Amazon backs down over Cornish-language children's book

Kindle publisher reverses refusal to handle Cornish text, amid global battle to protect minority languages

by: Alison Flood

With more than 40% of the world's estimated 7,000 languages "endangered and at risk of extinction", an army of tiny publishers is fighting an unsung battle to save them. UK press Diglot Books is one of them, and this week took on the might of Amazon to get its Cornish children's story out to readers.


Told by the internet giant that Matthew and the Wellington Boots (Matthew ha'n Eskisyow Glaw in Cornish, or Kernewek) would not be made available through Kindle Direct Publishing because it was in a language that is "not currently supported" by the platform, Diglot petitioned the retailer.

Director Alison O'Dornan said it did so "on the basis that our title was actually bilingual and that the Cornish translation had been checked by an examiner for the Cornish Language Board, and also that the alphabet was the same as English so there were no extra characters needed". When this had no effect, she turned to social media for support.

"The great news is that Amazon have indeed backed down after the support that we have generated, and have now agreed to publish the Cornish title," said O'Dornan, who hailed it as a testament to the power of social media in "allowing a minnow such as ourselves to change the minds of a big company".

O'Dornan added that KDP's official statement about the decision was: "The book is in a language that is not currently supported by Kindle Direct Publishing. At this time, you can upload and sell books in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish, Catalan, Galician, and Basque to customers worldwide in the Kindle Store. We're working to add more languages to this list in the future."

"It is a surprisingly short list of languages and doesn't even include Welsh," said O'Dornan.

Amazon did not respond to a request for comment, but Matthew and the Wellington Boots is now for sale as an ebook via Amazon and Apple – where it has already received two five-star reviews, one in Cornish.

"When Matthew bounces down the stairs in a rush to play in the garden with his best friend Diglot, he discovers it is raining outside. Oh no! How can he play with his digger, ride his bicycle, or swing on his swing if everything is all wet?" runs the English text. In its Cornish translation from translator Stephen Gadd, this becomes: "Pan aslamm Matthew an grisyow war-nans yn uskis rag gwari y'n lowarth gans y goweth gwella, Diglot, ev a dhiskudh hy bos ow kul glaw. Ogh na! Fatel yll ev gwari gans y jynn-palas, diwrosa po leska war y lesk mars yw puptra glyb?"

Around 500 people cited Cornish as their main language in the 2011 census, which places the language as "endangered" on the Catalogue of Endangered Languages, a global collaborative project to preserve languages. Diglot believes it is vital to protect it.

"From a cultural perspective the existence of its own language adds considerable weight to the feeling of a cultural identity to Cornish people, and according to Cornwall councillor Bert Biscoe, a member of the Cornish Language Partnership, 'If you're looking at Cornwall's distinctiveness, its brand in the future world of trade and so forth, having something that distinguishes and defines our brand like a living language is very important'," said O'Dornan.

She feels the best way to breathe life into Cornish is through children. "The key to truly reviving the language is clearly with the younger generation and bilingual books are a fantastic way to achieve this as they are easily accessible to both parents and children alike," she said.

The importance of stepping in to preserve minority languages has been recognised by Unesco, which argues that that their disappearance "is neither inevitable nor irreversible". Its Endangered Languages Programme aims to demonstrate its belief that "well-planned and implemented language policies can bolster the ongoing efforts of speaker communities to maintain or revitalise their mother tongues and pass them on to younger generations".

The Alaskan language Tlingit is listed as being "critically endangered", with an ethnic population of only 400 people. But that didn't deter the small Alaskan publisher Hazy Island Books from publishing the first ever children's book in the language. "Clearly, if the language is to continue to live and breathe, it must find a way to take its nourishment from the here and now," said publisher Liz Dodd, releasing The Story of the Town Bear and the Forest Bear, or Aanka Xóodzi ka Aasgutu Xóodzi Shkalneegi, in 2011.

Dodd said this week that the book had been distributed to 700 students in South East Alaska, Yukon and British Columbia, and another 200 have been sold in bookstores and online. Hazy Island was hoping to extend its reach by making an iPad app of it. "A few years ago things looked very bad for Tlingit. All the elders were dying off, but I went to a clan conference about a year ago and there were all these young Tlingit speakers, who speak a half-and-half language," she said.

Back in the UK, independent press Francis Boutle is on a mission to protect the lesser used languages of Europe, releasing titles in everything from Manx to Occitan – and Cornish.

Publisher Clive Boutle said: "Although there is a surprising amount of interest in minority and regional languages – for some, like the Norman languages of the Channel Islands, the interest may be too little, too late. Even Welsh, which is widely spoken, may have reached a tipping point in its heartlands.

"In France the situation is perhaps worse than in the UK, with regional languages not recognised by the French government, the only one not to have signed the European Charter for Regional and Minority Languages. Occitan, the language of the troubadours, is greatly endangered as it slips from everyday use in Provence, Gascony and the Languedoc. My aim is not just to record these languages as they pass, but to provide a platform for their revival."

He added: "While so much good work is being done by small publishers in the area of minority languages, it is disturbing that so much power over the distribution of books is concentrated in the hands of Amazon, who also own Abebooks, Kindle, and now, GoodReads.
"It is not surprising that they don't recognise or value languages like Cornish, which don't represent significant market opportunities – that's money! A small victory may have taken place with Amazon's change of heart over Matthew and the Wellington Boots, but in the long run Amazon are the mortal enemies of diversity. Publishers use them at your peril."

from: Guardian