Garifuna Language for Beginners (Purchase a copy for $10.95)
Mabuiga (Welcome)!
Garifuna is a language spoken by the Garinagu people that now live in Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and the United States of America. The Garinagu people were originally exiled in the 1800’s by the English settlers near the Central American coast. Groups of them later worked their way to the various countries mentioned above. The Garinagu people brought with them their culture including their language. As our lives progress in various countries, and our need for assimilation increases, we are simultaneously losing our language. Many of us have not spent time teaching our children the native dialect. As our children become aware of their identities, they hunger to learn the language. That is the reason I am now writing “Garifuna for Beginners”.
Garifuna is an indigenous language that originated in the Caribbean. It is a language that originated from the Arawak and Carib Indians and has evolved as the Indians mixed with Africans that intermingled in the community in the early 1700’s. Over the last ten years the Garifuna language has started to become lost. One of the reasons why this loss has come about is because the second generation Garinagu have not passed the language on to their children.
