A/HRC/21/53 Annex Expert Mechanism Advice No. 3 (2012): Indigenous peoples’ languages and cultures A. General 1. Distinct cultures and languages are often a central and principal feature of indigenous peoples’ identities as collectives and as individuals, providing unity. Indeed, the distinctiveness of indigenous peoples’ languages and cultures is a common feature of many indigenous peoples and the global indigenous peoples’ movement. Indigenous cultures cannot be divorced from indigenous peoples’ histories, often including colonization and dispossession, which have had a powerful impact on their languages and cultures. 2. Healthy indigenous peoples’ languages and cultures, while rooted in history, must not be understood as static. It is essential that States, indigenous peoples, international institutions, national human rights institutions, non-governmental institutions and the private sector take a perspective on cultures that enhances their vitality, allowing them to live and breathe and take on new forms and shapes as voluntarily and customarily determined by indigenous peoples themselves. Contemporary expressions and forms of indigenous languages and cultures are important modern extensions of their age-old traditions and an indicator of the good health of their cultures. 3. Indigenous cultures include their ways of life, protected by the right to selfdetermination, and indigenous peoples’ relationships, including spiritual connections, with their lands, territories and resources. They include manifestations of cultural practices, including economically driven activity, traditional knowledge, cultural expressions, jurisprudence, cosmovisions, spirituality, philosophies, membership codes, dispute resolution techniques, social values, arts, dress, song and dance. 4. Cultural diversity is a value in its own right, supported by the international legal framework, particularly as established by UNESCO. 5. The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples should be the basis of all action, including at the legislative and policy level, on the protection and promotion of indigenous peoples’ rights to their languages and cultures. Many of the rights in the Declaration relate to indigenous cultures and languages, especially indigenous peoples’ rights to self-determination and to lands, territories and resources. 6. The impact of assimilationist policies on indigenous peoples’ languages and cultures has been in many cases extremely harmful, leading to the near extinction of indigenous languages and cultures. The deliberate use of boarding, residential schools and orphanages for indigenous children, with a focus on integrating them into non-indigenous mainstream societies, has been tragically harmful for indigenous peoples and their cultures and languages and the health of indigenous individuals, including the inter-generational trauma suffered by the children and grandchildren of attendees of such schools. 7. Strong action is required to address the effects of historical and ongoing discrimination against indigenous peoples and individuals based on their cultures and use of their languages. Their languages and cultures will only flourish in environments when they are more broadly respected in their own right and for their contribution to an understanding of humanity. 20