Navajo Broadband 2009 – 2013 Broadband on Navajo: a $60 Million Dollar Opportunity

According to Dr. Kalsoyas, the isolation of people from resources — whether financial, educational, or health — is among the most difficult challenges faced by the Navajo Nation. “People need access to resources, they need access to their elected officials and they need to be included in the opportunities of the digital economy. Essentially this is about opportunity,” Dr. Kalsoyas said. And while the SNNVA will have no immediate impact on individual households, it will offer new opportunities to communities. The SNNVA has equipped all 110 chapter houses with broadband Internet access and network training for the public. This was step one. Step two, which is already underway, involves the deployment of touch-screen kiosks with bilingual (Navajo/English) interfaces. This will provide the Navajo Nation with previously unavailable networking resources regarding business and home loans, health care, education and public services. These networking resources will also facilitate land management, election protocols, community events information, online seminars, and the sharing of solutions to common problems among local chapters.

Bilingual Interface

Since 75% of Navajos speak Navajo as their primary language, one of the most important aspects of the SNNVA network will be its bilingual interface, which is designed to be easy to use for monolingual Navajos without literacy skills and little or no previous experience with computers or computer networks. The interface, with its streaming video and audio, will provide visual and audio directions and downstream information in the Navajo language. This design will ensure that the new technology fits the needs of culturally conservative monolingual Navajo users, rather than forcing these users to adapt their needs to the technology. And this design could be the determining factor in securing the widespread acceptance, and use, of this technology by culturally conservative Navajos, which is significant in adding community value to the network. In addition to the interface, streaming video and audio will be used to deliver bilingual information, while Navajo Nation information resources will be configured on a common template through a dedicated NAU server for bilingual access for end users.

The bilingual interface design, matched with streaming video and audio, is the sort of innovation that, along with the two-way satellite technology, could create the missing synergy needed to bring the Navajo Nation, and Indian Country in general, into Information Age without the intense cultural assimilation that has been associated with the dissemination of other technologies throughout the 20th century. At this point, it appears that the Navajo Nation has taken an enormous step towards establishing a model for the cultural appropriation of information technology for indigenous people throughout the world. However, there is much left to be realized.

Intra-Tribal Communication

When the Navajo Nation Council passed the Governance Act of 1998, the Council effectively transferred a substantial amount of governing authority to local chapters. Accounting, payroll, property management, and the day-to-day direction of chapter services and communications are now required of the chapter staff and their leadership. However, without an effective means to share the information and resources necessary to address local community problems, the chapters were not properly equipped to effectively manage their new responsibilities. This problem was complicated further by distances of up to 300 miles between the chapters and central government services. This made it improbable, if not impossible, for Navajos to access necessary information and resources. The Internet provided a possible solution, but the enormous cost of attaining a connection was, in most cases, prohibitive.

The SNNVA is now providing broadband solutions to these problems. The SNNVA, with the help of intensive staff technology training led by NAU, is providing a means for the chapters to network with each other to address common concerns through email, community bulletin boards and lists. According to Hank Willie, one of the SNNVA’s administrators from the Seba Dalki Boarding School, “Through the Virtual Alliance project these chapters will become one big virtual community. And that was not possible before this project.” The SNNVA provides a means for chapters to host town hall meetings and Navajo presidential forums, increasing civic participation that had been limited by distance.

The SNNVA represents a unique opportunity for increasing the frequency, velocity and quality of communication between local chapters and the central Navajo government — and between agencies within the central Navajo government. This will aid the government’s ability to share of information and resources and address the social needs of the people in a much more efficient manner. The SNNVA will also help the Navajo Council and central governmental agencies develop and maintain relationships with their constituencies in a manner that was previously impossible. This increased level of strategic intra-tribal communication could, ultimately, lead to greater political stability. And being that political stability, according the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development, is one of the most important factors in determining a tribe’s ability to attract outside investment for economic development, the SNNVA could have a lasting effect on the Navajo Nation’s economy.

Conclusion: Turning Satellites into Dreamcatchers

Laurence Gishey, one of the SNNVA coordinators at Northern Arizona University, contends that “the potential benefits and service to the people are almost unlimited?‚A…the Navajo Nation will become a smaller and more singular community and not divided by districts, agencies or state lines as we now know it.” However, there are many operational obstacles still left to overcome. For instance, the training of enough personnel to manage the SNNVA network is a huge task. The kiosks and thier bilingual applications have yet to be implemented. The administration of the project appears to be understaffed. The SNNVA is subject to political conflicts and distractions beyond their control. And, of course, the technology itself is unproven, so it is very difficult to predict its reliability and overall effectiveness.