Volume 18 (2024)

Lilly Metom, Su-Hie Ting

The Iban language of Sarawak is an indigenous language that has an orthography and has been taught as a subject in Malaysian schools since 1968. However, no findings are available on whether Iban is used for written and formal communication. This study examined the extent of the formal use of Iban among the Iban community. Questionnaire data from 1,204 Iban respondents showed that mastery of Iban is acquired through informal language acquisition rather than formal learning. The percentage of those learning Iban in school dropped from the parents’ generation (53.90%) to the children’s generation (33.39%). Over 93% of the respondents could understand and speak Iban fluently, 88.54% could read in Iban, and 82.23% could write in Iban. The radio plays a bigger role in promoting Iban use among the respondents than the television. The sources of support for the written use of Iban are formal education, printed and audio-visual materials such as selected newspapers and magazines, and community groups. However, only 23.51% of the respondents had the experience of attending meetings conducted in Iban. The findings suggest low confidence for Iban to serve formal functions of communication not because of proficiency issues but due to lack of official status.

Pittayawat Pittayaporn, Songphan Choemprayong

Moklen [mkm] is a severely endangered Austronesian language spoken by a sea-based population along the Andaman coast in the southern part of Thailand. As an initial attempt to document this language, we propose a Thai-based orthography of Moklen that not only captures all the phonemic distinctions but also considers the social, political, and cultural contexts of Moklen communities. The proposal is based on fieldwork data collected intermittently in Bangsak, Phang Nga Province, Thailand, between 2017 and 2021. Based on Smalley’s (1959) criteria of adequacy, the proposed orthography adopts a subset of consonant and vowel symbols, as well as major orthographic rules of the Thai [tha] script. Notably, it includes a tone mark that captures a tonal distinction confirmed by this study. Moreover, it is flexible enough to allow indication of sociolinguistic variations reported in previous studies. While a formal evaluation of the proposed orthography is still needed, guidelines recommended by UNESCO are also adopted to assess several sociocultural determinants that may influence the usability and acceptance of the proposed orthography. The proposed orthography is a promising tool for the documentation of the language and has potential to contribute to efforts to preserve the cultural heritage of the Moklen community.

Ignacio L. Montoya, Julien De Jesus, Macario Mendoza-Carrillo

This paper focuses on the development, planning, and implementation of Numu (Northern Paiute) language classes at the University of Nevada, Reno. The authors’ engagement with the Numu classes as well as the description and analysis presented in this paper are guided by principles of decolonization, language reclamation, and community-based research. Our analysis is based on participant observation, informal discussions with the instructor and other community members, and interviews with students. The primary claims of the paper are (1) that because an Indigenous elder has the autonomy to teach the classes however he sees fit, the Numu classes have created a decolonial space at the university, and (2) that a rethinking of expertise has been critical to this creation of a decolonial space within a colonial context. The findings from our study inform a broader understanding of how universities can provide spaces for decolonization, how community-based linguistic projects can be more attuned to community needs and interests, and how broadening notions of expertise can help disrupt the replication of colonial structures.

Anna Bax, Mary Bucholtz, Eric W. Campbell, Alexia Z. Fawcett, Inî G. Mendoza, Simon L. Peters, Griselda Reyes Basurto

Indigenous communities working to reclaim their languages have called for a shift from the traditional research paradigm of language documentation and description, in which outsider scholars set the agenda, to one in which community language workers take on leadership roles at every stage of the process, possibly with secondary support from outsider linguists. This article describes one such effort, a collaboration between a diasporic Mexican Indigenous (Indígena) community and university-based linguists to support community language maintenance goals in California. We discuss five key previous or ongoing project activities: (1) community-centered documentation of local Mixtec varieties; (2) literacy classes for these varieties; (3) a special class on linguistic research and activism for Indígena youth; (4) a community survey of attitudes toward and use of Indígena languages, Spanish, and English; and (5) the creation of language and literacy materials for community use.
The article offers a model of collaborative, community-centered language documentation and maintenance research that prioritizes community members’ agency, perspectives, and goals for their languages. The collaboration also serves as an example of linguistic research with and for diasporic communities, a context of growing need that remains neglected in the field. We highlight our focus on mobilizing data and analysis to create practical language materials, and we discuss some challenges we have faced.

Anuschka van ’t Hooft, José Luis González Compeán

Young urban migrants can be valuable actors in projects that aim to document and revitalize their Indigenous languages, especially when these efforts involve new technologies. Based on data from a Huastec (Tének) language documentation project in Mexico, this article describes the digital interactions of young migrants in the documentation and revitalization of Indigenous languages. To address this issue, we briefly review the migration of Huastec speakers in the context of language shift. We then examine how digital language activism can be linked to language documentation and explore how such digital projects can contribute to language maintenance and revitalization. Finally, we present the most salient factors that drive Indigenous migrants to participate in initiatives aimed at language revitalization through digital language activism: entertainment, affection, and being connected.

Caroline Jones, Jesse Tran, Eleanor Jorgensen, Romi Hill, Patricia Ellis, Jane Simpson, Felicity Meakins, Ben Foley, Marcel Reverter-Rambaldi, Gari Tudor-Smith, Paul Williams, Clair Hill, Mark Richards

Dictionaries for under-resourced languages are, like other dictionaries, traditionally in hard-copy form. Electronic online formats can improve access to dictionaries for under-resourced languages. To make it easier to create online dictionaries with linked sound and image files, starting from a Toolbox file or similar backslash-formatted dictionary text file, a new online tool, WordSpinner, was created. It was used and iteratively improved over several years in order to convert backslash lexicon text files into formatted dictionary output pages, with five Indigenous languages of Australia. In various stages of dictionary creation, checking, and formatting, the online tool was revised to meet user needs. The resulting version of WordSpinner is another free option now available to users for creating online dictionaries.

Eline Visser

Yamdena is an Austronesian language of eastern Indonesia. Although many language materials are available, the language has received very little scientific attention. In this article, I present the Yamdena corpus, which includes glossed legacy materials and original fieldwork. I also give an up-to-date introduction to Yamdena grammar, sketching its phonology, word classes, pronouns, nouns and noun phrases, possessive marking, verbs and verbal inflection, some clausal syntax, multi-verb constructions, and clause coordination.

Manuel David González Pérez

Although some critics consider it time-consuming and demanding, proponents of the monolingual approach for field research (i.e., learning to speak a target field language as part of the research process) argue that it can provide a unique insight into its structures. However, this claim remains largely unsubstantiated in the available literature on field methods. The present paper sets out to achieve a twofold objective: First, it reviews prior observations about the monolingual method in documentary-linguistics publications, highlighting important gaps in research. Secondly, based on qualitative data from the author’s fieldwork context in rural, indigenous China, it contributes to addressing one such gap by demonstrating how, when, and why basic to intermediate communicative competence can enhance the documentation, description, and analysis of a field language, in ways that complement and sometimes outperform other approaches such as bilingual and stimuli-based elicitation.

Anu Pandey

Podcasts are a unique media that have been used in Indigenous and endangered language communities in the form of Indigenous radio podcasts, instructional websites, or tools to aid classroom instruction. A podcast called Rituals of Kanauji speakers was created in Kanauji, a low-resource Indian language variety. Using this case study in Kanauji, I aim to examine the usage of podcasts for outside classroom instruction in low-resource and lesser-studied languages. Thus, this study highlights the uniqueness of podcasting for language revitalization, as podcasts can be created and consumed anytime and anywhere. For low-resource languages, there can be three kinds: podcasts for teaching language, those for cultural expression and general awareness, and those for entertainment purposes. The paper also describes their pros and cons as well as directions for creating a podcast, to help native speakers and linguists in their future documentary projects. Remote data collection of audio recordings was done via WhatsApp for making this podcast. The performance statistics from Kanauji’s podcast demonstrate that it has helped promote the language and brought pride and prestige to native speakers. Finally, I conclude that podcasts break the norm and help in language reclamation.