Documentation of Baba'l, a Bantu language from the Grassfields of Cameroon

The Endangered Language Documentation Programme (ELDP) provides grants worldwide to for the linguistic documentation of endangered language and knowledge. Grantees create multimedia collection of endangered languages. These collections are preserved and made freely available through the Endangered Languages Archive (ELAR) housed at the library of SOAS University of London.

Baba'1 is a non-written language spoken by a community of people in the village of Baba'1, in the Ndop plain, North West province of Cameroon. Work has started on the phonetics and phonology of the language and collecting audio and video data in July 2005. The community and especially the chief of the village and the school teacher are very much concerned with the preservation of their language and traditional stories, and they have supported the project. The field trip enables the collection of more systematic data from a wider variety of speakers and situations, and more cultural data. Primary investigator: Anne Vilain

Project Details


Location: Cameroon, Middle Africa, Africa Organiser(s): Endangered Languages Documentation Programme Project partner(s): CNRS - Institut de la Communication Parlee (UMR 5009), University Stendhal Grenoble Funder(s): Arcadia Funding received: £7,857.00 Commencement Date: 01/2002
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