People passionate about preserving and promoting ancient Tay script

Coming to Muong Chieng commune, Da Bac district, Hoa Binh province, many people know Sa Van Cam, a person passionate about preserving and promoting ancient Tay script. Cam has been collecting, recording, and opening classes to teach ancient Tay script, contributing to preserving the cultural values of the Tay ethnic group in Muong Chieng commune in particular and Hoa Binh province in general.

Born and raised in Muong Chieng commune, with more than 70% of the population being Tay ethnic people, Cam was raised and accumulated a lot of knowledge, life experiences, and documents about Tay ethnic culture in general, including ancient Tay script in particular. Sa Van Cam shared: Ancient Tay script has been preserved and taught to children and grandchildren by our ancestors until now. But in modern times, many cultural values are gradually being lost, especially for the younger generation. In order to propagate and mobilize Tay ethnic people and students to learn and write their own script to preserve the ethnic cultural identity, I have researched, learned, and opened classes to teach writing to preserve and promote the Tay ethnic language and script.

Mr. Sa Van Cam (left), Muong Chieng commune (Da Bac) introduces ancient Tay books that he has preserved and promoted.

From 2010 to now, Mr. Cam has organized 7 ancient Tay script classes, attracting more than 200 students from Muong Chieng commune and neighboring communes in Da Bac district to participate. Notably, in 2017, the Hanoi branch of the Vietnam Institute of Linguistics coordinated to open an ancient Tay script class and a calligraphy writing contest (ancient Tay script) in Muong Chieng commune (the class was taught by Mr. Sa Van Cam). Also in 2017, Muong Chieng commune organized the Cau Muong festival to promote ancient Tay script to tourists inside and outside the province.

Mr. Sa Van Cam shared more: The ancient Tay script and the improved Thai script are completely different. The ancient books passed down to me by my ancestors have been passed down for 6-7 generations. I have worked hard to collect and research to create books and lesson plans for the ancient Tay script to teach the people. However, the biggest difficulty now is the funding to open classes, but because of my passion for passing on the knowledge left by my ancestors, I continue to open classes for the people. Mr. Cam has actively coordinated with the commune's folk culture club to both maintain the cultural, artistic, and folk dance movements and teach the ancient Tay script to members. Through Mr. Sa Van Cam's classes, many brothers, sisters, uncles, and students have become proficient in reading and writing the ancient Tay script. Currently, Mr. Cam's class is maintained with more than 30 students participating (3 sessions/week) at the community house of Chieng Cang hamlet, Muong Chieng commune.

Comrade Nguyen Quang Hieu, Deputy Head of the Provincial Emulation and Reward Board, emphasized: The model of "Preserving and promoting the cultural identity of ancient Tay script" of Mr. Sa Van Cam, Muong Chieng commune has not yet calculated its economic value, but it brings very high social value to preserve and promote the writing and cultural identity of the Tay ethnic group; helping people understand more deeply and clearly about the rich and extremely unique culture of the Tay ethnic group. Mr. Cam's model has the ability to create a ripple effect, an exemplary effect, a level of influence and a wide range of replication throughout the province. Recognizing the process of researching, collecting folk culture and the contributions of Mr. Sa Van Cam, in 2024, the Provincial People's Committee recognized the model of "Preserving and promoting the cultural identity of ancient Tay script" as a typical advanced model at the provincial level.

Huong Lan (Hoa Binh Newspaper)

Source: https://baophutho.vn/nguoi-dam-me-bao-ton-va-phat-huy-chu-tay-co-220758.htm