indigenous language
Encouraging Birhor Children to Speak Their Language
Livemint.com, an Indian news website, published an article on March 19 about a new children’s dictionary of the Birhor language. The news story indicated that the dictionary is designed to increase the appeal of the language for their children so they will want to continue using it when they become adults. Titled Abun Ari Re […]
Saving the Nubian Language
A group of volunteers in Egypt is beginning to compile a dictionary of the Nubian language in order to save it from going extinct. According to an article published last week in The Arab Weekly, the volunteers, calling themselves the Koma Waidi initiative, Nubian for “Tales of the Past,” have published a pamphlet describing 230 […]
Studying Tahitian
Teachers at the University of French Polynesia have been telling their classes that their Polynesian languages are in danger, so the students studying Tahitian decided to take action. According to a story in a major Polynesian news source on February 16, students studying reo mā’ohi (the language of the Tahitians) highlighted the different Polynesian languages […]
Traditional Lepcha Culture [research report review]
A fascinating research report about a project intended to strengthen the indigenous knowledge systems of the Himalayan peoples, including the Lepchas, was published in June 2018. A news report dated August 31 prompts interest in the report. The research study was designed to reinforce traditional systems of providing foods in the mountains by focusing on […]
A Zapotec Renaissance Man
A Zapotec physicist who was originally from Juchitán, Oaxaca, is planning to translate Sir Isaac Newton’s Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica, an essential work of western science, into his native language. According to an article in Mexico News Daily, Feliciano Carrasco Regalado is confident that his translation will be useful. In contrast to his detractors who […]
An App for the Nubian Language
To commemorate International Mother Language Day, held on February 21 each year, an Egyptian magazine decided to interview the co-founder of the Nubi-App, a repository of the Nubian language. Momen Talosh told the magazine Egypt Today that the app is being regularly updated and that it has been downloaded 13,000 times. It focuses on simple […]
Inuit Students in Ottawa and their Community
A student club in Ottawa allows Inuit teenagers to get together and share foods from the North as they try to keep their culture alive in the city. The activities of the Inuit Culture Club at the Rideau High School reaffirm the Inuit heritage of the young people as they hang out together one afternoon […]
Preserving the Semai Language [conference paper review]
The languages spoken by the Orang Asli of Malaysia preserve their wisdom, social concepts, environmental knowledge, and, for some, their beliefs about peacefulness.
Tahitians Learning from the Maori
A delegation from Tahiti recently visited a Maori community in New Zealand in order to study their approaches to teaching their language to children, since the use of Tahitian is dying out.
Revitalizing Zapotec Language and Culture [journal article review]
Coyote wanted to eat Opossum but the latter, too wily for his would-be consumer, said he must first eat the juiciest fruits from a nearby cactus. Coyote did as Opossum instructed—he opened his mouth and closed his eyes, whereupon, the possum pitched three prickly pears down the coyote’s throat. The myth, according to Elizabeth Falconi, […]
