Thanks to all the great volunteers who turned out this past weekend to dedicate their afternoon to the first-ever Dokotoro Hackathon. We had a dozen dedicated folks turn out to merge (French-English) several new chapters, do formatting, and make some serious inroads into thinking about how to best review the outdated medical information from the old French version. We all learned first hand how much preparation needs to be done before sending our text to our Mali-based translation team.

The atmosphere was one of industriousness and intense concentration. The scene was one of pizza boxes, snack wrappers, and laptops. In the middle of the table was one our our prized possessions: two volumes of the latest French-Bambara dictionary (by Father Bailleul), which had just arrived in the mail, slightly battered and smelling of soap.

It was a productive afternoon, and it was fun to meet up with friends who share a love for Mali. If you would like to volunteer, please email Jenna at jenna@dokotoro.org; we will be having more hackathons in the future and would love for you to join. And you don’t have to live in the San Francisco bay area or speak French to get involved — we have volunteers from Minnesota to New York, from Bamako (Mali) to Bobojulaso (Burkina Faso) pitching in.  Please join our team!

Illustration from page 23 of “Là Où Il N’y a Pas de Docteur”

Things are moving quickly since we first conceived of the idea to translate Where There Is No Doctor into Bambara in the spring of 2012. Our steering committee meets once a month (and has lots of phone calls and emails in between!) I’ll be posting monthly updates here so you can track our progress.

Subscribe to email updates or like us on Facebook to stay in touch. And if you can volunteer to help, email Michelle Chan.

Administrative
We’ve set up a website (obviously!), and sorted out all the administrative details. Our goal is to be as transparent as possible, and to make sure that all donations will be tax deductible (in the US anyway). All the nitty-gritty details are here.

Translation
Our translators in Bamako have finished translating two chapters (about 10% of the book). Now, we are having those chapters undergo proofreading and copy-editing by independent reviewers. (If you are a native Bambara speaker, or know of one that can help us, please get in touch — we could use more help!)

The chapters we chose to translate first were Chapter 1: Home cures and popular beliefs, and Chapter 19: Information for mothers and midwives. (The chapter numbers refer to the English edition, which you can read online here; the numbering is slightly different in the French edition published by ENDA in Senegal.)

All translation and editing is being done by professional translators who are native Bambara speakers. We are paying fair but competitive wages. Paying for translation will be one of our two major expenses, along with printing. Translation of the first two chapters was paid for by donations from Steering Committee members, and a generous startup grant of $1,250 from our sponsoring organization, African Sky.

Illustration from page 20 of “Là Où Il N’y a Pas de Docteur”

Layout & Design
The chapters will be laid out in Adobe InDesign by volunteer Ruth MacDonald. We’ll post PDF copies here on our website and invite comments and feedback. Next comes a very important step.

Field Testing
Our partners in Mali will organize a half-day meeting to “field test” the text. We will invite health workers, representatives from government and NGOs, and others to review the text and offer feedback. Field testing is an important step that Hesperian Health Guides, the publisher of the original Where There Is No Doctor, does for all of its books. The goal is to make sure that the text and images are clear an understandable to the target audience — local health workers who may have little formal education — and that information and advice is appropriate for local conditions.

Launch Party
Next, we’re planning a house party in the San Francisco Bay Area in the Fall, probably in mid-November. This will be a chance to learn more about the project, meet some of the people involved, and of course, enjoy some good food and music. The event will also be a fundraiser — we need to raise money soon to be able to keep our translators busy .

Fundraising
Finally, we are working on a fundraising strategy, and will be submitting proposals and applying for foundation grants. In the meantime, we are soliciting individual donations. Thank you to three former Mali Peace Corps Volunteers and friends who have together donated $400! Individual and family donations will help us to keep paying our translators and keep the project going!

To make a fast, secure online donation, visit our page at First Giving. If you have any ideas or suggestions for fundraising, or can help, please get in touch with Anh Ly.

Illustration from “Là Où Il n’y a Pas de Docteur”

Please stay in touch to get updates on the project and news from Mali, and to make sure you are invited to our Launch Party in Fall 2012.

Subscribe by email using the link at the top right. We promise you’ll only receive a few messages each month, and we will never share your information without your permission.

If you have a question, comment, or suggestion (or if you’d like to help!) feel free to drop one of us a line. See the About Us page for a list of steering committee members. For general inquiries or website questions, feel free to email Matthew Heberger.

We are thrilled to be working with a talented team of language scholars, who until recently, served as instructors for the United States Peace Corps in Mali, teaching new recruits the intricacies of language and culture in Mali.

Salifou Bengaly

Salifou Bengaly

Mr. Bengaly is known by the nickname “Teacher” because he is a high school teacher and owner of a private elementary school in Kati, a city north of Mali’s capital,Bamako. He was born in Kabarasso in the Sikasso region in 1979 . After high school, he studied languages (English, Arabic, and Bambara) at the University of Bamako from 2000 to 2004. Since that time, he has worked with international NGOs, projects and government departments as a translator through short term contracts. Since 2007, Mr. Bengaly has spent most of his time working for the US Peace Corps in Mali as a language instructor. He speaks, writes, and teaches English, Arabic, French, Bambara, Senoufo and Minianka, and is conversant in Bomu. During his free time, he likes to read and debate current events.

When asked about the importance of this project, he says, “As more Malians are learning to read, the country will have additional health care advisers which will help to improve health conditions in Mali.” He adds, “Because some people think that health workers don’t always tell the truth, they will be aware of the true information because the doors are opened to them (they can read health books now).”

Fatoumata Bouaré

Fatoumata Bouaré

Fatoumata Bouaré, or just “Fatim”, was born in the city of San in Mali’s Segou region. She is a graduate of FLASH (Faculté des Langues des Arts et des Sciences Humaines) at the University of Bamako. Ms. Bouaré has worked with the United States Peace Corps since 2006 as a language and cultural instructor. She says, “The project is important, because in Mali there are many places where there is no health center. The book will help women to learn about health, and know how to better take care of themselves and their family. It will help them to avoid a lot of preventable sicknesses that are common in Mali. There are so many benefits that I cannot finish talking about all of them! I think it will particularly benefit communities, especially if the information is shared with women and girls.”

Abdoulaye Coulibaly

Abdoulaye Coulibaly

Abdoulaye Coulibaly was born in Dogofry in Mali’s Ségou Region. Bambara is his mother tongue. After his graduation from the Ecole Normale Superieure de Bamako (E.N.Sup), he started teaching pupils in primary school. Meanwhile, he also worked as a professional photographer. In July 1996, he joined Peace Corps as a Language and Cross-Culture Facilitator (LCF). Since then, he has taught Bambara, French, and technical language, helped with translation, and facilitated cross-culture training sessions. Abdoulaye thanks everybody involved in this translation project which will be extremely useful and profitable to many Malians. “In Mali, many people do not attend a formal school. There is a strong need for behavior changes and to learn about better health, but this is difficult when people are far from health centers and the roads are bad.” He adds, “All Malians will benefit from this project!”

Diatrou Dembelé

Diatrou Dembelé

Mr. Dembelé was born in the village of Niantanso, between Kita and Manantali near Mali’s western frontier. He is a graduate of the École Normale Supérieure of Bamako, where he studied English and French. After graduation, he taught high school in Côte d’Ivoire and Mali. In 2000, he began working for the Peace Corps, where he has taught French, Bambara, and Malinké to trainees and volunteers. During this time, he helped translate several documents, such as a Life Skills Manual, documents about food security, and others. Mr. Dembelé has also written general and technical instructional manuals for the Malinké language. Concerning the importance of translating Where There Is No Doctor, he had this to say:

“To me the translation of this document will help village health workers, because most of them didn’t go far at school. In addition, all literate persons can read it easily and understood it because it is in their native language. When people can understand something, it is easier for them to implement it. After the book’s translation, a large range of people will be able to read it and to be able to explain it to many, many others. In poor countries, when people can gain this important knowledge for themselves, I think that the rate of mother’s and children’s mortality will decrease a lot.”

Dokotoro means “doctor” in the Bambara language*. Bambara (or Bamanankan) is spoken as a first or second language by an estimated 80% of the people in Mali, West Africa.

In 2012, a small group of friends, most of whom served in the Peace Corps in Mali, decided to have the book Where There Is No Doctor: A Village Health Care Handbook, translated into Bambara. This extraordinary book, published by Hesperian Health Guides in Berkeley, California, is the most widely used health guide in the world, and has already been translated into 80 languages.

We are fully aware that the recent violence and political turmoil in Mali could make our project more complicated. Many non-governmental organizations have withdrawn their staff from Mali, and aid agencies have cut funding except for the barest essentials and humanitarian aid. However, it makes us even more committed to helping the people of Mali, and providing ordinary citizens with resources to give them more control of their health and well-being.

*We might have made our first spelling mistake. The online dictionary at bambara.org gives the translation as dɔgɔtɔrɔ. The funny-looking open o is pronounced as in “ought.”