A novel, worker-owned cooperative serving the language needs of New York City’s growing African immigrant community from within is officially up and running.
Afrilingual claims to be the first African worker co-op for language services in the city’s history. The 10-person group aims to serve a growing niche market that’s expanded as tens of thousands of migrants — including many from West African countries — have arrived in the city over the past year.
At Afrilingual’s launch party in Harlem on Thursday, more than 70 guests ate spinach stew and fermented rice balls over tables decorated with the black, red and green stripes of the Pan-African flag. Many guests — including family members, friends, elected officials and fellow advocates — were dressed in Ankara print outfits and colorful head wraps, kufi caps, and loose flowing boubou gowns.
Several speakers underscored the importance — which is sometimes a matter of life or death — of accessing health care, legal help and other services in one’s own language. Many also pointed to how the group provides “language justice.” Afrilingual says it provides not only more accurate and culturally competent interpretation — but also better conditions and pay for the workers themselves.
“We have people who are underemployed not using their language skills, their multilingualism, their resources, their brilliance, from back home. Think of that as an asset,” said Amaha Kassa, the founder and executive director of African Communities Together, the nonprofit that incubated the co-op. “And the asset is that we can build something like Afrilingual, where the people who are closest to the problem are also closest to the solution.”
Even as the number of African American New Yorkers declines, more African immigrants are calling the city home. From 2010 to 2018, the number of New Yorkers who identify as African increased over 30%, to more than 152,000 people, according to a recent report for the city’s…
Read the full article here
Leave a Reply