Cholula Nahuatl class and encounter

Fri Jan 17 17:06:21 UTC 2014

Yes indeed, this report by John is very interesting. In our work in Puebla and Tlaxcala we've conducted assessments of this kind of ability (reading and writing of Nahuatl texts by children who learned literacy via Spanish only) with similar results. This is the first example that I know of where bilinguals (with similar literacy learning background) have demonstrated proficiency with a 16th C. text. The implications of this experiment by our colleagues are far-reaching and important. I don't have to say what these are, in the recovery and preservation of Nahuatl-language texts and oral tradition to mention just one example. We'll be looking forward to future reports.
Thanks for posting this news.
Norbert

From: mario <micc2 at cox.net<mailto:micc2 at cox.net>>
Date: Friday, January 17, 2014 9:00 AM
To: "nahuatl at lists.famsi.org<mailto:nahuatl at lists.famsi.org>" <nahuatl at lists.famsi.org<mailto:nahuatl at lists.famsi.org>>
Subject: Re: [Nahuat-l] Cholula Nahuatl class and encounter

FANTASTIC!!!  Congratulations on your work John.  I am glad  your
efforts  are reaching the macehualli in their home turf, and showing
them, especially the teens, the importance of what they have in their
very own home, world, inheritance.

--
I live for reasoned, enlightened spirituality:

"Tlacecelilli", tranquilidad, paz

Mario E. Aguilar, PhD

619.948.8861

www.mexicayotl.net
www.mexicayotl.org
www.mexicayotl.com
www.aguila-blanca.com

On 1/17/2014 6:41 AM, John Sullivan wrote:
Dear listeros,
I’m writing from Cholula, where IDIEZ, in partnership with the University of Warsaw, is entering the last day of our two-week Nahuatl Language and Codex Institute. Tomorrow and Sunday we will hold our second Interdialectical Encounter with the participation of 70 native speakers of Nahuatl from seven states (and Joe Campbell). I just wanted to share with you something particularly surprising that happened last Friday.
An interesting aspect of the two-week course is the participation of eight young native speakers from the town of Soyatlan, Puebla. Even though the schools in Soyatlan are only in Spanish, the people in the town, including children speak Nahuatl. So, needless to say, the high school students who participated in the course have never read or written anything in their native language. Last Friday we transported our Institute to Soyatlan and held the advanced Classical Nahuatl component there. We projected a manuscript from Chalco, 1564, on the wall of a room used for catechism classes, and began to paleograph and interpret it. In attendance were high school students and a number of other community members, including some of the parents and grandparents of the students. The class was conducted monolingually, some of us speaking Huastecan Nahuatl and the people from Soyatlan speaking their variant. The surprise is that the high school students immediately began reading and understanding the manuscript — just like that! And one of the abuelitas picked up a copy of Molina’s dictionary and began thumbing through it.
We are now planning to formally expand our operations (teaching, research and revitalization of Nahuatl) in Puebla and Tlaxcala. And yes, the two-week Nahuatl Language and Codex Institute and the Interdialectical Encounter will held here again in January of 2015.
Un abrazo,
John

John Sullivan, Ph.D.
Visiting scholar, Faculty of Artes Liberales
University of Warsaw;
Professor of Nahua language and culture
Universidad Autónoma de Zacatecas;
Director, Zacatecas Institute of Teaching and Research in Ethnology
Tacuba 152, int. 43
Centro Histórico
Zacatecas, Zac. 98000
Mexico
Work: +52 (492) 925-3415
Home: +52 (492) 768-6048
Mobile (Poland): +48 73-380-9876
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