use both this parameter and , birth_date to display the person's date of birth, date of death, and age at death) --> , citizenship =

Northern Cheyenne Tribe of the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation The Northern Cheyenne Tribe of the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation () is the List of federally recognized tribes, federally recognized Northern Cheyenne tribe and a Plains tribe. The Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation is Indian reservation ...

, American , education =

McGill University McGill University (French: Université McGill) is an English-language public research university in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1821 by royal charter,Frost, Stanley Brice. ''McGill University, Vol. I. For the Advancement of Learning, ...

, alma_mater =

Montana State University-Bozeman Montana State University (MSU) is a public land-grant research university in Bozeman, Montana, United States. It enrolls more students than any other college or university in the state. MSU offers baccalaureate degrees in 60 fields, master's d ...

, BS, MS , occupation = Software engineer , years_active = , employer = , known_for = , title = , boards = , spouse = , partner = , children = , parents = , awards = , website = Michael Running Wolf is a

Native American Native Americans or Native American usually refers to Native Americans in the United States. Related terms and peoples include: Ethnic groups * Indigenous peoples of the Americas, the pre-Columbian peoples of North, South, and Central America ...

software engineer, artificial intelligence researcher, and advocate committed to preserving endangered Indigenous languages through the use of artificial intelligence (AI). A citizen of the

Northern Cheyenne Tribe The Northern Cheyenne Tribe of the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation () is the federally recognized Northern Cheyenne tribe and a Plains tribe. The Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation is reservation located in southeastern Montana, that is a ...

, Running Wolf leverages his background in computer science to develop technology aimed at preserving, protecting, and growing endangered

Indigenous languages An indigenous language, or autochthonous language, is a language that is native to a region and spoken by its indigenous peoples. Indigenous languages are not necessarily national languages but they can be; for example, Aymara is both an indigeno ...

through the use of culturally respectful applications.

Early life and education

Running Wolf, born to a

Cheyenne The Cheyenne ( ) are an Indigenous people of the Great Plains. The Cheyenne comprise two Native American tribes, the Só'taeo'o or Só'taétaneo'o (more commonly spelled as Suhtai or Sutaio) and the (also spelled Tsitsistas, The term for th ...

mother and

Lakota Lakota may refer to: *Lakota people, a confederation of seven related Native American tribes *Lakota language Lakota ( ), also referred to as Lakhota, Teton or Teton Sioux, is a Siouan languages, Siouan language spoken by the Lakota people of ...

father, grew up in the remote Cheyenne village of

Birney, Montana Birney is a census-designated place (CDP) in Rosebud County, Montana, United States. The population was 108 at the 2000 census. The post office was established in 1886. History The nearby town of Ashland was called Birney, the name of the po ...

. Running Wolf's early interest in technology came in the form of his

Atari Atari () is a brand name that has been owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by French holding company Atari SA (formerly Infogrames) and its focus is on "video games, consumer hardware, licensing and bl ...

video game console and modifying his TI-84 graphing calculator to play games. While Running Wolf's family did not have consistent access to electricity, he would learn how to code his calculator through printouts of instructions, often given to him by his teachers.

Career and research

Running Wolf holds a bachelor's and master's degree in computer science from

, and is a Ph.D. student at

Quebec, Canada Quebec is Canada's largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, New Brunswick to the southeast and a coastal border ...

. His work on Amazon's Alexa and seeing how a team of Maori researchers preserved the Maori language using AI spurred an interest in how artificial intelligence could be used to save endangered Indigenous languages. Running Wolf founded Indigenous in AI, an initiative focusing on creating automatic speech recognition tools for Indigenous languages in North America. Running Wolf cites the lack of data in Indigenous languages and the complexity of polysynthetic languages in current voice recognition models as a particular challenge to pre-existing models. To solve this, Running Wolf has done extensive research on the Wakashan language family, which is highly polysynthetic. Additionally, he is exploring immersive technology through the use of virtual reality to make learning Indigenous language more engaging through the use of virtual environments and coding camps, such as the Lakota AI Camp, to engage Indigenous youth.

Advocacy for ethical AI

Running Wolf is an advocate for

data sovereignty Data sovereignty means that data generated within a country’s borders is governed by that nation’s laws and regulatory frameworks; this ensures local control over data access, storage, and usage. In other words, a country is able to control a ...

within Indigenous communities. He advocates for the decolonization of user data by agreeing that the Indigenous community in which the data comes from is the owner of the data being used and is in full control of it. By having Indigenous people build the technology for their communities, Running Wolf believes that it could uplift Indigenous communities by having ownership of such technology. Running Wolf also believes that allowing Indigenous cultures to be pushed into extended spaces, such as the Meta-verse, would inspire future technologists and anthropologists to continue researching Indigenous languages, further helping the effort to grow their existence.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Running Wolf, Michael Wikipedia Student Program 21st-century Native American people American software engineers Native American engineers Northern Cheyenne people Engineers from Montana Native American people from Montana 21st-century American engineers Artificial intelligence researchers People from Rosebud County, Montana Montana State University alumni McGill University people Native American academics Academics from Montana Language activists Year of birth missing (living people) Living people 21st-century Native American scientists