9-Classes
Andrew Young
adults about American ways, bring Montagnard people to tell legends,
share experiences as refugees (this includes health, cultural shock,
jobs, etc, and much more.
I've taken the initiative to break out some of the critical topics Lap
has raised.
In the best circumstances, we'd have those who received formal
training organize classes and teach Rhade, Koho, etc. I've spoken to
Thomas Eban, Dock Rmah, Nay Rong, and K Broi Toploi about such topics,
and all agree that cultural heritage is in danger and needs to be
handed down.
There are a few big obstacles to this. The obvious one is money for a
facility, supplies and materials, but to be specific it is for
teachers AND students. Teachers do need to be paid for their time and
not be expected to work for free, even though I realize many committed
Montagnard elders would do this. I advocate this because for any
public project we can't send continue to send the message that culture
and language are free.
The idea of paying students is new. I think there could be some
serious discussion and outside grant funding about the value of paying
students -- adults and children -- to learn about the formal rules of
their spoken language as they might appear on the written page. My bet
is that acculturation would be stronger and faster if preliterate
speakers were to learn both English and their primary language at the
same time. For adults, it would certainly be a challenge. Many clients
we see seem to have a very rudimentary idea about how to record their
thoughts on paper; they reflect their 5-6 years of elementary school
training. For children under a certain age, acquiring multiple
languages is not a problem.
There's a clock running on this initiative.I don't think we can count
on the elders who are in now in their late 60's to be teaching good
Rhade or Koho 5 years from now. If the transfer of knowledge is going
to happen, it has to start now.