Tag Archives: Endangered languages

Module 3: Post 3: Language Revitalization, Auckland University

This website belongs to the International Centre of Language Revitalization of the Auckland Technological University, New Zealand.  The Maori, Indigenous people of New Zealand have been successfully revitalizing their language for decades.  This University center does not only concentrate on minority languages in New Zealand but is helping to create ways to save minority languages around the world.  Their goals are to create online learning programs for Indigenous languages around the world, use technology to archive and document traditional aspects of endangered languages, use technology as a resource for communities to access information and promote programs for linguistic researchers to work with minority communities around the world.

This website seems to be hopeful in revitalizing as many languages globally as possible through creating online communities and providing resources online. However, I wonder if there are Indigenous communities who resist “saving” their cultural knowledge online.  Some cultures may be opposed to sharing their sacred traditional with outside researchers.  I think it is a good initiative to save and record endangered languages.  However, I also question how successful they are at revitalizing languages than simply preserving languages in an online “museum.”  I think for language revitalization to occur it needs to be used and applied in everyday situations.  This is the difficulty many minority language speakers are facing as the young generations are encouraged to use a dominant language for a more secure future therefore losing their traditional tongue.

http://languagerevive.org/about-us/goals