Planning an International Decade of Indigenous Languages
(February 2020) UNESCO’s High-Level Event “Making a Decade of Action for Indigenous Languages” recently took place in Mexico City on 27-28 February. More than 500 participants from 50 countries attended, including SIL members, Ana Ibel Santiago and Juanita L. Watters (SIL Mexico), alongside Mexican colleague, Carolina González, from the Sierra Popoluca language community. An especially significant aspect of the event was that representatives from each of Mexico’s 68 nationally recognized language groups, 63 of which are considered indigenous, attended as well.
This historic two-day event was co-hosted by UNESCO and the government of Mexico—including the Secretariat of Culture, INPI (Institución de los Pueblos Indígenas), INALI (Instituto Nacional de Lenguas Indígenas) and the Secretariat of External Relations—to facilitate dedicated discussion and planning sessions on how to promote and strategize around the upcoming International Decade of Indigenous Languages (2022-2032), declared by the UN in December 2019.
The full event took place on the grounds of Los Pinos, which in former days served as the personal residence of Mexico’s presidents and is now a dedicated public Cultural Complex. To begin the program, the President of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, invited UNESCO leaders and the indigenous representatives to meet with him at the National Palace for his daily 6 a.m. press conference. During this time, President López Obrador and the Director of UNESCO, Audrey Azouley, signed the Los Pinos Declaration. This document “highlights the importance of enabling the use of indigenous languages in justice systems, the media, labour and health programmes.”
During the course of each day’s sessions, participants from around the globe shared from their experiences as indigenous language speakers. These personal accounts highlighted the challenges many indigenous communities face in such areas as education, language policy and rights, poverty, peace and reconciliation, and exclusion. They also helped guide the ongoing discussion on how to incorporate indigenous languages into the global development agenda.
Photos courtesy of Ana Ibel Santiago.
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