Venezuelan Indigenous Educational Cultural Diversity in the Social-Legal Context

Using legal-documentary analysis, this study considers the subject of indigenous peoples, their recognition and intercultural bilingual education. Highlighting tenets of the 1999 Constitution, the Organic Law of Indigenous Peoples and Communities, international conventions relating to the matter signed by Venezuela and other documentary sources are examined. The profound change in political, legal and cultural perspective is described, which reorients the direction of the Venezuelan State in relation to the indigenous worldview. However, enough importance has not been given to bilingual education, running the risk that the indigenous languages be lost due to inconstant oral transmission and a lack of systematization. Indigenous peoples have knowledge and expertise in different fields and, as expressed in the 1999 Constitutional preamble, Venezuela is a multicultural, multiethnic and multi-bilingual nation. Failure to follow up on the progress of indigenous languages in their oral and written expressions would contribute to their possible disappearance and the loss of expertise and ancient knowledge, which are the intangible heritage of humanity. It is the responsibility of society and the State to promote increased opportunities for the participation of their culture, designed to deepen in this population a greater sense of belonging to their territories, customs and traditions without excluding them from the cultural process of the nation.