THE MIROMAA WAY

The Miromaa Documentation tree is a way for you to think about your language’s documentation journey. Through this you can pay tribute to those who have come before you, acknowledge all parts of the journey and plan your role in the journey moving forward.

All parts of the tree are important, you can’t have the branches and the leaves without the roots and the trunk.

The following points * the way we look at this tree:

• Everyone has their part on the tree and are part of the history and story that is your language.
• Acknowledge and respect everyone.
• It’s all part of where we are today.
• Remember the good and the bad.
• Those who have fought the hard fight and were punished and not allowed to speak language.
• The generations who because of this have been denied language.
• Those who now want and need language.
• Those who are lucky enough to have the gift of language in their lives.
• The academics, the linguists, the missionaries, the educators all have their place on the tree.
• House this journey, make it visible and be proud.

Once you have done this it’s time to empower YOU. The generation who have inherited this situation and for whom the future now depends.

Miromaa is set up for YOU to now be the custodians, the ones who took the power back and reclaimed the language into community hands.

It’s your turn, you create the new way forward. 

YOUR DOCUMENTATION TREE

Now look at your own language tree, how would you plot the parts of it?

Here is the tree trunk and the roots. Think about where you would put your branches and who would go where.

To help you we’ve provided space some brainstorming exercises below. Once you have completed them, you can put the circles, branches and orders in the trees on the image that just has the trunk.

EXERCISES

1. Your community history
   - Key events effecting your language
   - Key events effecting your community
   Be honest!
   
   
2. Special people you want to acknowledge
   
   
3. The documentation of your language history
   - Names of people and publications
   - Books published and resources developed
   - Studies done
   - Recordings made