Saving Languages

As globalizing becomes the only way for countries to survive economically, and as more people learn to speak "dominant languages" such as English and Mandarin, more and more aboriginal languages are dying out. Every two weeks, yet another language disappears somewhere in the world, possibly bringing with it centuries of history, of experience, of traditions never to be communicated again. "Australia, a very large island with over 250 plus languages with each language probably having 5 or so dialects is more at risk" of losing its languages. What could we do to stop indigenous languages' seemingly inevitable death in this modern age? What to do, Australia's Arwarbukarl Cultural Resource Association (ACRA) decided, but using modernization's very tool of globalization: the computer.

Winsome Denyer introduced the ACRA's solution in his article "How technology can save dying indigenous languages." In an attempt to revive and disseminate their own Arwabakal language, members of this cultural organization developed a computer program aimed directly at indigenous communities to save their languages. The program, called Miromaa, allows speakers (sometimes the last living speakers of a language) to record and explain a language with audio clips, still photos, and clips. Extremely user-friendly, the program works on both stand-alone desktops and within a network, and can aid not only in the storage, but also the teaching of a language. It is blank in its original form, allowing each user, each community to record and store their languages however they want to. Miromaa is protected by a secure network and a user-password system, and also has a learning tab, where you can access the information stored and begin learning right away.

In Arwabakal, Miromaa appropriately means "save." This program, indeed, might be the most effective way to save many dying oral languages--languages that can't otherwise be preserved after the last speaker passes away. Currently in Australia, Miromaa is used around Queensland, in New South Wales, and Victoria. Its developers hope to get it out to at least thirty eight language areas in the near future.

Miromaa, in my opinion, is a great and creative effort, but it will not be enough of an effort to save many languages. Many communities of indigenous speakers have neither the computer access nor the technological knowledge to make use of Miromaa, and most countries will not have the funds to support such an effort (especially poor, underdeveloped nations in Africa, where indigenous languages are in the most danger). As an effort to preserve cultural identity, however, Miromaa can help provide great insight into communities' history, customs, and views of the natural world: by listening to and analyzing the information each community chooses to record in their program, researchers, scholars and anyone interested can peek back into the past and pinpoint that community's most significant outlooks, beliefs, and values. This will allow to study these communities as building blocks of the larger community, city or country they together made up, and help us better understand this larger community as a whole.


Sources I used for information:

• The ACRA website
• How technology can save dying indigenous languages