Discovering Mafea: texts, grammar and lexicon
The Endangered Language Documentation Programme (ELDP) provides grants worldwide for the documentation of endangered languages and knowledge. Grantees create audiovisual collections with transcription and translations of endangered languages and practices. These collections are preserved and made freely available through the Endangered Languages Archive (ELAR).
This project proposes to record and describe Mafea, an Austronesian language spoken by about 200 people on Mafea island, northern Vanuatu. To date, the only publication about the language is a 300-word list collected by Jacques Guy and published in Tryon 1976. Two objectives guide this research: (i) to produce linguistic documentation for the Mafea language, in the form of a descriptive grammar, a lexicon, and a collection of digitized (and subsequently glossed) texts; and (ii) to convert digital documentation into literacy material (such as story books), in order to assist Mafea-speaking children and adults in developing L1 literacy skills
Primary investigator: Valerie Guerin
Project Details
Location: Vanuatu, Melanesia, Oceania
Organiser(s):
Endangered Languages Documentation Programme
Project partner(s): University of Hawai'I at Manoa
Funder(s):
Arcadia
Funding received: £12,292.00
Commencement Date: 01/2001
Project Status: Completed
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