Creation of an audiovisual fund of endangered languages of the indigenous peoples of the North

In 2022, within the framework of the state program of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) “Preservation and development of state and official languages in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) for 2020-2024”, approved by Decree of the Government of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) No. 355 dated September 15, 2022, a project “Creation of an audiovisual fund of the linguistic, literary and cultural heritage of the peoples of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia)” is being implemented.

The responsible main manager of budget funds for this project of the state program of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) “Preservation and development of state and official languages ​​in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) for 2020-2024” is the Ministry of Culture and Spiritual Development of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). The responsible executor of the project is the Institute for Humanitarian Research and Problems of Indigenous Peoples of the North of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

The purpose of the project: creation of an audiovisual fund of the linguistic, literary and cultural heritage of the peoples of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), fixing the use and internal structure of endangered languages ​​in the form of a collection of transcribed speech samples of various genres, synchronized with media files (audio and video) and linguistic data on local variants of dialects and dialects of the Even language.

The goal of the audiovisual fund is to systematize and classify the linguistic and folklore materials available to the performers according to the language of different local groups of Evens: samples of everyday speech, folklore material (nimkans, fairy tale and non-fairy-tale prose, small genres of folklore, ritual folklore, songwriting of Evens) , designed to fill the gap that exists in the Even dialectology and folklore. Previously unpublished linguistic and folklore material has been introduced into scientific circulation.

The description of the language of the territorial groups of the Evens of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), which live in 13 districts, is presented. The Even audio and video materials are provided in the text interpretation which is in the phonetic transcription accepted in the Even dialectology and are accompanied by translations into Russian. Reproduction of texts is provided without any distortion and literary processing, with the obligatory preservation of the features of the Even speech and dialectal forms of the language.

The documentation of linguistic and folklore materials collected from the Yukaghirs of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) living in the Nizhnekolymsky region was made. Audio and video materials in the tundra Yukagir language are provided in text transcription and are accompanied by translations into Russian.

Currently, the content is in the process of being posted on the website of the Institute for Humanitarian Research and Problems of Indigenous Peoples of the North of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.