SIL Tanzania - Scripture Engagement Research and Ministry

In the Nyakyusa language area, from May to September, we met with eight groups (totaling 70-80 people) to listen to their stories. The majority of those we met with were church leaders or people with specific church responsibilities. Some were former SIL staff, some have attended literacy/Scripture engagement workshops held over the years, others had some connection to SIL through church visits made by SIL staff or through the Nyakyusa Community Based Organisations (CBOs). Sense-making meeting On Thursday 5 th October, we held one final meeting, in Kyela, gathering together representatives from the two Nyakyusa CBOs. About fifteen people came, including four from Malawi (which created an interesting language situation as some of them couldn’t understand Swahili very well, which was our primary language of communication in the meeting). It was very hot, and people struggled to stay awake after lunch! Outline of meeting Welcome and greetings (we invited the Chair of one...

On Tuesday we did a bit more harvesting in the Nyakyusa language area. Our initial trip had been planned with the Nyakyusa Community Based Organisation called AMBOBA. What we didn’t realise is that there is a second CBO (amusingly called ‘UN’, the acronym for two Nyakyusa words that I can’t remember) supposedly working in cooperation with AMBOBA, but still separate, and none of the people from that CBO had been involved in our research trip. Both CBOs had been set up by former SIL staff, though UN was mostly on the initiative of one person, while AMBOBA includes both the former translators and literacy/SE workers. It seemed wise to make sure that UN also felt involved in the process, and we knew they’d have some good stories to share, so we arranged one more harvesting meeting to listen to some of their stories. We were able to take public transport to get there, as we met in a small town bordering the main road that goes to Malawi. Ten church leaders gathered, and we heard some encour...

Our trip included a combination of Outcome Harvesting, distribution and ministry. Here's how it went. Team Core team from the office in Mbeya: Me (Katherine) and Frank Mwaluanda. Assistants: First we were joined by David Mwangunga, to visit the mountainous region in the north of the Nyakyusa language area (a.k.a. Unyakyusa). Then in the south of Unyakyusa, which at a much lower altitude is hot and tropical, we were joined by Andrew Mwangosi. Both David and Andrew used to work with us as the literacy/SE workers for the Nyakyusa language area. Finally we went to Malawi, where Frank and Andrew were joined by Andrew Mwamatandala, who was one of the Nyakyusa translators, while I returned to Mbeya (due to the challenges of getting a visa to enter Malawi). What we did Wednesday: Travelled to our first research location in the Nyakyusa language area, the small town of Kandete. We used Wednesday evening as an opportunity to show the Nyakyusa translation of the Jesus film on the out...

On the 1 st – 2 nd June, Frank and I met with some key members of the Nyakyusa community for the purpose of our research. These were former SIL staff (two Bible translators and two literacy/SE workers), the Chair and another member of the CBO, and two members of the Malawian committee (as Nyakyusa is a cross-border language). Four of them lived close enough to return home each evening, but the others had come some distance (we had picked up two en-route) so they stayed overnight in local guest houses (we covered everyone’s travel, accommodation and food expenses). Despite planning to start at 10am, and most of us being there by then, we weren’t able to get started until over an hour and a half later as it was important to wait for the Chair of the CBO (adhering to protocol and hierarchy is essential here) and we needed to find a suitable room to meet in. The meeting was conducted primarily in Swahili, but with some Nyakyusa and English to help one of the Malawians. Here is rough ou...

On Thursday, 25 th May, the Malila Outcome Harvesting team (Katherine, Frank and Mwangwale) met with the Malila NGO to discuss findings (Mwangwale is also a member of the NGO). About half of the NGO were able to attend. The NGO is made up of men and women, church leaders and lay people, from different denominations. Many of them were part of the ‘Language Committee’ when the New Testament translation was ongoing and shared our vision for Bible translation. They engaged well in the discussions, though it was harder to draw the women out into sharing their thoughts. Brief outline of what we covered in the meeting Welcome & introductions Short devotional , based on 1 Corinthians 3:6-15 (about someone planting seeds, someone else watering, but God making it grow) What is our goal (as a NGO, but also as SIL)? Wanting to see people know God better through His Word, as well as to preserve and promote local language and culture. The research was directed towards the first part of this ...

This week, I met with Frank and Majaliwa again to continue sense-making and to plan for how to do further sense-making with the Malila community. I thought it was time to share a few of our initial observations, rather than just describe what we are doing. So here is a snapshot of what has emerged. --- Having the complete New Testament (NT) makes a difference: people (including church leaders) are more motivated to use the Malila Scriptures now that they have the complete NT. We also heard multiple testimonies of how much easier it is to understand the Malila Scriptures than the Swahili Scriptures. A variety of materials are being engaged with: there were multiple stories relating to not just print Scriptures, but also audio Scriptures, songs, the Jesus film and literacy materials such as story books. However, deep and consistent engagement was less obvious and distribution may need strengthening. This was particularly noticeable in relation to audio Scriptures; although people ob...

It’s challenging working across two languages! I am constantly having to switch back and forth. Anything processed with my colleagues in Swahili I need to put into English for further analysis and sharing. Anything I have worked on myself I have to put into Swahili in order to discuss further with my colleagues. Google Translate provides a good starting point, but what it produces inevitably needs a significant amount of correcting. So, after the trip to the language area, I began to work on the data, firstly tidying up the Outcome Statements in both languages, so that I could begin to work with them. Then I continued to fill in the spreadsheet, identifying the following points in order to begin some analysis: Main actors: this refers to the person who demonstrated some kind of change of behaviour, whether that be starting to use Malila Scriptures, or demonstrating a change of attitude to using the Malila language, or starting to teach people to read Malila, or becoming a Christian...