The international movement for recognition and preservation of Indigenous languages
Over the past few decades, Indigenous peoples of the world have made a huge leap in the protection of their individual and collective rights. Persistence of the leaders of the Indigenous peoples movement has allowed to begin to overcome the legacy of colonization and gradually come to recognize the responsibility of the international community for the most vulnerable of its members, who thanks to their proximity to nature and traditional knowledge, have preserved and taken care of the cultural and natural diversity of the planet for many centuries. Today, it is the turn of humanity to help Indigenous communities preserve their identities, health of their languages, and their ways of life.
The Charter of the United Nations starts with the words “We the peoples of the United Nations determined…”, acknowledging that all peoples on Earth should be equal. Indigenous peoples over centuries had been put in a disadvantaged position and have become vulnerable. Only recently in history has the international community started to recognize the severe consequences of colonization and assimilation policies. And only recently has it decided to move towards reconciliation with and remedy for indigenous communities around the globe. The United Nations plays an important role in this process.
Role of the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
The UN mechanism in which I was a part of from 2013 to 2019, The Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (EMRIP), is the youngest mechanism among indigenous-specific mechanisms of the United Nations family, but many Indigenous communities already bind their hopes with this body.
EMRIP explicitly owes its birth to the adoption of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in 2007. When the drafting and negotiation process by the Working Group on Indigenous Population successfully finished, states and Indigenous peoples were in need of other types of services. It was a strategic decision by states to establish the Expert Mechanism to assist them in achieving the ends of the Declaration, protection and fulfillment of the rights of indigenous peoples, by providing expertise, and advising through thematic studies and research.
Comprised of seven Indigenous experts from different socio-cultural regions and areas of knowledge, EMRIP in collaboration with other sister-mechanisms — the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues — is qualified to advance states’ understanding of their human rights obligations when it comes to Indigenous peoples.
EMRIP is not a monitoring body, and its role is not to critique state policies and practices. But given the need for implementation of the rights of Indigenous peoples in a reconciliatory spirit, EMRIP is well placed and equipped to interpret different articles of the Declaration and to provide guidance on how specific rights of Indigenous peoples can be best implemented across different countries. This work enlarges our understanding of the nature of states’ human rights obligations and introduces possible implementation mechanisms.
The Declaration, not legally binding by its legal nature, puts in the specific indigenous context existing universal human rights recognized by the majority of states as obligatory. This international instrument introduces a collective aspect of indigenous peoples’ rights as necessary for their survival given traditional ways of life and close special connection to Mother Earth. Therefore, this instrument sets a minimum standard of the rights of indigenous peoples’ human rights, which states committed to strive to.
Indigenous languages are a human right
One of the first studies of EMRIP was on the role of languages and cultures in the promotion and protection of the rights of Indigenous peoples, a study which five years later became one of the key documents to build grounds for the Action Plan of the 2019 International Year of Indigenous Languages, proclaimed by the UN General Assembly. This study builds on Article 13 of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which states that “Indigenous peoples have the right to revitalize, use, develop and transmit to future generations their histories, languages, oral traditions, philosophies, writing systems and literatures.”
EMRIP believes that indigenous cultures and languages are a central and principal feature of Indigenous peoples’ identities as collectivities and as individuals. While defining Indigenous peoples as being primarily responsible for language survival, EMRIP experts also recognize states duties to promote indigenous languages and safeguard them from extinction. This includes providing sufficient funding to support teaching methods, literacy materials, and orthographies in the pupil’s own language. According to the studies, states shall also “enact national law and policy frameworks to support traditional & formal education…with the aim of developing and implementing appropriate programs and activities for and by indigenous peoples.” States must also “obtain indigenous peoples’ free, prior and informed consent when developing and implementing laws and policies related to indigenous peoples’ languages and culture.”
A most recent report of EMRIP, “Efforts to implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: recognition, reparation and reconciliation”, provides that the “recognition of indigenous languages is another key aspect of the recognition of indigenous peoples and is receiving greater attention in the framework of the International Year of Indigenous Languages”. The study also contains several examples of both constitutional and legal recognition of Indigenous peoples’ languages and their relatedness to other rights, such as land rights and education.
Understanding significant importance of indigenous languages for peace, reconciliation, and sustainable development, and trying to ensure application of a human rights-based approach for languages, EMRIP joined others in proposing to proclaim the International Year of Indigenous Languages, as “…an opportunity for states and indigenous peoples to remedy injustices in the realm of language rights, including many states’ historic suppression of indigenous languages, and to undertake preservation and revitalization measures, which earlier have seemed impossible or untimely”.
Around 40 percent of the 7,000 or so languages spoken around the world are currently under threat. Not only globalization is a reason for this situation, but most of all the legacy of colonization and targeted assimilation policies exercised by colonial powers. Intergenerational trauma caused by these efforts has led to the sense of mistrust between Indigenous communities and authorities, severely damaging the confidence of Indigenous peoples in their languages’ vitality and resilience. In order to reconcile with the historical suppressions, the truth has to be found and recognized, and mutual investments in preservation and development of languages has to be agreed on. EMRIP is confident that states should invest to the revitalization of languages at least as much resources as has been spent to destroy them.
One of the most prominent examples of a reconciliation process is the Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission, established in 2008 with the purpose of documenting the history and lasting impacts of the Canadian Indian residential school system on Indigenous students and their families. In June 2015, the Commission released an Executive Summary of its findings along with 94 “calls to action” regarding reconciliation between Canadians and Indigenous peoples. The Commission found that children in residential schools were not allowed to speak their native languages or practice their culture, partly to encourage the use of English, but also in an effort by the government to assimilate the children into non-aboriginal society.
The calls to action request increased funding for educating children in Indigenous languages and also request that post-secondary institutions provide degrees and diplomas in Indigenous languages. This domestic process in Canada along with the increased international attention to this issue has led to the public apology by the government of Canada and has triggered a process of revision of Indigenous peoples related legislation in the country. In particular, in June 2019 Canadian parliament adopted the new Indigenous Language Act and established the office of the federal indigenous language Ombudsman.
Unfortunately, there are still many countries where Indigenous peoples and their languages are not recognized and therefore no targeted indigenous language policies have been put in place. However, the movement towards recognition is going forward in many parts of the world. Most recently, the Cabinet of Japan has approved a law that recognizes the Ainu as Indigenous people, although Ainu representatives claim that the law in itself does not constitute an effort to achieve recognition, reparation, and reconciliation, as there is no reference to past violations. However, this recognition is a good ground for further dialogue where UN human rights experts’ assistance may or may not be requested.
In order to foster dialogue and reconciliation around indigenous languages, parties should abandon potentially damaging stereotype-based approaches. First of all, it is very often that states and international organizations treat languages only as part of cultural heritage. Recently renewed UNESCO’s Policy of Engaging with Indigenous Peoples speaks about indigenous languages as “a vehicle of their intangible cultural heritage”. Although it is non-contestable and non-doubtable that languages and cultures are indivisible, they should not be considered only in the context of cultural performances and festivals. Languages are a tool for communication, transmission of knowledge and a human right.
Another extreme is to consider languages from a national security perspective and set legislative restriction on the linguistic communities. So called political nation building policies in many countries, in fact, constitute a neocolonial effort to determine on behalf of Indigenous peoples how their languages can be taught and where they can be spoken and used. Over-regulated language related normative framework provides little space and flexibility for Indigenous-led educational systems. These efforts are often articulated as state care of the nation well-being, prevention of segregation, or advancing equality in the society¹.
Policies put in place without or with little participation of Indigenous peoples in the drafting process lead to the dysfunction of such policies and eventually cause damage for languages and loss of critical time. Application of the principle of free, prior, and informed consent is the key to the instrumentality of laws, policies, or action plans. For example, the idea proposed by authorities and researchers to invent the unified Karelian language embodied in the Development Plan for the Karelian Language for the period from 2009 to 2020 was never realized because of the lack of support by Karelians. Well-planned policies with full participation of indigenous peoples determine what methods could be most efficient in each case: reclamation, revitalization, maintenance, or promotion. Collaboration of states and Indigenous peoples in a good faith would make languages visible, resilient, and restore prestige to speak those languages. Indigenous peoples have the knowledge how to preserve their languages, and states have resources to assist and encourage them to do so, including by building capacity of linguistic communities and individual language activists.
Efforts to revitalize languages
Many Indigenous languages are recognized by the UNESCO’s Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger as severely or critically endangered. These cases demand urgent measures of revitalization. One of the most effective ones — a pre-school full immersion method of language nest — was born in an indigenous Maori community in Aotearoa / New Zealand, and expanded to Hawaii, the Nordic Countries, and Russia. Language nests facilitate bilingual education and recreates native speakers in a relatively short period of time.
The one existing Karelian language nest, Kielipezä (‘Language Nest’), is run by the House of the Karelian Language. The nest is similar to a regular kindergarten, except that the language of instruction is Karelian, with no translation into Russian. The staff helps the children learn the language, using nest-specific teaching methods. The nest group is small, which allows individual work with each child. The next challenge will be to maintain the Karelian-language skill throughout a Russian-language school period. With this in mind, the House of the Karelian Language carries out informational and educational work, encouraging the parents and the local community to improve their language knowledge and speak to language-nest graduates in Karelian.
While language nests are useful for settled communities, nomadic Indigenous communities would need other culturally appropriate models. Understanding the negative experience of boarding schools, the Russian government has introduced a mobile (nomadic) school method, which ensures access to education without taking children from their families, and without harm to their physical and mental health. This method also allows for the preservation of native languages and cultures via traditional occupations. This educational practice might be appropriate for indigenous peoples living in the conditions of the Arctic and developing reindeer husbandry in tundra.
Although formal educational programs run by authorities or communities are very important and provide stability in language teaching, many indigenous language activists also significantly contribute to the language preservation and development. Moreover, community-led language activism is a pillar for linguistic sustainability and development. It is a modern environment that encourages speaking and learning the native languages through educational and social activities: producing handicrafts, cooking, singing in a village chorus, or performing in a local amateur theatre. For example, in the House of the Karelian language, Karelian is the official working language. The project is a response to the emerging needs to revive the traditional knowledge, which almost faded away together with the senior generation of Karelians, keep the regional history, strengthen the Karelian identity, and test new forms of social interaction. These trends find more and more support in the local community and drive the interest to the House in guests and tourists. Projects like this ensure balance and cooperation between formal education and informal, community-based activism.
It is important for indigenous languages’ survival and development that they are used in the education system, public administration, and the media. In the modern life they should be also represented in cyberspace. While some languages still don’t have own scripts and writing systems, others have been actively used on the Internet and in technology. The Centre for Innovative Language Technologies of the Republic of Komi in Russia has contributed to the digitalization and documentation of many indigenous languages of Russia. Another example is the Language Recourse Media Centre of the Karelians, Vepsians, and Finns in the Republic of Karelia in Russia. Built on a publishing house, the Centre unites journalists, researchers, and activists to support indigenous literatures, media, digital language technologies, and language modernization efforts.
Capacity building and empowerment of communities is one of the priorities of the 2019 International Year of Indigenous Languages. Seven indigenous non-governmental organizations in the Baltic Sea region have established a Civil Society Network for preserving and revitalizing indigenous languages “SANA 2019”. The team of SANA 2019 believes that neither school, nor NGOs shall be held solely responsible; a successful revival of an endangered language can only be achieved through a coordinated work of policy-makers, educators, and civil society. This position has been formulated and transferred into a set of specific recommendations by participants of Language Activism Forum, organized by SANA 2019. The recommendations have outlined how to promote language activism and how to ensure its interrelation with the agenda of formal educational institutions, cultural establishments, state bodies, and other stakeholders. The preservation of indigenous languages would be impossible without optimism on the local level — in indigenous peoples’ habitual lands. The Network has contributed to increasing local optimism by providing training and financial small-scale support for indigenous languages activists and organizations and by promoting their advanced practices internationally allowing for cooperation with like-minded across the globe.
The added value of the International Year of Indigenous Languages
Preliminary results of the International Year of Indigenous Languages show the potential for recognition and reconciliation around Indigenous languages. National steering committees and task forces are being formed in different countries; national and local action plans are being agreed on and implemented. Communities around the globe started to cooperate with each other and state authorities in search for best ways of safeguarding of critically endangered, although still vital, languages. More resources have been allocated to the instruction of indigenous languages and building the capacity of communities. In some countries there have been moves towards expanding language policies and negotiating new, more effective language safeguarding strategies, with the participation of indigenous experts and decision-makers. The crucial work being done by language grassroots activists has been supported and acknowledged.
The International Year has mobilized international community’s attention to the need for preserving indigenous languages. Hundreds of international, regional, national and local events are held in all continents, where indigenous and expert community articulates calls to action and tries to find ways on how to keep going after the Year is over. At the high-level event of the UN General Assembly to mark the opening of the International Year, President Evo Morales of Bolivia stated that indigenous languages are very important for the modern democracy. Victoria and Yuelu Proclamations — outcomes of the regional meetings in Asia, North America and the Arctic — contain calls to shift the paradigm and recognize at all levels the human right nature of languages, which includes full respect to the right to free, prior and informed consent of indigenous peoples, and potentially the need for a legally binding international instrument to protect languages.
As proposed by the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the UN Human Rights Council held in its 42th session a half-day panel discussion on promotion and preservation of indigenous languages. The International Year’s calendar still has a lot of events, but it is rapidly approaching its conclusion.
Is it enough for us to pay attention only for twelve months? Do we have time to conclude all we have in mind? Shall we use the momentum and prolong our efforts building on the results and dynamics of this year? On the World’s Indigenous Peoples’ Day, all four UN indigenous-specific mechanisms, jointly called on states to proclaim an International Decade of Indigenous Languages. This would give a little bit more time for all of us to support indigenous languages, and therefore give them more chance for longevity.
¹K. Carpenter and A. Tsykarev, (Indigenous) Language as a Human Right, 24 UCLA Journal International Law & Foreign Affairs (forthcoming 2019)
