By Carmem Cazaubon (CS Intern)

Language is the root of culture. Far from a random grouping of words, language carries worldviews, identities, and knowledge systems and allows their transmission between generations. Therefore, safeguarding and strengthening language systems, especially among youth and future generations, is the most authentic way of strengthening culture. This month’s fellowship spotlight is dedicated to Indigenous Youth Fellows who, with the support of Cultural Survival’s Indigenous Youth Fellowship Program, have impacted their communities with projects of language revitalization and maintenance. Through different strategies—making use of music and theater, technological tools, or producing dictionaries, compilations, and teaching materials—they all dived into their communities, registering Traditional Knowledge and culture and focusing on the participation of local youth in the process.
 

Tashi Lhazom collecting material about Limi language and folk songs.

Tashi Lhazom (Limi) and the Limi Youth Society in Nepal

The Limi Valley is located in the heart of the Himalayas. Cut off from the rest of Nepal by two high mountain passes and lacking roads, the local Limi community struggles for basic health care, educational access, and political participation. Pressured by policies of the Nepalese government and a massive Tibetan migration and occupation of the region, the community is facing a state of identity crisis. Limi youth don’t have opportunities to learn their own language in government-run schools, and existing native language teaching materials are scarce. This reality led Youth Fellow Tashi Lhazom and her collective, the Limi Youth Society, to develop the project, “Going Back to Go Forward Through Language.”

The central idea was to create a digital reference for the Limi language and to document traditional songs and general culture. Lhazom said, “We wanted to make a digital dictionary of Limi vocabulary by spending time with community Elders and documenting folk songs that infuse our history and literature. These songs are the most reliable source of information to understand the Limis’ take on nature and climate change. Documenting them is not just a matter of safeguarding our tradition, but also an ecological necessity. By doing this project, we also hope to create an e-library where our youths can enlighten themselves about our culture, traditions, and histories, articulating their own narratives. We need this project because nobody is going to help us until we help ourselves; so that our language and culture can flourish and our future generations celebrate them with pride.” 

The project was successful, and the dictionary and song compilation came to life in a rich and lively format. While in the field, Lhazom discovered a more positive situation than she expected, where younger people were still quite bonded with tradition and spoke the native language well. She also came across strong community bonds, which gave her hope and made her love her community even more intensely. The project contributed not only to her knowledge on the Limi language and culture, but also to her personal development and skills such as teamwork, cross-collaboration, and leadership. You can access the materials that were created at Digital Dictionary and Folks Songs Compilation, and you can follow the work done by the Limi Youth Society through their Instagram.
 

Cover of the Limi language dictionary compiled in the project.

Bielka Miguel Feliciano (Mayangna) from Nicaragua

Bielka Miguel Feliciano (Mayangna) believes the use of technology can be very beneficial for Indigenous Peoples, their cultures, and languages. “By keeping up with technology, we can more easily adapt to social change and learn how to use free and accessible tools with the objective of making our origins and knowledge stand out,” she says. As an Information Systems Engineering student, she decided to use her skills to impact her local community in Santa Maria, on the north Caribbean Coast of Nicaragua. Through the development of a translation software that acts as an extension to Google Chrome, Miguel seeks to ensure that her origins and mother tongue won’t be lost. Through this tool, her People can have the autonomy to navigate through media and information sources in their own language.

The project involved meetings with local Elders and knowledge holders for language studies, culminating in a database of terms in the Miskito and Panmahka languages. Miguel was also supported in her project by university faculty and fellow systems engineers. By the end of her Cultural Survival fellowship, she had created a prototype version of the software. “My plans are to start with two languages and eventually incorporate the others, taking into account those that have almost ceased to exist. The followup will be constant, and with a more ambitious vision. Perhaps we will achieve a software product at the level of Google Translator, but only of native languages of the world,” she said.

Check out Bielka’s presentation. 

Carmen Alicia Jansasoy (Inga) from Colombia

“Strengthening the Inga mother tongue and culture through different activities focused on teaching-learning allows us to reaffirm the Inga identity through encouragement and teaching strategies. We believe in the potential of art for this purpose; art possesses a sublime character as a way to learn, express, and develop cultural knowledge and skills in a natural and spontaneous manner.” This belief in the power of art as a tool for individual and collective transformation has driven Carmen Alivia Jansasoy to promote a series of artistic activities in her local Indigenous community, located in the department of Putumayo, Colombia. One of the central objectives was to strengthen the Inga language through music and theater workshops focused on children and youth.

The first part of the project was a visit to local Elders and knowledge holders. This resulted in a rich intergenerational exchange leading to the compilation of cultural myths, tales, festivities, historical events, all set in the native language. Once the material was gathered, practical lessons took place on topics such as singing and theatrical expression or musical instruments like guitar, violin and vientos andinos (flute). The playful workshops were attractive for the youth involved, whose interest in tradition and ancestral knowledge was revitalized. “Learning lines from a play or a song is the first step for young people to make their daily conversation in their own language, sowing in young people the seed of curiosity to know and to be proud of their own language,” Jansasoy said. The results of this powerful initiative can be seen in the booklet compiled by Jansasoy, and in the music video recorded as a closure of the project—a visual and auditory statement of resilience and resistance.

Cover of the booklet produced with the material gathered on the project. Complete version can be found here.

Quetzaly Quintas Arista and Lucero Quiroz Zaragoza (Zapoteca) from Mexico

Santa María Guienagati is a Zapotec Indigenous community located in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, Oaxaca, Mexico. According to the 2020 census, it is home to 3,178 people, of whom 25.5% (810) speak an Indigenous language. The Dadi’idznu language, which, in Spanish means, “our language/word,” is a dialectal variant of the Zapotec linguistic group. It is at high risk of disappearing, with all remaining speakers over the age of 70. Facing this alarming reality, Indigenous youth Quetzaly Arista and Lucero Zaragoza partnered up with the intention of reversing this decline. Arista has a degree in Linguistics, while Zaragoza is a Systems Engineering student. Aligning their skills, they conceived an online platform that contributes to the revitalization of Dadi’idznu through the collection, creation, and dissemination of text and audiovisual materials that can be used both for self-learning and language teaching at educational institutions.

The compilation of material and the fresh educational ideas were a product of the collective work of speakers, academics, teachers, municipal authorities, and people interested in preserving the language. After these exchanges, fellows started building a website, which is still in process. Arista explained, “The website will contain text divided into three types: academic (theses and articles), literary (stories and poems), and Zapotec textbooks. The audiovisual material will consist of songs and videos narrating local stories in Zapotec. We will design a bilingual Zapotec-Spanish vocabulary search engine and playful activities for the acquisition of vocabulary and grammar.” The platform will be a free and accessible virtual space of language consultation and dissemination that supports teachers and appeals youth and children, contributing to the language, legacy, and collective memory of the Zapotec Peoples.
 

Elders share their knowledge of Dadi’idznu traditional language. Currently, most of the fluent speakers are over 70 years old.

Native speakers, academics, teachers, and municipal authorities took part in the project.