Nigerian Language Oral History Documentation Project/Evaluation Report 2021/Key findings

Nigerian Language Oral History Documentation Project

Summary

Limitations

Inputs

Outputs

Outcomes

Key findings

Appendix

What did we learn about Nigerian Language Oral History Documentation Project in terms of impact?
We examined the results in terms of the health and status of the Nigerian languages, fluency in the languages by speakers, the resources needed to learn these languages and how speakers prefer learning any Nigerian language.
Read this page to learn the most important takeaways and recommended next steps.

Learning about impact	Most useful resources for learning the languages off-reserve Online videos (for example, YouTube, Wikimedia Commons or Vimeo), and audiovisuals recording were recorded by over 62% of the survey responded as the the best resources to learn the languages. This shows that digitization of languages in terms of audiovisuals recording and online videos are effective ways to learn the languages, and as such impactful. The result shows that while face-to-face classes are effective, they are not as effective as audiovisuals and online videos. Access to resources Accesibility to resources to learning Nigerian languages Many speakers have access to limited centers. The results shows that speakers have access to language and cultural resources, finalized writing systems such as books and dictionaries than language recordings and oral histories that are archived. Over 80% of survey respondent reported that there are no enough Nigerian language learning resources (teachers, mentors, booklets, dictionaries) accessible to those who live off-reserve. Audiovisuals recording such as oral history audiovisuals and online videos might be helpful for those who live off-reserve. Health and status of Nigerian languages Over 50% of campaign responded stated that Nigerian languages are endangered. This suggests that more supports are needed for these languages to grow and thrive. 28% of respondent reported that the languages are severely endangered. Less than 16% of respondent stated that the languages are safe. According to the respondent, Nigerian languages are only spoken at home and in wider cultural setting. Less than 13% of respondent reported that Nigerian language is taught in school and use for business transactions. This is evident that acceptability in business is very low. 18% of respondent reported that Nigerian languages are mostly spoken by grand parent and older generation. This suggest that these languages are not very popular among the younger generation. Nigerian oral history and language revitalization Nigerian Oral History Documentation Project Evaluation Report Over 98% of survey responded reported that Nigerian oral history and language revitalization should be prioritized. This suggest that our work on oral history documentation of Nigerian languages is valuable and the effort should be prioritized and sustained. Notes
How easily can this project be replicated?	Roughly 6,500 languages are spoken in the world today. Language is one of the core values of people and identity of any nation. It's been established by the United Nation that in “every two weeks, at least one indigenous language vanishes, leading to two language extinctions each month”. This project could easily be replicated in other countries. Although, the cost of implementation may be high if the services of professional documentary filmmaker and cinematographer are sort.
Challenges	Below are the challenges faced during the project implementation. Traveling from community-to-community may poses some risk if security measures aren't adhere to Occasional disruption by miscreants who may be demanding money or something similar from the project team Subtitling into English and other large languages such as French, Arabic, Spanish, etc. could be very difficult. Accessibility to some rural areas. Most of the native speakers lives in villages and some of these villages are not motorable Poor accessibility to internet network. Some villages have little or no internet services at all and this makes internet and other facilities inaccessible. .