Indigenous Languages and Climate Change

February 21, 2025

Important Intersection Ahead
Indigenous Languages and Climate Change 

As the Indigenous lands of the Bosawás, Nicaragua are increasingly encroached upon by non-Indigenous settlers, maintaining and preserving ancestral knowledge, cultural practices, and Miskito and Mayagna mother tongue languages is challenged. Embedded in Indigenous knowledge and language is a connection to land, embracing a responsibility to ecological stewardship and biodiversity protection, and finding balance with all beings. And while the ability to rely on traditional knowledge and agricultural practices is also threatened by climate change impacts – more frequent floods, hurricanes, and crop failures – Indigenous languages hold knowledge of sustainable resource management, environmental stewardship, and adaptive strategies and perspectives.

However, without written documentation, language and Indigenous knowledge preservation in the Bosawás is at risk — at the mercy of oral transmission, diluted over time as more dominant languages and cultures threaten their continued conveyance, and as urban migration increases, resulting in a decline in mother tongue language fluency.

Our partnership with The Ărramăt Project made space this past year to safeguard against language scarcity in the Bosawás. On front porches, in community meetings, and through one-on-one interviews, elders and community sages have contributed to the creation of resources to serve local schools and communities, to fill the void of written and digital documentation of the mother tongue languages in danger of extinction.

Embedded within language is the environmental knowledge of generations of land stewards who have adapted to, and continue to show resilience in the face of, the changing climate. As the world faces climate uncertainty, protection of this knowledge to complement scientific approaches to climate adaptation is of paramount importance —  balancing both core values and new ideas.

Here we are at the intersection of Indigenous languages and knowledge and climate change. Let’s slow down. Look both ways. Proceed with care.

Mother Tongue for Conservation of Mother Earth
A Partnership with the Ărramăt Project

The Ărramăt Project based at the University of Alberta, is a Team of Indigenous organizations, governments, university researchers, and resource people working together to develop a strong voice for protecting the environment in ways that strengthen the capacity of Indigenous Peoples to document their knowledge. The project supports Indigenous-Led research initiatives that study the relationship between the environment and the health and well-being of communities and Indigenous Peoples worldwide.

With support from The Ărramăt Project, Change for Children has been working with Miskito and Mayagna communities and in alliance with the local Indigenous Territorial Government in the Bosawás in a collective effort to develop mother-tongue education resources. The resources will enable students to learn to read and write their Indigenous language and serve to preserve local Indigenous Knowledge critical to mitigating the impacts of climate change and fostering sustainable local development.

Bosawas Central America and the Caribbean Climate Change Education In The Field Indigenous Peoples Nicaragua