Language is an inseparable part of one’s culture. Why else would the French ban the word “email” from their government documents (they prefer to use the phrase “courier electronique)? To accept even a fraction of another culture’s language is to forever lose a part of your own. h
Colonization – and its newer brother, neocolonization – has done much to influence, and sometimes wipe out, a culture’s language. Spanish colonialists caused both the Incan and Mayan empires to pull a disappearing act, though descendants of the Mayan people remain in parts of Central America – including Guatemala, where Roots and Wings is working to provide education to indigenous Guatemalans in their native tongue of k’iche.
In other parts of the globe, colonization has taken a worse toll. Whole cultures are vanishing completely. In the Andaman Islands, a remote chain controlled by India, the last woman to speak the local language, Bo, has died. The island on which she lived was nearly destroyed by a tsunami in 2004, and she was one of the few who survived.
After surviving for nearly 70,000 years, the Andaman tribe was ravaged by harsh British colonial rule. A steadily declining population and adherence to a ancient hunter-gatherer tradition meant that the tribe wasn’t ready to bear such a grave natural disaster. The tsunami, and the passing of years, took too high a toll.
The disappearance of the Andaman culture underscores the importance of Roots and Wings International’s work in Guatemala. By providing education and tutoring services to indigenous students in their native tongue, RWI is doing its part to preserve an entire culture. Not only does the Guatemalan government provide educational instruction in Spanish, it makes education past primary school a near impossibility for indigenous children.
With our assistance, RWI scholars will have the opportunity to get a college degree and return to their communities and pay it forward, helping future generations of indigenous children to get a quality education. I think that’s a great thing.
