Wales is embarking on a year of listening to other languages. Gwrando, led by Wales Arts International (the international agency of Arts Council of Wales) and supported by Welsh Government, seizes the first year of the UN Decade of Indigenous Languages as an opportunity to nurture the art of listening.
There will be a programme of activity taking place across this first year of Gwrando including opportunities for artists and audiences to take part.
In this short conversation starter, poet Mererid Hopwood identifies that at the core of the Welsh word for listening – Gwrando – is ‘daw’, that comes from ‘dawelwch / tawelwch / silence’. In Welsh the sense of being still and being silent is at the core of listening.
Mererid’s piece is a call to listen to the linguistic landscape of the world and makes a deliberate connection between language and the environment. The suggestion is that it’s time to listen to the diversity of languages for the same benefits that we’re now beginning to appreciate in appreciating the diversity of the species of our natural world.
Mwynhewch y Gwrando. Enjoy Listening.
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