo songs, sharing oral histories
• locating and producing archival digital copies of as many older recordings of Caddo oral traditions as possible
• using the latest technologies to build a permanent, comprehensive archive of Caddo oral traditions for the tribe
• increasing awareness of and appreciation for the Caddo language and other oral traditions.

Classes

Currently the Kiwat Hasinay Foundation is not offering Caddo langauge classes, but the Higher Education Department of the Caddo Nation holds language classes every Wednesday evening at 6pm at the tribal headquarters in Binger, Oklahoma. For more information about their classes, click here.

What You Can Do

• Volunteer your time to help record elders, locate recordings, and copy CD's
• Attend language class with your kids
• Apprentice yourself to a Caddo speaker
• Donate your financial support.

Please contact us for more information. E-mail at us: xernaut11@yahoo.com.

Kiwat Hasinay Foundation
Box 305
Binger, OK 73009 USA
(405) 656-2503