This post is republished with permission from the Indigenous Tweets blog.
Last Friday February 21st was International Mother Language Day, a celebration of linguistic and diversity originally created by UNESCO in 1999. This year, together with Rising Voices and the Living Tongues Institute, we tried to encourage people to tweet in their native language using the hashtag #imld14 (#dilm14 in Spanish). We were thrilled with the response, and you can see some of the many tweets by searching for #imld14 on Twitter, or by checking out the Storify created by Laura Morris from Rising Voices.
For fun, I looked specifically at tweets written in any of the 157 languages we're tracking on the Indigenous Tweets site. In all, there were 491 tweets containing #imld14 or #dilm14, written in 31 of the 157 languages. Leading the way were Gàidhlig with 158 tweets, followed by 74 tweets in Aragonese, 45 in Ojibwe/Nishnaabemwin, 41 in Malagasy, and 28 in Irish/Gaeilge.
One of the primary goals of the Indigenous Tweets project is to get people to use their language every day on Twitter and other social media sites. We hope that a few of you who did this for the first time for #imld14 will continue to tweet in your native language and encourage others in your community to do the same.
For additional inspiration, we'll close with a sampling of tweets in a few other languages. Looking forward to an even better turnout for #imld15!!
Nahuatl:
#dilm14 Monequi #Nahuatlahtolli ontla'totiuh telpochmachtilcalco. Yu'quin totelpopochtin a'mo quimpoloz totlamatilizhuan.
— Rodrigo Chacón (@Soyuntamal) February 22, 2014
Manx Gaelic:
@JamysJeheiney s'mie lhiam geaishtagh rish @juliefowlis
#manx #gaelg #kiaull #IMLD
— Chris Williamson (@FeerVaynrey) February 21, 2014
Lezgian:
ВацIун рикIелай булахар фида, гьуьлуьн рикIелай – вацIар #imld14 #Lezgian
— Лезги Лугьунар (@LezgiQuotes) February 21, 2014
Karuk:
. @CASottile @FirstPeoples Nixuti pu'thiinatihar pa'úuhyan ‘peace’ pa nanuhihaak. @JulianKaruk fáat ixuti? #imld14 #Karuk
— Susan Gehr (@vurayav) February 21, 2014
Nez Perce:
núunim héesin titooqatímtki péelleheype híiwes. Our breath is with language everyday. #nezperce #imld14 #risingvoices #liveyourlanguage
— Phil Cash Cash (@weyiiletpu) February 21, 2014
North Sámi:
Odne lea riikkaidgaskasaš eatnigiela beaivi! Lihkku beivviin! #NorthSami (International Mother Language Day 2014) #imld14 @samiallaskuvla
— Jelena Porsanger (@JPorsanger) February 21, 2014
Māori:
Kāore au e whakapākehātia. Mā tēnei mea pea e whakamārama taku kōrero :) http://t.co/cPm1Gmchde #Imld14 #Māori
— K.H. (@landkatia) February 22, 2014
3 comments
Thanks dear Kevin for including the tweet in Lezgian. ^_^
I believe that imld15 will be far better than this year