by Nomvuyo Lerato Mzamane

Between April and June 2021, Puku hosted a series of curated conversations amongst writers, academics, publishers, activists, and institutions in the indigenous language ecosystem on the role of children’s literature in preserving and promoting our indigenous languages. These conversations took the form of nine webinars in isiXhosa, isiZulu, Setswana, Xitsonga, Sepedi, isiNdebele, Siswati, Sesotho, and Tshivenda. The isiXhosa webinar was organised in partnership with the University of the Western Cape. The remaining eight webinars were organised in partnership with PanSALB and ILIFA – the Pan South African Language Board and the Indigenous Language Initiative for Advancement, respectively. 

Significantly, this was the first time ever that a webinar series of this nature was conducted in our indigenous languages and there was consensus among webinar panellists and attendees that it should not be the last. Most welcomed by the experts and activists, was that they had never at this level, had discussions about their language, in their language, and for the benefit of the African child. 

Panellists represented academia, broadcasting / media, the performing arts including actors and poets, business, linguists, storytellers and writers of several genres including children’s literature, educators and independent publishers.

The webinars were each facilitated by a Moderator and hosted by a member of the Puku team who also delivered the Vote of Thanks. A Rapporteur was appointed to provide a report of the proceedings in both the language of the webinar, and to craft highlights in English. 

Whilst each webinar was unique in its own right, with noteworthy panellists and informed and informative discussions, recurring themes were identifiable. A comprehensive synthesis culled the webinar discussions and their accompanying reports into an analytical reflection, listing the major issues arising and highlighting key suggestions for the future.

All webinars were recorded and are available in their entirety of approximately two hours each, on the “PESP Webinar Project” playlist on the Puku Channel on YouTube.

The written reports of the webinars in each indigenous language are available on Puku’s website in the Blogs, Features, Opinions & Editorials section.

COMMON THREADS FROM THE WEBINARS

Early childhood is where to start. Across the heritage landscape.

• Significant emphasis was placed on African languages development in both the first 1000 days of life (conception to age 2) and in early childhood 0 to 9 years of age (up to grade 3).  
• The primacy of storytelling was particularly named with a robust call-to-action being the regeneration of indigenous spoken languages in homes, and the embrace of all other child literary legacies: songs, poetry, play, toys, visual aids, and sayings-idioms-proverbs. In addition, newer children’s literature genres must be made in indigenous languages; graphic novels (comic books), colouring books, and news and information, to name a few.

It is the responsibility of every adult to tool and inspire children to be skilled and proud speakers of indigenous languages.

• A clarion call was made to all adults, be they parents, older siblings, teachers or community members, that this movement needs them not just as producers and presenters of this content, but also as exemplary role models and vigorous influencers.

Every child must be able to access books nearby. Those books must be in languages they understand.

• 80% of South Africa’s 24,894 public schools (June 2022), do not have a school library. This number excludes the many different kinds of early childhood centres, institutions and homes.
• Just 2% of the books published in South Africa are in an African language.

21st century technologies are the only way forward.

• We are in the 4th Industrial Revolution. Contemporary digital tools and resources must be deployed to promote children’s literature in African languages 
• The possibilities for contributors in this space are limitless and themself require specific South Africa-centric avenues of discourse, planning and implementation. There are unique opportunities for us to be global leaders. We have the motivation and skills sets, what is elusive are the resource investments.

Our languages need a significant creative presence in the multimedia universe.

• Edutainment is an impactful tool for preservation and promotion in children’s worlds.
• New opportunities are forever presenting themselves such as the digital video streaming services and social media.
• Radio is still royalty in many South African homes. We need to make greater use of radio to promote books in our languages.

Today’s young demand diverse genres and more complex topics in their children’s literature. 

• Themes for children’s literature must themselves reflect contemporary affairs, engage with complex issues youth are facing today, present real triumphs of the majority of our children, and tackle “taboo subjects”.
• New genres enjoyed by children in non-African languages must find their way into indigenous literature:  cosmology, science fiction, space science, modern fantasy, present-day magic, historical fiction, and biographies and autobiographies. 

Professional development offerings need to be made available to current and future writers of children’s literature.

• We must replicate the rich supportive ecosystem that is common among, for example, writers of children’s literature in English: resources showcasing how one writes for children, what one ought to write about, where and how to get published, show-and-tell videos abound, associations and chat-groups, quality social media accounts, guidelines, free e-learning courses at reputable institutions,  and other elements of a nurturing ecosystem.
• In literature, children’s needs and wants are unique and the African child is especially deserving of quality content reflective of their often underrepresented and misrepresented worlds. 

Schools and the educational systems have a monumental responsibility to preserve and promote our indigenous languages.

• National and provincial governments including minimally, the departments of education, arts and culture, human settlements, agriculture, forestry, digital communications, health, higher education, tourism, water and the Presidency could contribute significantly more to the children’s book production ecosystem. 
• Some queries: Who will write books in our languages in adulthood when these languages are not widely taught at schools in childhood? How will our children read for meaning when the books are written in languages they neither know, nor learn in the real world they live in but only in the isolation of their classrooms? How do we promote social cohesion when we are so fragmented as language and literature workers? What uniquely South African experiences are lost when our children’s literature is not an early introduction to one another and to our country?

Children’s literature must become a serious area of intellectual inquiry; a plea to higher education.

• The preservation and promotion of indigenous languages, including endangered languages, is doomed without the robust and wide involvement and leadership of academia, including but not limited to inter-institutional collaboration.
• The tensions and imbalances in institutions of higher learning need a resolution; “institutions of higher learning need to review policies in which indigenous language literature, compared to academic papers, is not highly regarded for grading academic production.” 

Repatriation and inter-translation must be pursued with vigour.

• There is a dominance of works translated from European colonial languages to Africa’s indigenous languages. Much is lost in this cultural chasm. Children’s literature needs more inter-translation, the cross-lingual rendition between African languages. 
• In addition, we need a repatriation of children’s literature, the transposition of literary works from English (and other European languages) back into the languages of the authors and their language communities, e.g. Sol Plaatije’s works being translated into Setswana. 
• Repeatedly, alarms were raised about how translations into African languages have mainly delivered work devoid of technical quality and full of cringeworthy and inaccurate cultural nuances. Furthermore, translating for children is a particularly unique subset competency of translation. We need a plethora of professionally trained translators specifically for children’s literature, a role South Africa’s multiple qualification bodies could embrace. 

We need an enabled and enabling publishing terrain.

• Prohibitive. That’s the word/synonym many used about South Africa’s indigenous language publication universe. For most who have wanted to pursue this dream further, everything about it is repressive and gatekeepers include commercial publishers, bookstore corporations, independent and self-publishers, and, getting on to the Department of Education’s setworks list is akin to “attempting space travel when all you have is a bucket and a dream.” In summary, unless we address blockages in the current ecosystem our languages will be threatened with extinction. 
• Questions that must be asked and addressed: What are the real investments of programmes and initiatives across all government structures in indigenous language children’s literature publications? What are the actual monetary investments in publications made by NGOs working with reading, children’s literature, languages? How many corporations support indigenous language children’s book publishing as their CSI? What aspect of indigenous languages children’s publications are high networth individuals (HNWIs) making? What about bookstores? Digital spaces? Any other entities?

Public celebrations of children’s literature in indigenous languages must be plentiful and magnificent.

• We must affirm and honour our stories, our books, our writers and illustrators, our literacy activists, and our publishers. 
• We need to address some serious challenges: How many children’s literature awards do we have? Do our parents and teachers rush to go buy the books that have just won prestigious or less well known awards? Do publishers do a rushed reprint to fulfil the consumer’s appetite after the announcement of such a prize? Do our motion picture studios and directors rush to the laureate to negotiate having their book made into film? Where is our Brand South Africa recognition in the indigenous languages children’s literature universe? 

Existing strategic partnerships in the indigenous languages ecosystem must be strengthened.

• Our children deserve for our collaborations to be values-based and outcomes-focused, and always attending to what is in the best interests of the African child. What are we actually achieving for our children? 
• The clarion call for all the needs of preserving and promoting indigenous languages in children’s literature, requires all of society, not just those involved with the book ecosystem.

We require differentiated investments made in and tailored attention paid to endangered languages.

• The UN has declared an International Decade of Indigenous Languages 2022-2032, at a time when half of the world’s approximately 6000 languages are at risk for extinction by the end of this century. This includes our endangered languages like N/uu.
• We need an intensive focus on our languages spoken at home by the fewest South Africans: isiNdebele (1.6%), Siswati (2.8%), Tshivenda (2.5%) and Xitsonga (3.6%). 

The webinars concluded with a call for similar engagements to be held with  greater regularity and each concluding with a proactive call-to-action. Potential future topics were listed and appreciation was expressed to Puku for the groundbreaking webinar series.