Our Correspondent
Dimapur | January 16
The Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL), Mysore, under the aegis of Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India, has undertaken the project of preparing learners’ grammars and dictionaries of all the languages spoken in Nagaland. For the preparation of the first phase of the Project, the CIIL will be organizing a seven-day workshop from February 16-22 at Central Institute of Hindi, Dimapur. The inauguration of the weeklong workshop was held today at the premises of the Central Institute of Hindi, Dimapur in the presence of Professor Awadesh Kumar Mishra, Director, Central Institute of Indian Languages; Dr. Sivaramakrishna, Reader cum Research Officer, CIIL, Mysore who will be the coordinator of the workshop; and Dr. Ramnivas Sahu, Director, Central Institute of Hindi (Regional Centre), Dimapur as the local coordinator of the workshop.
Central Government funded, CIIL project of learners’ grammars and dictionaries will cover all the 17 tribal languages of Nagaland. The first phase of the project will cover the larger speaking languages, which are Ao, Angami, and Lotha in preparing English-Ao-Hindi, English-Angami-Hindi, and English-Lotha-Hindi trilingual learners’ dictionaries. The remaining Naga languages will be prepared in the second phase of the project during April-May 2013. The Central Instituted of Indian Languages have already taken steps on the importance of preservation of Naga languages spoken in Nagaland, and as the State Government may not have funds for such projects, it will conduct more workshops, seminars, and conferences to prepare dictionaries, grammars, and phonetic readers in Naga languages. Through the workshops, it will provide experts to help complete orthographies and grammars, and all assistance needed in developing and publishing curriculum materials. The Central Government will provide grant-in-aid for publication of lingual literature. The CIIL is also working on documentation of folklores in Naga languages, development of materials for evaluation and testing in Naga languages, translation of knowledge texts from English to Naga languages and vice-versa and preparation of bilingual children’s literature in English and Naga languages.
Speaking at the brief function, Director, CIIL, Mysore, said that the purpose of undertaking the project was to preserve and document tribal languages of Nagaland in the form of Learners’ Dictionaries. The impact of Globalization has endangered regional languages and dialects. He also reported that out of 196 Indian languages declared endangered by UNESCO, 89 languages are from the NE region, which included 14 languages of Nagaland, namely- Ao, Angami, Chang, Chakru, Kheza, Khiamnungan, Konyak, Lotha, Phom, Pochuri, Rengma, Sangtam, Yimchungru, and Zeme. He said that the reason for the dying out of the mother tongue is the lack of use of the language at home, education, and mass communication. The Lingua Franca of the younger generation in Nagaland is English, Nagamese, and Hindi (as most are stationed outside the State for studies) because mother tongue is not empowered, as it is not used in larger domain. Hence, the idea of coming up with dictionaries, which is a form of documentation will help preserve the endangered languages as it can be used for references, and in educational institutes, he said.
For the first phase of the project, Lecturers, academicians, scholars, who teach and write in languages of Ao, Angami, and Lotha attended the brief inaugural function. They are also the participants of the weeklong workshop who will assist in translation.
