Bolivia's Aymara Language Set for Official Facebook Status

[Judi Lynn]

Bolivia's Aymara Language Set for Official Facebook Status



Aymara translators hard at work at their office in La Paz

Since 2012 a group of volunteers have been translating almost 27,000 words from Spanish into Aymara. They hope to finish by Christmas so Facebook can designate it as an official language.


For three years a small group of volunteers have given up their time at least once or twice a month to take part in an ambitious and unique project. Camped out in a small office in El Alto, a sprawling city near La Paz, members of Jaqi Aru, which means language of the people, spend hours on their life’s work.

And that is a passion for translating Spanish words into Aymara, one of Bolivia’s thirty six native languages. Aymara is the second most common language spoken by Bolivians and it is also designated as “vulnerable” according to UNESCO.

The aim is to get Facebook to recognize it as a formal language option but in order to do that they have to translate thousands of words into Aymara for the social network.

More:
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Bolivias-Aymara-Language-Set-for-Official-Facebook-Status-20151002-0021.html

[Fred Sanders]

1. Socialism sweeping South America has to be a true capitalist's worst nightmare - other than Cuba

having proven to have done just fine without the benefit of greed as a creed, and with an elephant's foot on it's throat the whole time.