Mother Tongue

Mother Tongue

Author: Kerning Cultures Network February 17, 2022 Duration: 35:37

How do you preserve a language when your government is actively trying to erase it?

Abduweli Ayup is a Uyghur linguist who was trying to stop the Chinese government from replacing Uyghur with Mandarin. He had been studying the language's history, teaching Uyghur to younger students and writing books in Uyghur. But when the Chinese government began forcibly detaining Uyghurs in Xinjiang, his work got much riskier. Then, they came for Abduweli himself. This week on Kerning Cultures, Abduweli's fight to preserve his mother tongue.

This episode originally aired in August 2019.

Special thanks to Abduweli Ayup and his family for sharing their story, and to Arienne Dwyer and Timothy Grose.

You can find a transcript for this episode here.

This episode was produced by Durrie Bouscaren and Alex Atack, with editorial support from Dana Ballout and Hebah Fisher. Sound design by Mohamed Khreizat. Fact-checking by Zeina Dowidar. Kerning Cultures is a Kerning Cultures Network production.


Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.


Dive into the rich, complex, and often surprising narratives that define a region through the lens of Kerning Cultures. This documentary-style series moves beyond headlines to deliver intimate, human-centered stories from across the Middle East and North Africa, and from the nuanced spaces in between. Each episode is a crafted audio journey, blending personal testimony with immersive sound design to explore themes of identity, history, innovation, and everyday life. You’ll hear from voices seldom amplified elsewhere-artists grappling with tradition, scientists tackling local challenges, families navigating change, and communities preserving memory. Produced by the Kerning Cultures Network, the podcast is built on deep reporting and a commitment to nuanced storytelling that challenges monolithic perspectives. It’s for anyone curious about the forces shaping cultures and societies, presented not as a lecture but as an experience. The result is a listening session that feels both expansive and personal, connecting global audiences to specific lives and places. Tune in for stories that are meticulously researched, emotionally resonant, and fundamentally human, reminding us that the most compelling tales are often found in the details we haven’t yet heard. This is a podcast dedicated to the art of narrative, offering a fresh and essential auditory window into a dynamic part of the world.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Kerning Cultures
Podcast Episodes
Behind the Scenes: Zar and Zabelle [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 29:31
While we're gearing up for our next season, we wanted to share a behind the scenes look at what goes into making our episodes.Hear Trancing with the Zars here, and Zabelle here.This behind the scenes episode was produced…
Update: Where the Heart Is [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 46:51
For his entire life, Maysam has lived in Dubai. His parents are from Syria, a place he hasn't visited since he was a young child. If you ask him, the UAE is his home. But on paper it isn't, and likely never will be. So w…
Jerusalem Calling [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 39:27
The Palestine Broadcasting Service started airing in 1936, from a brand new transmitter tower in Ramallah. It was a British station in three languages, aimed at promoting the message of the mandate government throughout…
More Than A Buzz [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 41:28
In our day-to-day lives, it's a drink. But for some people, it is not as simple as that. It's a Sufi's spiritual companion, an Emirati's keeper of tradition, and a Yemeni's connection to his homeland. Today, we dive into…
Little Syria [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 34:28
The lower west side of Manhattan used to be home to the biggest population of Arab immigrants in the US. In the early 20th century, streets were full of people speaking Arabic, with street vendors selling ka'ak, storefro…
Open Sesame [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 42:47
In 1979, Iftah Ya Simsim - the Arabic version of Sesame Street - aired for the first time. Over the next ten years, the show was loved by children across the Arab world, until 1990, when the show was pulled off the air a…
Elephants in the Desert [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 27:44
Faysal Bibi and his team of palaeontologists have been captivated by this one particular moment that took place in the Abu Dhabi desert seven million years ago. This week, a journey back to a time before the desert was t…
The Missing Archives [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 43:35
In 1968, a trio of Palestinian filmmakers began making films about life under Israeli occupation. Almost 15 years and over 90 films later, their film unit became a dominant force in the Arab film industry. But in 1982, t…
Lebanon, USA 2.0 [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 48:15
This week, a special collaboration with one of our all time favourite podcasts: Radiolab. We produced the episode - Lebanon USA - last year, and Radiolab have taken that original story and elevated it to a whole new leve…
How to Help Beirut [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 0:50
We're heartbroken by what happened in Beirut on Tuesday, August 4. Many of us at the Kerning Cultures team are Lebanese, or have close ties to Beirut. So we're taking a break from publishing our episode this week. Instea…