1.
George Simon (artist and archaeologist)
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George Simon is a Lokono Arawak artist and archaeologist from Guyana. He is the founder and mentor of the Lokono Artists Group, Simon is widely regarded as one of the leading Guyanese artists of his generation, and his paintings are notable for their explorations of Amerindian culture and the Guyanese environment. He has also recognized for his achievements as an educator, his efforts to develop opportunities for Amerindian artists in Guyana. George Simon was born on 23 April 1947 to Olive and Mark Simon in St. Cuthberts Mission on the Mahaicony River in British Guiana and his father was a woodcutter, and his mother was a housewife. Simon attended school at St Cuthberts Mission up until the age of 12, when he was 12 years old, Simon was adopted by James William Pink - an English Anglican priest who was serving in the Mahaica-Berbice region at that time. He subsequently moved with his foster-father to Linden and then to Georgetown, in 1970, Simon and his foster-father moved to Essex, England. From 1972 to 1974 Simon studied A-level Art at Thurrock and Basildon College in Grays, in 1975, he enrolled at the University of Portsmouth where he studied for a BA in fine art, with a special focus on art history and 19th-century art. He graduated with honours in 1978, in 1978, Simon returned to Guyana and began working as a lecturer in art at the Burrowes School of Art, and then at the University of Guyana. Simon worked at the Walter Roth Museum until 1992, and it was during this time that he began his training in archaeology and anthropology, as part of his work at the Walter Roth Museum, Simon took part in numerous anthropological expeditions to various parts of Guyana. These expeditions had a impact on his life and his artistic development. Shortly after joining the Walter Roth Museum, Simon was asked to lead an expedition to a Wai-Wai community in the south of Guyana, the expedition stayed at the Wai-Wai village of Sheparyimo for a month, conducting anthropological work among the community. Many of the expeditions in which Simon took part involved journeys on the Essequibo River and he also spoke more generally of the way in which all of the expeditions in which he took part transformed his perspective and particularly his relationship to Amerindian culture in Guyana. He explained that prior to this period he had traveled very little in Guyana, and had felt partially cut off from people and his work at the Walter Roth Museum, therefore, enabled him to be reunited with people and to explore his Amerindianness. During these years, Simon also worked hard to improve the training, concerned about Amerindians from his village not going very far in their education, Simon founded a drawing and design workshop in St Cuthberts mission in August 1988. The workshop fostered a number of talents who have since achieved artistic recognition in their own right, including Oswald Hussein, Roaland Taylor. These artists - including Simon - are known collectively as the Lokono Artists Group, in February 1991, Simon organised an exhibition of his own work along with the work of nine other artists from the Lokono Artists Group at the Hadfield Foundation. The exhibition was entitled Contemporary Amerindian Art, Contemporary Amerindian Art launched a tradition of exhibitions of Amerindian art that are organised most years as part of Amerindian Heritage Month. In 1992, Simon returned to England to study for an MA in Field, Simon completed the MA in 1994, when he returned to Guyana
2.
Lokono
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The Lokono or Arawak are an Arawak people native to northern coastal areas of South America. Today, approximately 10,000 Lokono live primarily along the coasts and rivers of Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname and they speak the Arawak language, the eponymous language of the Arawakan family. Historically, the group self-identified as Arawak, which became the usual name outsiders called them. Subsequent scholars shortened this convention to simply Arawak, thereby causing confusion with the mainland people, in the 20th century, scholars such as Irving Rouse began using the older term Taíno for the Caribbean group to distinguish them from mainlanders. The mainland Arawak also call themselves Lokono, this has more common in scholarly literature as well. The Arawakan languages may have emerged in the Orinoco River Valley, the group that self-identified as the Arawak or Lokono settled the coastal areas of what is now Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana, and parts of the island of Trinidad. While the Spanish were quick to colonize the Caribbean, the Lokono, the Spanish were unable to subdue them throughout the 16th century. Subsequently, the Lokono engaged in trading relationships with the Europeans, however, economic and social changes in the region in the early 19th century, including the end of the plantation economy, affected the Lokono negatively, and their population began to decline. In the 20th century, the Lokomo began to supplement their agricultural economy by selling fish and lumber and through migrant labor. There are approximately 10,000 Lokono living in Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana, and thousands of others with Lokono ancestry
3.
Guyana
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Guyana, officially the Co-operative Republic of Guyana, is a sovereign state on the northern mainland of South America. It is, however, included in the Caribbean Region due to its cultural, historical. Guyana is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north, Brazil to the south and southwest, Suriname to the east, with 215,000 square kilometres, Guyana is the fourth-smallest country on mainland South America after Uruguay, Suriname and French Guiana. The region known as the Guianas consists of the large landmass north of the Amazon River. Originally inhabited by indigenous groups, Guyana was settled by the Dutch before coming under British control in the late 18th century. It was governed as British Guiana, with mostly a plantation style economy until the 1950s and it gained independence in 1966, and officially became a republic within the Commonwealth of Nations in 1970. The legacy of British rule is reflected in the political administration and diverse population, which includes Indian, African, Amerindian. Guyana is the only South American nation in which English is the official language, the majority of the population, however, speak Guyanese Creole, an English-based creole language, as a first language. In addition to being part of the Anglophone Caribbean, Guyana is one of the few Caribbean countries that is not an island in the West Indies, CARICOM, of which Guyana is a member, is headquartered in Guyanas capital and largest city, Georgetown. In 2008, the joined the Union of South American Nations as a founding member. The name Guyana is derived from Guiana, the name for the region that formerly included Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, Guyana is derived from an Indigenous Amerindian language, there are nine indigenous tribes residing in Guyana, the Wai Wai, Macushi, Patamona, Lokono, Kalina, Wapishana, Pemon, Akawaio and Warao. Historically the Lokono and Kalina tribes dominated Guyana, although Christopher Columbus sighted Guyana during his third voyage, the Dutch were the first to establish colonies, Essequibo, Berbice, and Demerara. After the British assumed control in 1796, the Dutch formally ceded the area in 1814, in 1831 the three separate colonies became a single British colony known as British Guiana. Since its Independence in 1824 Venezuela has claimed the area of land to the west of the Essequibo River, in 1899 an international tribunal ruled the land belonged to Great Britain. Guyana achieved independence from the United Kingdom on 26 May 1966 and became a republic on 23 February 1970, the US State Department and the US Central Intelligence Agency, along with the British government, played a strong role in influencing political control in Guyana during this time. The American government supported Forbes Burnham during the years of independence because Cheddi Jagan was identified as a Marxist. In 1978, Guyana received international notice when 918 members of the American cult, Peoples Temple, however, most of the suicides were by Americans and not Guyanese
4.
Indigenous languages of the Americas
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Indigenous languages of the Americas are spoken by indigenous peoples from Alaska and Greenland to the southern tip of South America, encompassing the land masses that constitute the Americas. These indigenous languages consist of dozens of language families, as well as many language isolates. Many proposals to group these into higher-level families have been made and this scheme is rejected by nearly all specialists. According to UNESCO, most of the indigenous American languages in North America are critically endangered, the most widely spoken indigenous language is Southern Quechua, with about 6 to 7 million speakers, primarily in South America. Thousands of languages were spoken by various peoples in North and South America prior to their first contact with Europeans and these encounters occurred between the beginning of the 11th century and the end of the 15th century. Several indigenous cultures of the Americas had also developed their own writing systems, after pre-Columbian times, several indigenous creole languages developed in the Americas, based on European, indigenous and African languages. The European colonizers and their states had widely varying attitudes towards Native American languages. In Brazil, friars learned and promoted the Tupi language, as a result, indigenous American languages suffered from cultural suppression and loss of speakers. Many indigenous languages have become endangered, but others are vigorous. Several indigenous languages have been official status in the countries where they occur. In other cases official status is limited to regions where the languages are most spoken. Although sometimes enshrined in constitutions as official, the languages may be used infrequently in de facto official use, examples are Quechua in Peru and Aymara in Bolivia, where in practice, Spanish is dominant in all formal contexts. In North America and the Arctic region, Greenland in 2009 adopted Kalaallisut as its official language. In the United States, the Navajo language is the most spoken Native American language, the US Marine Corps recruited Navajo men, who were established as code talkers during World War II, to transmit secret US military messages. Neither the Germans nor Japanese ever deciphered the Navajo code, which was a using the Navajo language. Today, governments, universities, and indigenous peoples are continuing to work for the preservation and revitalization of indigenous American languages, in American Indian Languages, The Historical Linguistics of Native America, Lyle Campbell lists several hypotheses for the historical origins of Amerindian languages. These proliferated in the New World, notes, Extinct languages or families are indicated by, †. The number of members is indicated in parentheses
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