This is a Spanish translation to a new telenovela, Baktún, in which all the characters speak only Maya.
Source: LL NewsWire Headlines – July 3, 2013, Univision News
By Cristina Constantini
With Latinos across the country arguing over the new Lifetime telenovela, Devious Maids, it seems we’ve overlooked the premiere of another ground-breaking telenovela last month.
Baktún, the world’s first Maya language telenovela, is a great achievement for indigenous communities, according to filmmaker Bruno Cárcamo.
Finally, Mayans have the right to be entertained by the same kind of poorly-written, overacted, predictable melodramas the rest of us were forced to watch with abuela have absolutely adored for years.
Directed and produced by documentary filmmaker Cárcamo, the 30-episode drama was filmed in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo and will soon be made available for your enjoyment on YouTube. The series premiered at the Museo de Antropología last month. Cárcamo told Mexican news outlet Sin Embargo that it would air on Mexican television this month, and also possibly in Peru and Bolivia in the future.
The telenovela, which revolves around love stories and Mayan culture, aims to preserve the indigenous language by making it entertaining to watch.
In the Yucatán peninsula of Mexico there are an estimated 750,000 Maya speakers, but many fear the language will die out if it is not revived by efforts like this one.
“If you lose a language, you’re not only losing those words,” Cárcamo told Sin Embargo.” “You are losing an entire peoples, and this could happen with the Mayan people of the Yucatán.”
Check out the project trailer:
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