Making the Organizing Toolbox Accessible

Tomas Aguilar is the co-founder of Colectivo Flatlander and co-wrote Risk Amid Recovery: Occupational Health and Safety of Latino Workers in the Aftermath of Gulf Coast Hurricanes.

At CSTI, I saw what can happen when an organization integrates a multilingual approach to their work. The workshop I co-facilitated was on assembling an organizers toolbox. Among the tools that my organization, Colectivo Flatlander, felt important to include was that of a multilingual approach.

Our work has always been done primarily in Spanish. Recently we have been working in English as well. What does it mean to be an organization and a movement where all languages and cultures are included? How does this look in practice?

We had two sets of interpreters since we had three languages being used: American Sign Language, Spanish and English. Well, if you count Spanglish, my language, there were four languages being used!

The discussions we had were inclusive, with plenty of participation from speakers from all languages. Just imagine the lively discussions that included people agreeing and disagreeing in three different languages! There were some good, challenging discussions that took place by people speaking in their own languages. At times they were difficult.

Sure, the discussions took a bit longer. We modified the agenda. Most important, though, we had very good participation from speakers of all languages. This was reflected in the comments during and after the workshop.

Among the comments was one from a person who said that this was a good workshop where she felt like a full participant and not just like an observer.

This space that was created was made possible by people at Western States Center who believed enough to ensure language access to as many people as they could. To hire interpreters, rent equipment and to translate materials takes a lot of effort and resources. I hope these efforts continue.