[eluser]OverZealous[/eluser] @tdktank59
You cannot use $this outside of an instantiated object. Look at your code. The place you are in is before the Object (the model) has been created.
If you want to dynamically assign language-based labels, you'll have to do them within the object constructor (__construct), before you call parent::__construct().
At some point in the future I'll add in language-based labels. Make sure you are not using the production cache with language based labels. They will be cached as whatever language you start with.