Safeguarding a mother tongue and mother nature — Global Issues

Though each Nami and Tomoyuki had been born on Okinoerabu Island (at the moment house to solely 12,000 inhabitants), neither discovered to talk Shimamuni – a neighborhood number of the Kunigami language – fluently as kids.

Kunigami was added to UNESCO’s Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger in 2009 and labeled as “undoubtedly endangered” to lift public consciousness that “kids now not study the language as a mom tongue within the house.”

A household takes motion

After studying that the indigenous language of Okinoerabu Island was formally thought of endangered, the couple and their 4 kids took it upon themselves to translate their love for language into impactful actions which have since resonated far past the island.

Okinoerabu Island residents weren’t simply involved about dropping a language, but additionally more and more alarmed by the proliferation of marine litter. In what started as a faculty challenge assigned over the summer time break, the Sao kids determined that they may sort out each points concurrently by performing every day seashore clean-up whereas participating in language actions, comparable to singing and holding a diary in Shimamuni to doc their day-to-day progress.

Leveraging the Shimamuni vernacular as a thread of shared native identification connecting folks from various walks of life, the Sao household has since expanded its conservation pursuits to incorporate cooking native delicacies, offering haircuts to residents of nursing properties, studying arts and crafts on the neighborhood centre and taking part in a “Shimamuni Salon” the place language classes are provided and native environmental points are commonly mentioned. The objective is to domesticate the following era of eco-conscious Shimamuni audio system.

“With out these community-driven actions, the language would turn into extinct with the passing of its aged audio system,” mentioned Dr. Sumittra Suraratdecha, assistant professor of linguistics on the Analysis Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia (RILCA) in Thailand.

Linguistic range and sustainable growth

When queried concerning the underlying motivation for his household’s involvement in such a broad vary of actions, the considerate Tomoyuki cites the urgency of reaching the bold Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030.

He felt that slightly than imparting to his kids information that he acquired via formal schooling 20 to 30 years in the past, it could be higher to assist their studying by doing and thereby facilitate their accumulation of real-life experiences that may empower them to make a distinction.

Because it seems, the Shimamuni language not solely serves as a car for transmitting native information, comparable to conventional dessert recipes, to the island’s youth, it additionally improves the effectivity of communication about environmental points to aged islanders, a few of whom as soon as harboured the mistaken perception that marine litter ought to merely be left to degrade by itself.

Given the present world actuality of burgeoning non-degradable waste and microplastics, the Shimamuni mom tongue helps to convey the true extent of the issue to senior residents with better immediacy.

Reflecting on the circumstances of the Sao household and their inventive response to native ecocultural challenges, Kyungah Kristy Bang, a marketing consultant for multilingual schooling on the UNESCO regional workplace in Bangkok and coordinator of the Asia-Pacific Multilingual Training Working Group, remarked that “celebrating linguistic range could be an efficient device and answer to attaining the SDGs on the native stage.”

Recognition on a worldwide stage

In October 2023, the Sao household had the chance to current their inspiring story on the seventh Worldwide Convention on Language and Training, in Bangkok, Thailand.

As representatives of Okinoerabu Island taking part in a significant worldwide convention co-hosted by UNESCO, they attended the occasion, which drew over 450 language consultants and members from all around the globe.

The Sao household garnered island-wide assist, as the 2 principal cities on the island united in serving to to organize the household’s presentation movies and canopy a portion of their journey bills.

“Whereas the convention brings collectively varied stakeholders, comparable to coverage makers, practitioners and researchers who share their experiences with language in schooling, we regularly neglect that there’s extra typically a complete crew or neighborhood, or in such case a household, driving the sustainability of linguistic range,” mentioned Brandon Darr, a schooling marketing consultant with UNESCO’s regional workplace.

For Tomoyuki, attaining recognition on a world stage has solely served to strengthen his household’s guiding sense of function.

“Our objective is to dwell a mentally ample life,” he mentioned.

His spouse concured.

“When our youngsters develop up, they’ll dwell anyplace,” she mentioned, “however I would like them to protect their language and tradition of their hearts.”