Developing Wikipedias in indigenous languages of Mexico

Fri Mar 11 23:05:16 UTC 2011

What you say is true. Wikipedia was conceived in terms of an encyclopedia in everyone's language. 

In practice however an effort to get a localized version requires a significant effort. If there are strong national and language community groups to back it up, then that works in your favor. 

In addition there may be an uphill struggle with Wikimedia if an effort falters. My impression from discussions about African language Wikipedias is that there is a line of thinking among some that it is better to delete Wikipedia editions that are showing no activity than to outreach to try to encourage activity. 

The case of most African language Wikipedias (dubbed at one point "Afrophone wikis") is somewhat different than that of most indigenous languages of, say, the Americas, but the issues encountered by them and views expressed about their development may be of interest - see the Afrophonewikis Yahoogroup (via yahoo.com - I don't have the URL handy). 

HTH

Don

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

-----Original Message-----
From:         Neskie Manuel <neskiem at GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       Indigenous Languages and Technology <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Date:         Thu, 10 Mar 2011 22:38:55 
To: <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Reply-To:     Indigenous Languages and Technology <ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU>
Subject: Re: [ILAT] Developing Wikipedias in indigenous languages of Mexico

Weytk,

Wikipedia is a great place to put knowledge that you want the world to
know, and it is 100% localizable into any language.

On a related note. There is this wikipedia page that lists all of the
language regulators

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_language_regulators

I saw that the Secwepemc Language Authority wasn't on there, so I put
it on there.  I would suggest someone take some time to add your
language authority to the list.  =)

On Wed, Mar 9, 2011 at 10:22 AM, Rudy Troike <rtroike at email.arizona.edu> wrote:
>
> Date: Wed, 9 Mar 2011 09:15:09 -0700
> From: Leigh Thelmadatter <osamadre at hotmail.com>
>
> I'm involved with a project among Wikimedia México, Red Nacional de Jóvenes
> Indígenas, ed de Comunicadores Boca de Polen and the Escuela Nacional de
> Antropología e Historía (affiliated with INAH) to develop and promote the
> creation and maintenance of Wikipedias in the various indigenous languages of
> this country. We have an informal agreement with the Instituto Nacional de
> Lenguas Indigenas, but are working on formalizing it. Essentially, it will
> involve not only training and encouraging speakers of these languages to
> write articles, but also to develop keyboards, operating systems and
> interfaces with Wikipedia in the target languages. For most of the languages,
> the first main challenge is to come up with a writing system, as many do not
> have a standard and many, like Mixteco, have a number of dialects.
>
> Anyone who might be interested in this project are welcome to look at
> Wikimedia México's page at
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_M%C3%A9xico  and especially the
> minutes of the last meeting on 4 March here
> (in Spanish)
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_M%C3%A9xico/Lenguas_de_M%C3%A9xico/Minuta_4_de_marzo_de_2011
>
> Or feel free to contact me. There's a very good chance we will need some
> expert linguistic advice!
>
> Leigh
>
>
> Darn! The organization is not involved with indigenous languages in Mexico.  Im involved with a project among Wikimedia México, Red Nacional de Jóvenes Indígenas, ed de Comunicadores Boca de Polen and the Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historía (affiliated with INAH) to develop and promote the creation and maintenance of Wikipedias in the various indigenous languages of this country. We have an informal agreement with the Instituto Nacional de Lenguas Indigenas, but are working on formalizing it. Essentially, it will involve not only training and encouraging speakers of these languages to write articles, but also to develop keyboards, operating systems and interfaces with Wikipedia in the target languages. For most of the languages, the first main challenge is to come  up with a writing system, as many do not have a standard and many, like Mixteca, have a lot of dialects.
>
> Anyone who might be interested in this project are welcome to look at Wikimedia México's page at  http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_M%C3%A9xico  and especially the minutes of the last meeting on 4 March here (in Spanish) http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_M%C3%A9xico/Lenguas_de_M%C3%A9xico/Minuta_4_de_marzo_de_2011
>
> Or feel free to contact me. Theres a very good chance we will need some expert linguistic advice!
>
> Leigh
>
>> Date: Tue, 8 Mar 2011 22:00:04 -0700
>> From: rtroike at EMAIL.ARIZONA.EDU
>> Subject: Foundation for Endangered Languages newsletter
>> To: UAESL-L at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
>>
>> Click on this link:
>>
>> http://www.ogmios.org/ogmios/Ogmios_043.pdf
>
>

-- 
Neskie Manuel
http://neskiemanuel.ath.cx
Tel: (250) 679-2821
SIP: mac at sip.ca2.link2voip.com
Skype: neskiemanuel
Twitter: @neskiem
Identi.ca: http://identi.ca/neskie