Revising Rural Indian Cultures

An indigenous minority, the Adivasis, of Gujarat have commenced various projects to enliven and document unwritten rural languages that have never before been recorded. This New York Times article explains the importance of this action in a time when Hindi and English dominate as pathways to “modern” identity. The Adivasi Academy, a school created to reposition local thought on the value of heritage, actively works to keep languages and lifestyles of rural India alive through their various projects. One of the vital tasks of the Acedemy’s pupils is to create dictionaries for languages that have never had them before. The most interesting aspect is that the area’s youth, who typically flock to metropoles, have changed concepts of rural culture and increasingly show signs of appreciation for it through endeavors to keep it alive in the public memory.