Tejemet Nusan (which is Nawat for “Us Too”) is a new adult language program commencing in 2004, promoted by IRIN (the Nawat Language Recovery Initiative). Inspired and encouraged by the initial success of the Nawat school textbook project, Tejemet Nusan will differ from and complement the Universidad Don Bosco project by attracting the adult population of the Pipil region to the Nawat language, and helping to make Nawat available and accessible to the general public through the organisation of practical language courses at community level.

The promoters of this program feel that while it is right to place children at the centre of the language recovery plan, there are also adults who would like to learn (or remember) Nawat if given the opportunity, and that they too – or rather “We Too” – should be catered to, not within the children’s project itself, but as a parallel track within the language recovery movement.

Tejemet Nusan believes that once the local demand for adult Nawat courses in Pipil localities has been researched and ‘marketed’, it should be possible to make such courses available to members of the public for a modest fee adjusted to the local economic situation. Priority will be given to a model in which courses are organised, and if possible funded, as local community initiatives, while TN provides orientation, technical support, teaching materials, didactic assessment, evaluation and certification. Since TN needs to be self-financing to be viable, its costs will need to be covered by other funding sources, such as subsidies or sponsorships on a local or course-by-course basis.

As far as possible, TN also hopes that the Nawat instructors can come from the communities where the courses are given. This means that Tejemet Nusan, like the school textbook project, needs to develop a teacher training program to produce language instructors. It should be possible to share resources with the textbook project, and perhaps offer a joint training program.

At present there is no specific Nawat textbook for adult learners, but TN plans to produce one in the medium term, following a methodology similar to that implemented in Ne Nawat, Tutaketzalis, the school textbook series.

Cecilia de Méndez is the coordinator of Tejemet Nusan. The first adult Nawat courses under the scheme are programmed for early to mid 2004, depending on the availability of funding.

Cecy de Méndez, TIT assistant