S.S.E.C EDUCATION DIRECTOR SAYS LANGUAGE IS TREASURE
Solomon Islands has marked the International Mother Language Day on 21st February. Photo: SIBC.
The South Seas Evangelical Church Education Director, Joash Manepuri has said there is so much treasure in our local languages that needs to exploration.
Mr Manepuri made the statement while speaking at the International Mother Language Day marked in Honiara last week.
Attended by literacy groups and members of the Solomon Islands Translation Advisory Group, SITAG, this year’s theme is “Local Languages for Global Citizenship: Spotlight on Science.”
Speaking during the ceremony held at the Solomon Islands National Museum, Mr Manepuri said Solomon Islanders have lots of undiscovered treasure in their local languages.
“We have so much treasure in our languages that we never explore. We just have low self esteem of ourselves even to the point which we think that only English is good, but we forget that how to learn English is if we know ourselves well, then it will be very easy to learn English as well as to learn new things. So if there’s a message that I’d like to share, that’s the message.”
Mr Manepuri adds, it is a misunderstanding to say that our languages are limiting us from advancing further, especially in terms of science.
“Because it is a misunderstanding that our languages are not current, not for scientific knowledge and because of that they are limiting us from advancing, but when in fact it is not because language is our identity.”