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Keeping K'iche'

When we think Mayan, we think of a civilisation long gone, of ancient temples and majestic pyramids. We don’t think languages. And we likely don’t think of Mayan people living today and speaking those languages. But that’s exactly what this film is about.

Filmed on location in the Guatemalan Highlands, Keeping K’iche’ explores the reality of living daily life with a language spoken by a million, yet so underrepresented that many outside of the region don’t even know of its existence.

  • Ash Williams
    Director
  • Lindsay Williams
    Writer
  • Lindsay Williams
    Producer
  • Carlos Castillo
    Interviewees
  • Juan Leon Cortez
    Interviewees
  • Dave Prine
    Interviewees
  • Carlos and Family
    Interviewees
  • Lindsay Williams
    Presenter
  • Lindsay Williams
    Translation and Subtitling
  • Ash Williams
    Filming and Editing
  • Project Type:
    Documentary
  • Genres:
    Documentary, Language, travel, Guatemala, kiche, mayan
  • Runtime:
    14 minutes 17 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    June 9, 2018
  • Production Budget:
    0 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    United Kingdom
  • Country of Filming:
    Guatemala
  • Language:
    English, Other, Spanish
  • Shooting Format:
    Digitial
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Northampton Film Festival 2019
    Northampton
    United Kingdom
    March 27, 2019
    Winner: Best Northamptonshire Short Film
Distribution Information
  • Lindsay Does Languages
    Country: United Kingdom
    Rights: All Rights
Director Biography - Ash Williams

Ashley is an enthusiastic film maker and Milton Keynes based primary school teacher, who has been producing short films for over fifteen years. From making films as a teenager, to gaining a First Class Honours degree in Media Production, he has constantly been involved with film in a variety of ways and gained experience working in corporate film, promotional videos, YouTube, and educational videos for online courses.

As well as this, he is well known for bringing film and media into his primary school classroom, both in Milton Keynes and Northamptonshire. In this time, he won numerous film awards for his own short films, as well as supporting youth groups to create films and animations for both national and local film competitions.

Ashley spent most of 2017-2018 travelling Latin America and Southeast Asia producing Language Stories, a short documentary series discovering languages around the world and meeting the people who speak them, with his wife, Lindsay Williams of Lindsay Does Languages.

Add Director Biography
Director Statement

Keeping K'iche' was made as part of a series of language based documentaries filmed across Latin America. Initially, my memories of our time in Guatemala were that of illness, injury and wet weather. However, what struck me about Keeping K'iche' is that it wasn't until it came to editing the film a few months later when I realised just how special Guatemala is, and how fortunate we were to meet and speak with the people we did. I'm sure that viewers of this film will agree with me.