Originally semi-nomadic, the Kusunda lived in the jungles of west Nepal until the middle of the 20th Century, hunting birds and monitor lizards, and trading yams and meat for rice and flour in nearby towns. I think it is very important for me, and others, to protect this language." "I used to listen to other, like Tharus and Magars, speaking their language, and wonder what it would be like to converse in my mother tongue. ![]() "But I am proud to know Kusunda now, even though I didn't learn it from birth. "Before coming to school in Dang, I didn't know any Kusunda language," she says. She now is able to speak it at a basic level. Hima, originally from the rural Pyuthan district bordering Dang, has been learning Kusunda for two years. In the last decade, as the government of Nepal has launched schemes to help Nepal's indigenous groups, it has also begun paying for Hima and other Kusunda children from remote areas to board at Mahindra High School in Dang – sometimes as much as a 10-hour drive away – where they are also being taught their native language. It is here the Language Commission of Nepal has been running Kusunda classes since 2019 in an effort to preserve the language. ![]() Today, most live in west Nepal's Dang district, a sleepy region of yellow mustard fields and misty, wooded hills. The Kusunda are highly marginalised and impoverished within Nepali society. ![]() But only one woman, 48-year-old Kamala Khatri, is known to be fluent. According to the latest Nepali census data from 2011, there are 273 Kusunda remaining.
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