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As our world grows smaller, it is becoming more homogenous. Whether that can be attributed to mass media and/or careless disregard or intentional extermination of cultures and languages, the purpose of WHAT MAKES US HUMAN is not to address the underlying reasons behind extinction, but to raise the alarm that it’s happening and to celebrate and promote that rich diversity before it is lost. The UN General Assembly declared the decade from 2022-2032 as the International Decade of Indigenous Languages. And this book, published in partnership with UNESCO, urges kids to consider how important language and cultural diversity is, and how many are becoming extinct like endangered species.
The narrative starts out as a mystery, a mask poem, where the narrator leads the reader on, describing its various attributes, but not revealing what it actually is until the very end of the book.
I have been around for a very long time.
Longer than toys, dogs, or anyone you know.
In the next spread, the narrator adds another clue.
My roots go back many centuries.
Some of them even longer.
Now, I must mention the gorgeous illustrations. Amazing art that was featured at the 2023 Bologna Book Fair “Beauty and the World” exhibition. I think that the one shown below is a favorite, although it was hard to choose just one.
I can show you love. But also hurt you.
The narrative is a marvelous guessing game that will keep readers engaged and turning the page. There’s also a spread moving from infancy to old age that nearly brought me to tears, as language can unravel in those who struggle with various kinds of dementia. And the spread about children’s books is magnificent!!! So movingly and creatively illustrated, that I want to give special kudos to the illustrator. As I said, it was hard to pick a favorite!
The author has a PhD in Linguistics, and adds additional factual details about languages in an author/illustrator note at the end. UNESCO also includes a paragraph about languages as well. And I appreciate that part of the author’s royalties will be donated to organizations that work to preserve and revitalize world languages.
This fabulous book releases on March 4, 2024, so you still have time to preorder!
Activities:
Watch these videos by HiHo Kids, featuring children sharing their languages.
Make up your own word for a strong feeling you get by hearing something, eating something, or seeing something, and use your made-up word in a poem or paragraph. See if others can guess the meaning of the word in context. Get ideas from these non-English words for feelings that can’t be translated into a single word in English.
Pair this book with Du Iz Tak? by Carson Ellis and talk about how language can be understood through context and visual clues.
Title: What Makes Us Human
Author: Victor D.O. Santos
Illustrator: Anna Forlati
Publisher: Eerdmans Books for Young Readers
Ages: Pre-k through elementary
Themes: language, culture, diversity
For more perfect picture book recommendations, please visit Susanna Hill’s website.