Dear Panel Members:
For my Senior Project, I plan to go to Mexico and learn my grandparent's dialect Zapoteco and learn more about my culture like the art, dances, food, and language. I have been meeting with my mentor Annet Higby who is teaching me about natural dye and weaving that is part of the culture in Oaxaca. The people in Oaxaca create different patterns when they are weaving, and each pattern has its meaning.
I would be using what I learned and made as a product of what I learned.
As a kid, I did not pay much attention to my culture but as I grew up, I kept learning to appreciate the beauty of it and there are a lot of things that I have not learned. I feel that by spending time in Oaxaca with my grandparents I will learn and understand the reasons why they became embarrassed to speak their native dialect. My motivation to learn the dialect and learn more about our culture is for my grandparents to feel not embarrassed but to be proud of it.
This project will involve new growth for me, spending time with my grandparents and learning their dialect, food, and more about the culture Zapoteco is a dialect that is slowly disappearing in Oaxaca so being able to learn it and understand it would be a challenge because there are not a lot of native Zapoteco speakers and teachers.
Annette Higby will be a perfect mentor for me. She goes to Oaxaca every year and learns about weaving, natural dye, and culture. She has already been teaching me how to do natural dye and she would be teaching me how to do some weaving.
I would be leaving to go to Oaxaca and would be taking classes to learn zapoteco so I would be spending my summer learning Zapoteco and exploring Oaxaca.
Thank you for your time and consideration of my senior project.
Sincerely,
Pablo Mendez