Indigenous languages in higher education: Case studies from the Amazon of Peru

Yopán R.V.; Rivera F.G.; Alvarado H.R. · Language Assessment in Multilingual Settings: Innovative Practices Across Formal and Informal Environments (2022) · DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.6762282

Resumen

This study examines the role of two indigenous languages in higher education in the Amazon of Peru. It looks at efforts to implement Kukama and Kichwa as key components in the teacher training model developed by the Programa de Formación de Maestros Bilingües de la Amazonía Peruana (henceforth FORMABIAP for its initials in Spanish). At present, Kukama and Kichwa are at different points of UNESCO's endangerment scale. Teaching them in higher education is part of a more comprehensive commitment to build culturally and linguistically appropriate education for Amazonian indigenous groups. This chapter documents several components of the FORMABIAP project. We look at a sample of eight FORMABIAP's alumni, five Kukamas and three Kichwas, to investigate and reflect on the overall outcomes of their learning process. In addition, we survey the profiles of the instructors, the structure of the language classes, and their communities of practice. An important finding of this study is that endangered languages can be relearned by heritage speakers in a combination of naturalistic and well-structured instructional settings. We conclude that the assessment of these relearning processes needs to be holistic, going far beyond linguistic proficiency. In the Amazonian context, at the center of it all are language attitudes, sense of cultural membership, and the learners' positioning with respect to the aspirations of their communities and indigenous organizations. Although the general teaching components can be in fact planned for several ethnic groups, the implementation of the proposals and the evaluation of the outcomes must be done individually and by the indigenous group to capture the uniqueness of each sociolinguistic context.