#StoriesThatInspire. Meet 10 activists who use digital media to strengthen and promote Mayan languages in México.

Photo by Cristina Álvarez, used with her permission.

Learn about the inspiring story of one of the grantees selected for the 2024 Mayan Language Digital Activism Fellowship organized by Rising Voices. In this personal essay, the author shares about her experience in activism and the project through which she seeks to promote her native language within her community and online.

My name is Cristina Agustina Álvarez Díaz; I am 22 years old. My community is called Amatenango del Valle, in Chiapas, Mexico, the land of pigeons and jaguars of clay, land of Indigenous artisans. Amatenango del Valle is a small Tzeltal community but with great culture. Its Indigenous language, clothing, and traditions are well represented. My community is unique in having magical hands that mold beautiful pieces, through pottery, mainly made by the women of the community.

I am Tzeltal, and for me, language represents our identity, it is what we are and what we do, it is a clear identification of being Amatenanguero. I am currently a community educator through the National Council for Educational Development (CONAFE) program and I recently graduated in agroforestry engineering, since I am interested in carrying out activities related to the countryside and rural people, while highlighting my mother tongue and my roots at all times.

Photo by Cristina Álvarez, used with her permission.

A few years ago I started carrying out projects in my community, initially focused on crafts. I worked mainly with women artisans to exchange knowledge that would allow them to strengthen their skills. Later, I participated in a project related to women's rights. In this space I learned facilitation tools to encourage people to express themselves in their language.

The flavors of my community

This year, with the support of the Mayan Language Digital Activism Program, I will continue to work within my community, combining the preservation of the language, knowledge about local foods, and my training as an engineer. My goal is to carry out actions that will strengthen my Tzeltal language and at the same time work to preserve local knowledge and products.

Photo by Rosa Gómez, used with her permission.

In order to achieve this, I am implementing the “Welil Amatenango Processing” project, which involves making short videos about food processing. I am certified in this topic by my degree and I would like to share this knowledge with my community. In my project, I decided to work with children and adolescents. Among the activities that I am going to carry out is to travel in the territory to collect fruits and then make some foods such as jams, syrups and wines. With this project, I want to help children learn about the foods that are produced in their community, strengthen their language and learn things that may even help them generate an income in the future.

Digital media and technology facilitate the connection between people inside and outside the community, so we are going to create videos to share this knowledge with more people, in our own language, and in this way, strengthen the importance of the Tzeltal language.

Photo by Cristina Álvarez, used with her permission.

So far, I have been able to notice that there are barriers to implementing language preservation projects, one of them being the lack of financial support, as well as the lack of support from the community, so I try to make my projects have practical elements that are of interest to the community and that in the long term allow for generating some income to sustain themselves over time.

Preserving our cultural identity

One of the things that has always seemed important to me is not losing our language, since not all people have a language that gives them identity and, therefore, we the youth have the great responsibility of maintaining and preserving our cultural identity. In the future, I would like to continue learning communication and education tools to continue creating projects that prioritize community collaboration and participation, as well as the preservation of our language.

At the end of these months of work, I would like to see a change in the value given to Indigenous languages ​​within my community. I would love to see people more capable of expressing themselves in their native language wherever they go, without fear of being discriminated against or even criticized for speaking their native language. I would also like to empower the producers and farmers of my community so that they can see the value of their products as raw material and the possibility of processing them themselves.