Singing Prestige into Being: Children’s Songs as a Resource for Indigenous Language Revitalization in Gilgit, Pakistan

Nadia Fatima Nisar and team

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Set within the summer Language Travels initiative in Gilgit, this project centres a children’s favourite song that welcomes summer after a long, harsh winter. The song—and the video produced around it—captures Gilgit-Baltistan’s landscape and the shared delight of children and elders, not as scenery alone, but as a living context where Shina continues to be valued, spoken, and passed on. The project explicitly frames the song as a tool for language maintenance: it creates a joyful, repeatable routine of Shina use, supports intergenerational transmission, and invites community participation through performance, listening, and sharing. Children are positioned as visible ambassadors of Shina, helping to extend the language into public and digital spaces while affirming its place in everyday family life. By “singing prestige into being,” the initiative demonstrates how culturally grounded musical practices can strengthen pride, increase opportunities for use, and contribute to sustainable Indigenous language revitalization in Gilgit.

Link to the song: