Enhancing understanding: India turns to AI to capture its 121 languages
India is building datasets in local languages to develop AI-based services and tools that non-English speakers struggle to access. RINA CHANDRAN, of the Thomson Reuters Foundation, reports…
New Mexican Spanish: A unique American dialect, survives mostly in prayers
GIOVANNA DELL’ORTO, of Associated Press, reports on the role Catholic brotherhoods are playing in preserving a dialect which evolved from the mixing of Spanish and Indigenous languages…
Access to language: Young Africans go online to preserve local languages, fight COVID-19
KIM HARRISBERG and KRISTI EATON, of Thomson Reuters Foundation, report…
Hands off our cultural heritage, say world’s Indigenous people
Tbilisi, GeorgiaThomson Reuters Foundation From disappearing languages to selfie-taking tourists at sacred sites, preserving native cultural heritage has become a race against the clock, Indigenous groups said. The suicide of an Indigenous rights activist protesting against Russia’s language policies has highlighted the cultural threats native communities face across the globe as they fight for their […]
ESSAY: HOW THE LOSS OF NATIVE AMERICAN LANGUAGES AFFECTS OUR UNDERSTANDING OF THE NATURAL WORLD
In an article first published on The Conversation, ROSALYN R LAPIER, of The University of Montana, says the loss of languages “can be considered as extreme as the extinction of a plant or an animal”…
Wycliffe looks to begin translations for 10 previously unknown language groups
Bible translation organisation Wycliffe Associates has said it is about to begin work in translating the Scriptures for 10 previously unknown language groups of people living in the Middle East and parts of Asia. The US-based organisation says the groups, which have very few Christians, don’t, as yet, have any of the Bible translated into their […]
Forty-nine languages received Scripture translations in 2017 thanks to work of Bible Societies, says report
Bible Societies around the world assisted in the completion of Scripture translations in 49 languages spoken by more than 580 million people last year, according to data from United Bible Societies. The organisation’s Global Scripture Access Report for 2017 also shows that seven communities – based in Mozambique, Myanmar, South Sudan, Taiwan, Turkmenistan and Vietnam – […]
JESUS film now available in 1,500 languages
The Jesus Film Project recently celebrated the 1,500th language translation of the JESUS film at a remote location in Ethiopia. A crowd of hundreds gathered early last month for the premiere of the Daasanach translation of the film, a language spoken by an ethnic group numbering about 70,000 who live in parts of Ethiopia, Kenya […]
Some 30 language groups – 95 million people – received Scriptures in native tongue for first time in 2016, says United Bible Societies
BIBLE TRANSLATION AROUND THE WORLD: Some 3,655 languages still have no Scriptures in their language according to the latest UBS report. GRAPHIC: United Bible Societies. Lumasaaba speakers of Uganda, Mongondow speakers of Indonesia and Inupiaq speakers of Canada were among 30 different language groups, accounting for some 95 million people, that received at least […]