Contextual literature in Mising and Assamese

Established in 2017, The Hummingbird School was born out of the hope of providing quality education in the flood-affected village of Kulamua, in collaboration with 19 other villages in Majuli, Assam. The foundation of the school reflects the strength and resilience of these flood-prone villages, where the community came together to donate the land, and bamboo, and to build the initial infrastructure of the school. Now it stands as a beacon of hope amidst the challenges of the region, nurturing the dreams of over 300 children.

In striving to understand what contextual education could look like for a rural, underserved, tribal community which has been geographically and socially isolated, the school hopes to transform the lives of the children through an education which allows them more choice and freedom to build a dignified life for themselves as well as for their community.

Ayang Trust, a registered social purpose organization runs the school. It works toward bridging gaps in primary education through teacher development programs and community libraries.

Additionally, they support women artisans and landless farmers, through collectivization, capacity-building programs and market linkages to help them achieve economic independence and resilience in the face of adversities.

Ayang Trust works to uplift and support the rural and underserved communities of Northeast India, fostering a sense of hope and possibility amidst challenging circumstances.

Working as educators in a tribal village in Majuli, Assam, led us to think about what meaningful education would look like in our context. We ventured into translating and creating original texts in Mishing and Assamese to cater to the needs of children we serve. Most of the children coming to the Hummingbird School belong to the Mishing community and speak in Mishing at home.

However, Mishing had predominantly remained an oral language till the community adopted the Roman script in 1972. Since then, much effort has gone into development of the language and literary works being produced in Mishing.But the presence of Mishing texts catering to young children at libraries in schools or otherwise is close to nil. Standing in a crucial time, where languages like English and Hindi (as linkages to the market economy and social mobility) threaten to obliterate languages like Mishing, we feel the need to act.

The world has marched forward into being ‘print-centric’. Developing readership in a language is crucial. The youth struggle to read texts available in Mishing, as such opportunities don’t present themselves early on. As Assamese, Hindi and English dominate the language arena in schools, Mishing youth struggle to express complex ideas in Mishing and often lean on Assamese and Hindi to get their thoughts across.

Members of our community share that they had no access to texts written in Mishing while they were growing up. Having to read, write and communicate only in the state language was challenging. It posed a constant obstacle in understanding and learning concepts in different subjects. There’s ample research to support the crucial role that mother-tongue instruction plays in a child’s language and cognitive development. NCF 2022 recommends it as the primary medium of instruction for children till eight years of age.

This gave rise to the pressing need for creating titles for early readers to engage with. While the landscape of children’s literature in India is shaping up dramatically with the availability of high quality, and a diverse variety of texts in English and Hindi, other regional languages struggle to catch up.

Having been an oral language, Mishing has a rich collection of practices, songs, poems, and lore that are central to the community’s history, culture and identity. We believe that texts are needed not just to expose them to the Mishing script early on, but to represent their identity, reality and experiences which feel closer to home and for the reader to discover the joy of finding themselves in it.

The expressions and experiences that are embodied in a language are sometimes unique to what one encounters in that region and context. The Mishing community holds a body of rich indigenous knowledge in their collective memory. Documenting it is the only way to save it from from oblivion with the passage of time.

Being situated at the heart of a Mishing community, we feel that the Mishing language should find space within the schools for expression and engagement. It’s an uphill fight for equal status of languages and that one shouldn’t have to feel that other languages supersede their own.

We, at Hummingbird School, are committed to creating a multilingual environment where children receive exposure to Assamese, English and Mishing at the same time and acquire all the three with ease early on. While it’s easier said than done, creating original as well as translated titles and placing them within the reach of children would bring us closer to our vision.

We began this journey in 2022 with Eklavya Foundation as our partner in producing translated titles in Mishing and Assamese. We translated 12 titles catering to different age-groups of children. What made this beginning a memorable one was that we were able to involve middle school students of Hummingbird School to take part in the translation workshop.

The team involved students as well as teachers who worked together in translating these titles. The joy of being able to express and read in one’s own language enlivened the teachers and students alike. A popular Rajasthani folktale ‘Khichdi’ was translated into ‘Purang-Pitang’ in Mishing. It was one of the most exciting translations as word-play was central to the text’s humor and plot. Being able to contextually adapt that into Mishing was a moment of joy and pride for the entire team.

The selection of books for translation were guided by themes challenging gender roles and stories set in a rural context. We also chose books that might appeal to different age groups of children. The hope is to eventually build a repertoire of texts that caters to a wide range of readers.

The excitement led to taking on the challenge of producing original titles in the following year, along with a few more translations. For months, our team members spent time in the community collecting folktales from the elders of the village. They also observed young children at play, to record the gamesongs they sang.

This resulted in two books called ‘Rinjangjang’ and ‘Ikut Bikut Chikut’ in Mishing and Assamese respectively. Children from grades 6th to 9th from Hummingbird School illustrated both of these game-song books. The delightful game-songs are quite popular among young children. One would often hear them singing together in groups.

We also produced two folktales in the form of picture books called ‘Tamuli Takom’ and ‘Baak’ in Mishing and Assamese respectively. These were illustrated by Pankaj Saikia. He brought the characters to life through his vivid illustrations.

However, our journey was not without its struggles. One of the difficulties we faced was to arrive at a common understanding of what it meant to translate a text and how word to word translation could lead to complete loss of meaning. On the other hand, many of the texts demanded one to be creative to be able to retain the lyricism of the original work.

A seemingly simple text called ‘The three friends’ by Indu Harikumar presented us with such a challenge. It pushed our team to think about how to keep the soul of the text alive.

We faced a similar challenge while translating a Bundelkhandi folktale ‘What a Song’ by Jitendra Thakur, in coming up with appropriate, rhyming sounds which would appeal to the reader in context!

Translating ‘Cheenta’, a book by Soumya Menon, also led to interesting insights. While translating, we had to pay close attention to the subtle nuance in the gender of the ant and the role it carried out, which, if overlooked, would take away from the poem’s central idea.

While translating, one could end up explaining what is going on instead of leaving it for the reader to discover. To restrain oneself from telling one’s understanding to retaining the flavor of the original text was a difficult ask from first time translators.

Contextualizing and modifying the texts to suit our readers was also challenging. One had to be mindful of the illustrations as well as of the overarching plot so that one is able to change a few aspects without compromising the original work. With the author’s permission, we changed the names of a few characters in some texts and even altered the names of fruits in a few cases with the hope that the reader would find it more relatable. One also had to understand the nature of the text and where it would be inappropriate to contextualize, for example, in the case of a non-fiction work.

As the literary world is expanding into different styles of storytelling and a boarder use of language in written work, one is faced with challenges in terms of word-choice to sentence structure. Is one to use a more colloquial word or to function within the precincts of a standardized form of what has been permissible in written work for ages?

Even when we moved on to developing original texts based on folktales collected from the community, we were faced with many conflicting questions. Do we wish to stick to the folktale as it is, or do we want to modify parts of it in keeping with the evolving times? These dilemmas led to many spirited debates, arguments and discussions to reach an understanding that was agreeable to all.

Getting the original titles illustrated was no simple task. One had to work closely with the illustrator to help bring out contextual nuances. For example, in ‘Baak’, the kind of fishing net we wanted our illustrator to draw was specific to what one would find in Majuli. Attention to detail in every aspect with regard to context, colloquial expressions, representing gender and identity was crucial in developing these texts.

Every time, a new title is published, and it arrives at school, the excitement among children spreads like wildfire. We see young children of grade 3 or 4 trying to read many of these titles to each other on their own. These texts also find their way into the classrooms. Children thoroughly enjoy these being read to them.

All these titles are also made available in the 39 community libraries that our organization Ayang Trust supports and works with. Our library facilitators conduct various activities like Read Aloud to share the stories with the children who visit the libraries. To support children in recognizing the Mishing script, they conduct some sound-symbol association activities as well.

One of our library facilitators, Rakesh, shares, “When the new books in Mishing arrived, the children were so happy and excited to see them. Even though they were unable to read, the children tried to engage with it. They would also request to listen to the stories again and again. Earlier when Mishing books were not available, engagement with Assamese books posed some challenges in comprehension and marred the joy of listening to the stories unhindered. In a year’s time, now many of them can read short texts on their own.”

Children issue these books from the library and take them back to their homes. They share these story books with their parents and grandparents, who in turn tell them more stories that they remember. When the children come back, they bring back new stories and songs to share in the library space.

In the communities which are predominantly Mishing, the members ask for more books in Mishing and eagerly look forward to engaging with them. The engagement of the youth and other community members have also increased since the arrival of Mishing books. Rakesh beams with pride as he holds up the text and says, “We are proud to share our stories!”

Now, going forward, we are working on a few original titles in Mishing, keeping the early years in mind, so that we can plant the seeds of reading early on. We hope that the voices of this community travel far and wide and become a luminous presence in the world of print. Creating this body of text, especially for children in Mishing, is going to be a long and arduous journey which we are committed to undertake.