In July 2013, our friends at the Living Tongues Institute [1] organized another language revitalization workshop for endangered language activists from around Micronesia. This four-day workshop was similar to the workshop held in Santiago, Chile in January 2013 [2] for language activists from Latin America, in which Rising Voices took part. Similar to the Latin America workshop, a major focus of the gathering was the use of technology in language revitalization efforts, and one of the outputs was the creation of “Talking Dictionaries” [3] for each of the languages represented.
The workshop was hosted by Island Research Education Initiative (IREI) [4] and the FSM Special Education Service, Department of Education [5]. A full summary of the workshop [6] can be found on the Living Tongues’ blog.
The eight language communities and their representatives that took part:
- Nukuoro language [7]: Johnny Rudolph, Maynard Henry and Kurt Erwin
- Mokilese language: [8] Danio Poll, Jason Lebehn and Monique Panaligan
- Yapese language: [9] Caroline Dabugsiy
- Namolukese language (dialect of Mortlockese [10]): John Curley
- Pingelapese language: [11] Leilani Welley-Biza and Darlene Apis
- Kapingamarangi language: [12]Howartson Heinrich
- Kosraean language: [13] Arthur Albert
- Pohnpeian language: [14] Pressler Martin and Mario Abello
The “Talking Dictionaries” can be found listed and displayed here [15], and one can hear the audio sounds of some of the lexical entries from these Micronesian languages [16].
