In 2008, Vale began a project to preserve the Kanak languages in the south of New Caledonia. After two years of linguistic and iconographic research, the project’s first educational tools have been produced.
Five posters have been printed covering the following themes: birds, marine life, plants, trees and fruit and vegetables. The collection is aimed at children, helping them to recover their mother tongue. There are also plans to create five primers and three children’s games.
The purpose of the project is to preserve and promote indigenous languages, creating teaching tools in partnership with the state, teaching and cultural institutions and the local population. In this manner we are contributing towards the preservation of the Nââ Numèè, Nââ Drubéa and Nââ Kwényï languages, three traditional languages in the Drubéa Kapûmë region in the south of New Caledonia.
Study confirms threat of extinction
Vale’s socioeconomic diagnosis of the island in 2007 confirmed that indigenous languages are falling into increasing disuse among children and the young and are threatened with extinction. The project, conceived in 2008, seeks to create tools that take learning beyondthe classroom.
Get to know Vale’s actions for traditional communities.