26154: Walton: (Project ) Educating Haiti's Children - Will they still b e "Haitian?" (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: "Walton, Robert" <robert.walton3@us.army.mil>

Be warned- This is more than "just talking about Haiti's problems."  The
project needs the  time and effort of those among you possessing certain
skills and background, not your money.  The rest of the good news is, you
can "do it from home!")

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Background- (The next two paragraphs are for those of you "just tuning in."

Thesis/Overview. The problem of  obtaining children's books in Creole is
real. As a result, literacy in  Creole will continue to suffer.  Translating
commonly published English- or French-language children's books into Creole
likely violates copyright and teaches nothing of Haitian cultural values,
history  or folklore.  I believe a commercial venture is all but out of the
question- the market that needs the books cannot afford to pay for  them.

Haitian folklore (oral tradition),history, child-level morality tales,
etc., could be desk-top published as monographs and pamphlets, illustrated
appropriately (hopefully by localHaitian artists), duplicated on a copy
machine and bound by staples.  (These would placed in the public  domain so
copyright woud not be an issue.)  There are "universal  novels and readings"
in the public domain that could also be translated and  republished
inexpensively.
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It has been all too often the case that Western missionaries, NGOs and
individuals, intent on "uplifting a people" they view as "disadvantaged,"
replace or attempt to replace a native culture or religion with their own.
This unfortunate tradition continued in Haiti when they undertook the
education of Haitian children- denigrating or removing cultural referents,
history, heroes and use of the native language from school curricula.  When
there are few if any educational materials available in the native language,
this process accelerates.  Haitian de-culturization occurs when reading
skills and religion are taught to children (and adults) from King James
texts written in Creole and Creole language children's texts pertaining to
Voudon are not made available.  Haitian children, schooled using French and
English reading materials do not become literate in Creole, their native
tongue and are unlikely to learn their history from their own cultural
perspective.

Those of you who share a vision of providing Haitian culture-based and would
collaborate in the production of Creole-language childen's reading materials
based on Haitian cultural concepts, folklore, Voudon religion, history,
morality, etc. are welcome to join this project and its email string.
Given the impending hiatus of the Corbett list, I recommend we communicate
by private email, adding adding his/her address as an email recipient.  I've
established  <mailto:robert-walton@excite.com> robert-walton@excite.com for
the purpose of this project and ask that you respond to me at that address.

Initially the project will involve:

1. Establishing a list/network of recipients: schools or individual teachers
in Haiti that will use the materials and perhaps duplicate and redistribute
them to other schools and teachers.

2. Selecting suitable texts and monographs (short essays, culturally
relevant children's stories, articles on Voudon, history, government and
statesmanship, folk-heroes, folklore, patriotic and character-building
stories etc. for translation into Creole.

This may include (a) obtaining a license to use a desirable existing
copyrighted work from the copyright owner (b) selecting existing appropriate
public domain materials (short stories, songs and articles on which the
copyright does not exist (see The Kids on the Web: Children's Books at
http://www.zen.org/~brendan/kids-lit.html
<http://www.zen.org/~brendan/kids-lit.html>  ) (c) authoring materials for
this project.

3. Translating the material into the Creole language, with verbiage and
structure suitable for children.

I am not skilled in "K through 3" or elementary education and I will happily
defer to any team member who is a K-3/elementary school educator on the
following-  I foresee a need for graded reading materials that teach (1)
Creole reading and writing skills (2) the subject matter, itself. To get
this project off the ground (unless we can get the assistance of team
members who are Creole-literate K-3/elementary teachers of reading) I
recommend our products be geared to children who already possess minimal
(3rd - 5th grade???) reading skills with some consideration for producing an
heavilly illustrated book to teach Creole phonetics (letter and word
recognition).

4. Editing the the draft Creole (word-processed) products to ensure correct
orthography, grammar and syntax.

5. Obtaining photographs/artwork to illustrate and enliven the
content/subject matter.

5. Producing an illustrated desktop products in sufficient quantity to
distribute to recipients who may further duplicate and distribute them for
free or at cost.

IMHO, we need help from -

1. People with  Haitian -  university (School of Education) connections who
could contact the school's Haitian student association for assistance with
translations, editing and/or desktop publishing.

2. People who can take photos/digital images or prepare drawings that
support/illustrate text content.

3. People who can translate/edit existing works into correct Creole or
compose works in correct Creole and provide their products to an
editor/desktop publisher.

4. Folks who own copyright to materials dealing with Haitian folklore,
Voudon, etc, who would license their products for this?


V/R

Bob  Walton


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