This essay will deal with a special type of center devoted to the documentation and teaching of the linguistic traditions of contemporary Native American communities. In my remarks, I will concern myself with the needs that such a center would satisfy in North America—in particular the United States, with which I am most familiar, although some of what I will have to say applies in other parts of the world, of course. While centers possessing many of the qualities I wish to champion here exist in other parts of the world, an impressive example being the Centro Linguistico Francisco Marroquin in Guatemala, there is none that closely approximates this model in the United States.