{"id":237596,"date":"2016-09-30T06:00:59","date_gmt":"2016-09-29T20:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=237596"},"modified":"2016-09-30T06:00:59","modified_gmt":"2016-09-29T20:00:59","slug":"betances-dont-stranger-homeland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/betances-dont-stranger-homeland\/","title":{"rendered":"Betances: Don\u2019t be a stranger on your homeland"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-237596 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon '>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/betances-dont-stranger-homeland\/cultural-pix-1-2\/'>cultural-pix-1<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-237605'>\n\t\t\t\tDr. Samuel Betances served as the keynote speaker of the second day of the Cultural Heritage Month Symposium held yesterday at the Saipan World Resort. (Erwin Encinares)\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon '>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/betances-dont-stranger-homeland\/cultural-pix-2-2\/'>cultural-pix-2<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-237606'>\n\t\t\t\tStudents of Marianas High School, Kagman High School, and Saipan Southern High School attended the second day of the Cultural Heritage Month Symposium held yesterday at the Saipan World Resort. (Erwin Encinares)\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p>The keynote speaker of Day 2 of the Cultural Heritage Month Symposium held yesterday at the Saipan World Resort talked about the dangers of losing a culture and language and how important these two are in preserving the CNMI\u2019s unique heritage. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe greatest danger, if you do not care for your language and your heritage is that you become a stranger in your own homeland, you become a shadow, instead of the real deal. Humanity is impoverished because every culture and every language has a unique contribution in the fabric of the society. When one culture dies, we impoverish all of humanity, and we can\u2019t let that happen,\u201d said Souder, Betances &amp; Associates Inc. senior diversity consultant and author Dr. Samuel Betances. <\/p>\n<p>He also shared the eternal question plaguing the CNMI. \u201cHow do we learn English, perfect English, embrace English, but at the same time, embrace the language of our heritage so that we can be rooted in our culture and effective in the global economy?\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Betances relayed to the high school students in attendance the significance of language, besides the usual means of communication. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cLanguage identifies us; we belong to a language group. Language is an umbilical cord to culture; it\u2019s what gives continuity to a particular people. Language is a way by which we can also become competent and become educated, because on this island, we need to know more than one language, because language enables us to connect to the world of work as well as our heritage,\u201d said Betances poetically. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cLanguage is the vehicle that allows us to practice cultural sovereignty and personal sovereignty, so that we could be happy with who we are. God does not make junk; sometimes the outsider comes in and tell us, \u2018[English] is better than your language,\u2019 for you, and maybe for business, but not for heritage. So it is important that we understand to appreciate our language that connects us to our culture and how to cross that island-global divide to be effective in the workplace,\u201d added Betances. <\/p>\n<p>First lady Diann Torres shared that the CNMI is slowly creeping up the footsteps of Guam relative to the possible loss of the native tongue. \u201cAs we see today, it really is dying. Guam is doing everything they can to save the language, and we don\u2019t want to get there. We are slowly getting there, but if we start now, we will save it,\u201d said Torres. <\/p>\n<p>The first lady shared that at the Torres residence only Chamorro can be spoken. \u201cHonestly, we try to keep it 100 percent Chamorro at home. When my kids come home from school, they start speaking English and I pretend to not understand them. We constantly remind them to speak Chamorro.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Torres also mentioned that they are trying to make this a family thing. \u201cWe also reach out to our family, my mom, dad, brothers, and sisters, to speak to my kids in Chamorro, and that goes for my nieces and nephews as well.\u201c <\/p>\n<p>Torres said that the symposium is important to the students not only for motivating them to speak the language, but also for getting the full cultural experience that comes with the language. \u201cI think symposiums such as these are important because they don\u2019t get it at home. That\u2019s one thing that I learned yesterday, we do speak Chamorro 100 percent, but what we are lacking at home, is practicing some of these. The little things, like buying the kamyu, and I actually thought about that, have my kids do that, and just experiencing the culture and some practices.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>When asked for her thought on culture and heritage hindering economic growth, Torres responded with, \u201cWe are really just protecting the culture and the language because we do have a lot of influences outside coming in, and we see that growing. If we start now, we\u2019ll save it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The keynote speaker of Day 2 of the Cultural Heritage Month Symposium held yesterday at&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":237605,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[13630,26,51,163],"class_list":["post-237596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","tag-betances-don","tag-cnmi","tag-guam","tag-kids"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=237596"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237596\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/237605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=237596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=237596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=237596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}