“Alone in a Crowd: Indigenous Migrants and Language Barriers in American Immigration”

2021 ◽  
pp. 215336872110064
Author(s):  
Denise N. Obinna

Indigenous migrants in American custody often speak neither English nor Spanish. This leaves them at risk for family separation, deportation and due process violations. In this article, I discuss the challenges which indigenous migrants face in American immigration. Examining linguistic variations, this manuscript illustrates that American immigration policies have not adjusted to the linguistic diversity at the border—or in the immigration courts. Despite the growing number of indigenous migrants seeking asylum, most are assumed to speak only Spanish. This assumption neglects the wide linguistic diversity of immigrants and directly impacts their experience through the immigration bureaucracy. For indigenous migrants, linguicism or the exclusion of native languages can have life or death consequences—especially if they are unable to secure interpreters or relay crucial aspects of their case. As such, linguicism perpetuates an unequal justice system which fails to provide an understanding of the asylum process for those who speak indigenous languages.

Author(s):  
Min Pun ◽  
Kamal Gurung

This paper focuses on the decline and death of indigenous languages with special reference to sampled languages used by indigenous communities in Kaski district, arguing that the indigenous language communities should be supported by the government for giving official status to their native languages, focused on formulation and implementation of education policies, and encouraged to insist on speaking their native languages. Together, the indigenous language communities need to collaborate with the government to curb all the issues related to preserving and promoting linguistic diversity in Nepal. Based on the findings and discussion of the study, the following recommendations have been made to preserve and promote linguistic diversity in Nepal: 1) The findings of the study concluded that documentation is one of the most important ways to preserve and promote indigenous languages; 2) The findings of this study concluded that both formal and informal languages classes can be effective to cover all types of age group indigenous language speakers; 3) It is recommended that language teachers should be provided with appropriate trainings to be good indigenous language teachers; 4) It is recommended that indigenous language groups should put pressure on the government for policy development and political advocacy for the preservation of indigenous languages; 5) The study suggested that indigenous language groups should be given language awareness programs occasionally in order to motivate them to use their native languages and then to preserve the linguistic diversity in Nepal; and 6) The study suggested that indigenous language communities need to get help of language researchers to address the issues related to indigenous language revitalization strategies.


2019 ◽  
Vol 72 (3) ◽  
pp. 52-58
Author(s):  
Nilo Couret

Nilo Couret interviews Brazilian documentary filmmaker Maria Augusta Ramos. Her recent documentary, O Processo (The Trial, 2018), chronicles the “parliamentary coup” against Dilma Rousseff, delving into the impeachment process and the former president's trial in the Senate. In O Processo, Ramos engages with enduring themes and subjects from her twenty-year career, particularly her well-known Justice Trilogy, which examined the Brazilian criminal justice system. For Ramos, documentary shares an affinity with forensic discourse when its purpose is truth-telling in the service of justice. Rousseff's trial and impeachment, however, find the filmmaker probing how justice has been sundered from the truth in a contemporary moment when corruption scandals and fake news compromise our democratic institutions. Her films combine an observational approach with institutional analyses in order to reveal the workings of power behind the surfaces of everyday life.


2018 ◽  
Vol 65 (13) ◽  
pp. 1767-1797
Author(s):  
Martin Bouchard ◽  
Carlo Morselli ◽  
Mitch Macdonald ◽  
Owen Gallupe ◽  
Sheldon Zhang ◽  
...  

The size of criminal populations is unknown, and policy decisions are typically based only on the number of offenses and offenders that come to the attention of the criminal justice system. However, the size of criminal populations may follow different trends than what is observed in official data. We use a regression-adjusted capture–recapture model to estimate the number of people at risk of arrest for offenses involving amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) from arrests and rearrests occurring in Quebec, Canada, controlling for year of first arrest, age, and gender. The 4,989 individuals arrested were the visible part of an estimated 42,541 [36,936, 48,145] individuals otherwise at risk of arrest (12%). Additional results show that trends in criminal populations and risks of arrest vary across offense type and drug classifications.


2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (100) ◽  
pp. 51
Author(s):  
Vicenta Tasa Fuster

Resumen:Este trabajo pretende dar una visión general del reconocimiento de la diversidad lingüística española que se deriva de la Constitución. Nos referimos exclusivamente a las lenguas autóctonas históricamente habladas en España; teniendo en cuenta, además, que una misma lengua puede recibir diversas denominaciones populares y oficiales.Partiendo de estas premisas, el trabajo estudia el reconocimiento que hace la Constitución Española de la diversidad lingüística en España en su artículo 3. Se subraya en el estudio que, en dicho artículo de la Constitución se establece que el castellano es la lengua española oficial del Estado y que todos los españoles tienen el deber de conocerla y el derecho a usarla (art. 3.1), que las otras lenguas españolas serán también oficiales en las respectivas comunidades autónomas, en función de la regulación que hagan sus estatutos (art. 3.2) y que España considera que la riqueza de las diferentes modalidades lingüísticas esun patrimonio cultural que deberá tener un respeto y una protección especiales (art. 3.3).El contenido de la Constitución, la jurisprudencia constitucional de las últimas cuatro décadas y los estatutos de autonomía y legislación lingüística autonómica, han asentado un reconocimiento de la diversidad lingüística española y de los derechos lingüísticos concretos de los hablantes de las distintas lenguas españolas fundamentado en el principio de jerarquía lingüística y no en los de seguridad lingüística e igualdad de derechos lingüísticos. El principio de jerarquía lingüística presupone considerar que existen unas lenguas que deben tener un reconocimiento legal y oficial superior a otras. Y, lo que es lo mismo, que los derechos lingüísticos de sus hablantes no tienen el mismo grado de reconocimiento. Llegándose a dar el caso que, en España, una misma lengua pueda llegar a tener diferentes niveles de reconocimiento legal-oficial y un número aún mayor de políticas lingüísticas que traten de convertir en una realidad substantiva todos o una parte de los derechos lingüísticos reconocidos formalmente a los hablantes de una lengua diferente del castellano en una comunidad autónoma.Así las cosas, se constata que legalmente una lengua (castellano) tiene una situación de preeminencia legal-oficial, seis lenguas españolas (catalán, gallego, vasco, occitano, aragonés y asturleonés) tienen algún tipo de reconocimiento oficial en parte del territorio en el que son habladas de manera autóctona, una lengua tiene reconocimiento político (tamazight), otra tiene un reconocimiento administrativo menor en Cataluña (caló), y tres lenguas autóctonas no tienen el más mínimo reconocimiento legal, político o administrativo (árabe, haquetia yportugués). El trabajo estudia detalladamente y de manera global la estructuración de la jerarquía lingüística en la legislación española derivadade la Constitución y concluye con una descripción de los seis niveles de jerarquía lingüística y de derechos lingüísticos que existen en España. Se defiende, finalmente, un cambio sistema lingüístico legalconstitucional que respete los principios de seguridad lingüística y el principio de igualdad de derechos lingüísticos de todos los ciudadanos españoles. Summary:1. Introduction. The Constitution and the Spanish languages. 2.Language in the statutes of monolingual communities. 3. Linguisticdiversity in multilingual communities with a single official language.4. Communities with co-officiality. 5. Final considerations: a hierarchicalrecognition. 6. Bibliography cited. Abstract:This paper is an overview of the recognition of the Spanish linguistic diversity derived from the Constitution. We refer exclusively to the native languages historically spoken in Spain; about that is important to know that the same language can receive diverse popular and official denominations.With these premises, the work studies the recognition in the article 3 of the Spanish Constitution of the linguistic diversity in Spain. It is emphasized in the study that this article establishes that the Castilian is the official Spanish language of the State and that all Spaniards have the duty to know it and the right to use it (article 3.1), that the other Spanish languages would be official in the respective autonomous communities, depending on the regulation made by their statutes of autonomy (article 3.2 ), and that Spain considers the richness of the different linguistic modalities a cultural heritage that must have special respect and protection (article 3.3).The content of the Constitution, the constitutional jurisprudence of the last four decades and the statutes of autonomy and autonomous linguistic legislation, have established a recognition of the Spanish linguistic diversity and of the specific linguistic rights of the speakers of the different Spanish languages based on the principle of linguistic hierarchy and not in those of linguistic security and equality of linguistic rights. The principle of linguistic hierarchy considers that there are some languages that have to have a legal and official recognitionsuperior to others. And, what is the same, that the linguistic rights of its speakers do not have the same degree of recognition. In Spain, the same language may have different levels of legal-official recognition and a lot of linguistic policies in the autonomous communities that try to be reality all or part of the linguistic rights formally recognized to speakers of a language other than Castilian. So it is verified that legally a language (Castilian) has a situation oflegal-official preeminence, six Spanish languages (Catalan, Galician, Basque, Occitan, Aragonese and Asturian) have some type of official recognition in part of the territory where are spoken, one language has political recognition (Tamazight), another has a lower administrative recognition in Catalonia (Caló), and three indigenous languages do not have the least legal, political or administrative recognition (Arabic, Hachetia and Portuguese).The paper studies in detail the structure of the linguistic hierarchy in Spanish legislation derived from the Constitution and concludes with a description of the six levels of linguistic hierarchy and of linguistic rights that exist in Spain. Finally, it defends a legal-constitutional linguistic system that respects the principles of linguistic security and of equality of linguistic rights of all Spanish citizens.


2020 ◽  
Vol V (IV) ◽  
pp. 27-33
Author(s):  
Irem Sultana ◽  
Malik Adnan ◽  
Muhammad Imran Mehsud

This research paper inspected the role of Pakistani media to protect indigenous languages and culture in Pakistan. The study examined the situation; if Pakistani media outpours concern with the native languages or not. The article also checked the media landscape, its language-wise segregation and scenario of literacy in different areas of the country. The outcomes of the study showed that Pakistani media is neglecting the indigenous languages. The study results exhibited clearly that media houses’ focus on protecting native languages, is not profound. The findings also showed that foreign ownership of Media houses plays a role in neglecting indigenous language promotions. The current study presented that Pakistani mainstream media is damaging the local and native languages. The study was the outcome of qualitative content analysis and in-depth interviews of senior communication experts.


Author(s):  
Andrea Paganelli ◽  
Cynthia Houston

If school library collections must meet the needs of the communities they serve, the native languages of the student population must be an important consideration when making purchasing decisions about eBooks. Many professionals in the library community believe that materials in electronic format have the potential to enrich library collections with linguistic diversity. To ensure that school library collections reflect the linguistic diversity of the community, as school library professionals we need to gain a better understanding of what resources are available for our students in digital format. Recent studies indicate that eBooks available from vendors to schools libraries do not meet the linguistic needs of children whose native language is not English. Several international organizations have recognized this issue and are developing initiatives to resolve the growing digital and linguistic divide.


Author(s):  
Céline Carayon

Taking a fresh look at the first two centuries of French colonialism in the Americas, this book answers the long-standing question of how and how well Indigenous Americans and Europeans communicated with each other during colonial encounters. French explorers and colonists in the sixteenth century noticed that Indigenous peoples from Brazil to Canada used signs to communicate. The newcomers, in response, quickly embraced the nonverbal as a means to overcome cultural and language barriers throughout French America. Céline Carayon's close examination of French accounts, combined with her multidisciplinary methodology, enables her to recover these sophisticated Native practices of embodied expression. In a colonial world where communication and trust were essential but complicated by the multiplicity of Indigenous languages, intimate and sensory communications ensured that colonists and Indigenous peoples understood each other well. Understanding, in turn, bred both genuine personal bonds and violent antagonisms. Nonverbal communication shaped Indigenous resistance to colonial pressures across the Americas just as it fueled the French imperial imagination and strategies. Challenging the notion of colonial America as a site of misunderstandings and insurmountable cultural clashes, Carayon shows that Natives and newcomers used nonverbal means to build relationships before the rise of linguistic fluency--and, crucially, well afterward.


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