Warra: Indigenous Languages Youth Forum
In November Living Languages travelled to Adelaide on Kaurna land to take part in the 2-day Warra: Indigenous Languages Youth Forum. The Forum was hosted by First Languages Australia and aimed to bring tomorrow’s leaders together, to build networks, gain skills and inspire young people to take on vital community language roles. The Forum held many inspiring and interactive presentations that provided participants with lots of resources to support their languages.
On the first day trainers Ebony, Chris and Mandy held an Immersion Language Teaching workshop where they shared strategies, techniques and activities to help keep language sessions in full language. It was great to see people getting up and engaging in these techniques with their own language. At the end of the session there was lots of discussion around language and sharing of stories about their own language journey.
Ebony and Chris presented on Living Languages' training programs and projects on the second day. Chris, a Warrungu man, has been working hard to fill in the Learner’s Guide template for his language, and has started teaching language to his extended family. Thank you to Chris our guest trainer for coming on board to help the team with the workshop and presentations.
Mandy also attended a presentation by two young Worimi language workers, Will Simon & Ngaja Perry-Tighe, who are both from the same Gathang language group as Mandy. Will and Ngaja spoke about their language journey, the challenges they have faced and how special it was to complete the Cert lll in Gathang with their mothers. They shared ‘Head Shoulders Knees and Toes’ in Gathang with everyone participating and it was a proud moment for Mandy to see them present and take on language leadership roles for their community.
The Living Languages team caught up with a lot of our friends including Language Leadership Program participants, and made a lot of new friends, too. Thank you to First Languages Australia for a deadly gathering, and thank you to Kaurna Country and Kaurna presenters for sharing their greetings and phrases and for the beautiful Welcome to Country by Ashum Sheree.