Bora language

Bora is an indigenous language of South America spoken in the western region of Amazon rainforest. Bora is a tonal language which, other than the Ticuna language, is a unique trait in the region. The majority of its speakers reside in Perú and Columbia. Around 2,328 Bora-speakers live in the Northeast Yaguasyacu, Putumayo, and Ampiyacu river areas of Peru. Peruvian speakers have a 10 to 30% literacy rate and a 25 to 50% literacy rate in their second language of Spanish. Miraña, another dialect of Bora, is spoken along the Caquetá-Japurá river which flows from Colombia to Brasil, and a few villages are there. Bora proper has 94% mutual comprehensibility with the Miraña dialect.

The written form of Bora was developed by Wycleff Bible Translators Wesley and Eva Thiesen with the help of the natives of the village of Brillo Nuevo on the Yaguasyacu river. Wesley and Eva Thiesen's daughter Ruth is also the first recorded non-native to learn the language. First, Bora to Spanish school books were developed. Then the New Testament Bible was translated. Finally, a comprehensive dictionary and grammar book was developed to document and preserve the language's grammar rules. This has since facilitated more text books so that natives can be taught to read and write in their own language, rescuing it from extinction due to the prevalence of Spanish and Portuguese in the regions where it is spoken.