Where is Papua New Guinea?

Where is Papua New Guinea?
Papua New Guinea is in Oceana and it occupies the eastern half of the island of New Guinea. Other major islands within Papua New Guinea include New Ireland, New Britain, Manus and Bougainville.
Buka Island on the left                                                                                  Bougainville Island on the right.

Who Goes to Papua New Guinea?

Tourists go to Papua New Guinea to see the festivals put on by the many different cultures that live there. The markets are full of local foods and crafts including traditional carvings and beadwork, traditional and contemporary paintings on canvas and traditionally woven baskets and serving trays. If the variety of flowers and birds weren’t enough, PNG is also known to have one of the healthiest coral reef systems on the planet. Divers come to see the beauty underwater.

Missionaries from various organizations have been bringing the Gospel to coastal groups of Papua New Guinea since the early 1800’s. They did not reach the rugged interior until decades later. People in the highlands, practicing tribal warfare and cannibalism, lived in a world that did not go beyond the next mountain range.

Linguists and Bible Translators of the Summer Institute of Linguistics, now known as SIL International have been going to PNG since the 1950’s. No matter how small the people group, the translators understand the importance of bringing the Gospel to them in their heart language. Read A Hidden People by Lynette Oates. It tells how a remote New Guinea culture, the Binumarien, was brought back from the brink of extinction. Also visit this link to read about this group and others.

http://www.sil.org/silewp/2004/silewp2004-004.htm

Name the Country

Alphabet Museum Celebration

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q63ryaw6OEw

 Representatives from local museums and consulates, met in Waxhaw to celebrate the 20^th anniversary of the Alphabet Museum on October 1st.  Those who attended had the opportunity to learn about the museum’s purpose through a power point presentation, a mono-lingual demonstration; the testimony of  a Gullah speaker, and the presentation of the song “Find Us Faithful” in sign language.  Click on the link above to see the song performed by Pat Missel. 
Psalm 102:18 "Let this be written for a future generation, that a people not yet created may praise the Lord."

A Creole Language

A CREOLE LANGUAGE
The Gullah language, a
creole blend of sailors’
English and African languages,
was born of necessity on
Africa’s Slave Coast, and
developed in the slave
communities of the isolated
plantations of the coastal
South.
People who speak Gullah
sound somewhat like people
who speak Krio, one of the
common languages spoken
among the people of Sierra
Leone, West Africa. The
similarity in the languages is
an example of the connection
between West Africans and the
people from the Sea Islands of
South Carolina and Georgia.
Gullah is a creole form of
English. Like most creoles,
Gullah began as a pidgin
language, transforming into a
language in its own right with
the first generation of Gullah
speakers born in America.
A similar form of plantation
creole may have been
widespread at one time in the
southern United States, but
Gullah now differs from other
African-American dialects
of English. Though creole
languages the world over
appear to share some of their
structure, the speakers of one
creole can seldom understand
speakers of another on first
contact.
Gullah as a language and
a culture has become an
intricate part of the Language
Arts curriculum in the Gullah
Corridor—the area stretching
from Wilmington North
Carolina to St. Augustine,
Florida.
The teaching of Gullah is
seen as a means to bridge
the gap created by the false
impressions that Gullah, the
language, and the culture,
is old fashioned and lacks
authenticity. On the contrary,
use of the Gullah language is a
reliable source of literature for
today’s students.
Through the confidence
gained in the Gullah literacy
program, a quilt maker began
to use the Gullah language as
the medium to describe her
work. Students have begun
to write poems, short stories,
and to write and sing Gullah
music. They have performed
for senior citizens and other
civic groups
The enthusiasm resulting
from the publication of De
Nyew Testament the New
Testament in the Gullah
language, has been a spring
board toward introducing
Gullah as a viable language.
Congressman James E.
Clyburn, Majority Whip
for the U.S. House of
Representatives, took his oath
of office with his hand on
the Gullah New Testament,
which had been presented
to him by Mary E. Ravenell,
international spokesperson for
the Gullah.

EXAMPLES FROM GULLAH LITERATURE

De Gullah Story Book by Ronald Daise “Jes fo dayclean, shree mudfish

nibble on a line.” Just before morning, three mudfish nibbled on his line.

De Nyew Testament John 3:16 “Cause God lob all de people een de wol

sommuch dat e gii we e onliest Son. God sen we um so dat ebrybody wa

bleebe pon um ain gwine dead. Day gwine lib faebamo.” For God so loved

the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in

him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

A Gift from Thailand

This is a gift from my daughter who visited Thailand

It will make a nice addition to the Asia alcove in the Alphabet Museum

Sequoyah, American Alphabet Maker

As we celebrate Freedom we want to remember an American alphabet maker.

He fought on the side of the United States in the war of 1812. Fellow soldiers could write letters home, read military orders, and record events, but he and his Cherokee friends could not.
After the war Sequoyah spent 12 years perfecting the set of symbols that would represent the sounds of his own Cherokee language. Not knowing the sounds which the Roman alphabet represented, many of the letters that you and I know received new “assignments” -- whole syllable sounds in fact.!

There weren’t enough letters in the Roman alphabet to cover all the sounds, so Sequoyah invented more letters to complete the set of 85 symbols. His daughter Ayoka learned to use the symbols and soon thousands of Cherokee Indians became literate.

Unfortunately the Cherokee occupied a vast amount of land in the Southeast that the whites wanted for themselves. “The Trail of Tears” is an appropriate name for the arduous journey they were forced to make westward, resulting in separation from family members, sickness and death. You would think this could have ended Cherokee culture, but the Cherokee found ways to adapt and even prosper.

Many names are mentioned in connection with the translation of the Bible into Cherokee. One interesting note is that John 3 was the first portion of the Bible translated into the Cherokee language in 1824 by a native Cherokee, At-see (also known as John Arch). This paved the way for the American Bible Society edition in 1960. The church ministered to the Indians at the end of the trail of tears. Cherokee Bibles have helped preserve the language.

So the next time you read a letter, e-mail, a text message, or your Bible, give thanks for the freedom to read in your own language. Praise the Lord that the Cherokee have had this opportunity for 150 years.

Join us in Praying for the people groups of the world still waiting for God’s Word in their heart language.

The Superb Korean Alphabet

Prince Ch'ungyon, later named King Sejong, was chosen by his father, not because of age, but because he was the wisest and most capable of his sons.  This is where I begin sharing part a brochure called "The Superb Korean Alphabet" written by Wally Kennicutt for the Museum of the Alphabet in Waxhaw, NC:

King Sejong's first act was to organize the Jade Hall of Scholars. Members of the hall compiled books dealing with history, government and poetry. Sejong believed that part of his responsibility was to train the men who would be capable administrators. For this purpose, he encouraged the spread of learning as widely as possible.


Sejong’s father had established a printing press that used yellow wax to hold type in place. Of course, whenever the wax got soft it allowed the type to slide. Sejong hit on the idea of making copper plates with grooves to hold the type.

Now he faced another problem. At that time, Korean was written in Chinese characters, but the 7,000 symbols of written Chinese made printing difficult. Besides, Korean and Chinese belong to different language families.


The rules of Korean grammar are also different than for Chinese. In a Chinese sentence, the verb comes before the object and preposition (as it does in English); while in Korean the verb comes at the end of the phrase. Written Chinese also includes symbols to distinguish between different sounds, but some of these sounds are not used in Korean.

Sejong became concerned that scholars found it difficult to communicate their ideas. Judges also had problems because “indictments and evidence are incomprehensible.”

The king asked Chinese scholars about developing a modified script for writing Korean, but they ignored him. Sejong decided to develop his own alphabet.

For this purpose, the king asked his advisors to learn all they could about phonetics. Sin Suk-chu took notes and eventually wrote several books on languages. Sang Sammun made thirteen trips to Manchuria to consult the Chinese scholar Huang Chu’an

Buddhist monks from Tibet may also have had a hand in developing the new writing system, but most Koreans say that King Sejong devised the alphabet himself.


The king called his alphabet Humin-chong-um (correct pronunciation of letters for teaching people), but later scholars called it Han-gul (great letters).

In 1940, a copy of Sejong’s book, Explanatory notes on Humin-chong-um came to light. In it the king gave detailed information on how he developed the alphabet. He said he began by considering language as music and isolating the vocal elements. He then modeled the letters on the shapes and functions of the vocal organs. Each letter is a stylized picture of the position of the tongue, teeth or lips, or how the throat would look while pronouncing it.

Each of the eleven vowels of the Korean alphabet represents one sound. The seventeen consonants were classified as cheek-tooth sounds, lip sounds, tooth sounds, throat sounds, semi-tongue sounds and semi-tooth sounds. These 28 letters were later reduced to 24. Sejong grouped letters by syllables to make them easier to read, and perhaps also to make them conform to the system in which Chinese characters are arranged.


Everyone who has studied the Korean alphabet gives it high marks. Its admirers call it “the world’s most scientific system of writing.”

Despite that, many scholars opposed the use of a new alphabet. They said the king’s study of Han-gul took him away from reading Chinese classics, that a new alphabet would prove harmful to the study of Chinese learning, and that it might anger the Chinese emperor.

Besides, it seemed that anything which was so easy to learn must not be of much value.

After Sejong’s death, it looked as though such arguments would put an end to the use of the new alphabet. Women sometimes used Han-gul in personal correspondence, but scholars disdainfully called it “female letters.”

The prejudice against the use of Han-gul started to give way late in the nineteenth century when the Korean government began using it as part of a program of social reform. After World War II, a typewriter using the Korean alphabet was developed and on New Year’s day, 1970, the government of South Korea declared Han-gul the official writing system of the country. North Korea now uses Han-gul exclusively.

Korean linguists are continuing the tradition established by King Sejong through their work with SIL International.

Sejong’s alphabet made it possible for all Koreans to learn to read and write, but some Asian languages have never been written. Who will do for them what Sejong did for Korean?



- Wally Kennicutt

The Museum of the Alphabet

Waxhaw, NC 28173

We enjoyed some special guests from Canada Thursday night .Korean young people participated in the final Jungle Jump-off session for this summer at JAARS   Our neighbor, Dana, modeled a Korean dress for them.