Our Garifuna Language Campaign
The focus of the Garifuna Language Campaign is to reinstitute the Garifuna Language in All Garifuna Communities. Our Garifuna Language Campaign must be robust and multilayered for us to make any dent in the status quo. If we are going to do this, we need to hit it, hit it hard, or just back down.
2025 Class Schedule
Layers
- Fluent speakers of the Garifuna language will be interwoven within our campaign.
- We will focus on Belize and St. Vincent and the Grenadines 2024 and 2025. We will focus on Honduras, Guatemala and Nicaragua in 2026 and 2027. This means that we need to carve a sustainability and continuity plan in each area.
- Garifuna communities throughout Belize and Central America will be visited by representatives from The Yurumein Project to identify support needed to get the Garifuna the common language spoken in their community. We anticipate this will require frequent travel.
- Recruit fluent Garifuna volunteers to conduct weekly sessions in areas where the language will be taught at a predetermined location. Our challenge is getting entire communities consisting of parents and children involved in sessions.
- Form cohorts in each community and establish meeting times.
- Purchase and public placement of signs encouraging Garifuna people to speak the Garifuna language.
- Visit Morning and Evening Radio and TV shows and purchase air time promoting our Garifuna Language Campaign initiative.
- Continue Wayanuha Garifuna Language Classes at all three Levels - Beginner, Intermediate, and Proficient.
- Youth Garifuna Language emersion Summer Camps in St. Vincent and the Grenadines (Yurumein), and Belize.
What are the expected results?
- The Garifuna language will be prevalent in Garifuna communities countrywide.
- Our cultural traditions of honouring our ancestors and elders will be a regular occurrence.
- Garifuna youth in all countries where Garinagu live will be versatile in all aspects of the Garifuna culture including, speaking the Garifuna language, singing Garifuna songs, dancing to the rhythm of the various genre of Garifuna music, playing the Garifuna drums, reciting Garifuna poetry.
- Garifuna youth will be able to articulate our history and clarify misconceptions when they arise.
- Procurement of Cultural and Sports facilities that open pathways to opportunities for Garinagu will be firmly established.
Campaign's Plan of Activities
- The Yurumein Project Garifuna Youth Emersion Camp in St. Vincent & the Grenadines
- The Yurumein Project Garifuna Youth Emersion Camp in Belize
- The Wayanuha Garifuna Language Classes (all three levels) continue four hours each week
- The Yurumein Project marketing of the Garifuna language
- The Yurumein Project outreach to seven Garifuna communities in Belize over 24 months
