Indigenous tap new app to save old languages (fwd link)

[Phillip E Cash Cash]

*Indigenous tap new app to save old languages
*
A modern texting app released in Canada allows indigenous people to
communicate in their native languages.

Renee Lewis Last Modified: 02 Aug 2012 08:50

Concerned about the disappearance of indigenous languages, activist Pena
Elliott thinks a new texting app could be the modern solution to preserving
his native Saanich language.

"This new chat [software] is going to help our more fluent speakers a lot,
because we're able to type it in, we're able to think in the language,"
says Elliott.

“It helps you memorise it a lot more if you use it every day.”

FirstVoices Chat, an app created for texting in native languages, was
developed by an indigenous technology council on a Canadian native reserve
in British Columbia.

It is the first app to contain custom keyboards for every indigenous
language of Canada, Australia and New Zealand, as well as Navajo - the
largest indigenous language group in the US.

Access full article below:
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2012/07/201272813513536259.html
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