Request for Proposals: Kpelle transcription & translation

RFP

Athinkra, LLC invites qualified translators of Liberian Kpelle to submit proposals for consideration to transcribe and translate content hosted by the Archives of Traditional Music at Indiana University. A selected portion of the available content consisting of interviews conducted about the use of the Kpelle script needs to be transcribed and translated into English. A complete one-minute sample transcription and translation must be submitted with the proposal. It can be drawn from https://media.dlib.indiana.edu/media_objects/zw12zt43q, Section 22/EC5330, after the first 40 seconds of the 27 minute, 42 second section. The due date is December 31, 2023 at 11:59 PM Eastern Standard Time, for submissions to be sent in .docx format to <zenodotus[at]gmail[dot]com>. The total scope of the project is envisioned to involve transcription and translation of at least a full 40 minutes from recordings.

Thanks so much!
Charles Riley

Letter in Loma from Pema Toupou

I received a six-page letter in the Loma script from the writer Pema Toupou, who I met in Conakry in 2009. It’s on my list to transcribe this and hopefully come up with a translation, maybe over the next couple of months as I find time for it. In the meantime, enjoy!

friendly-loma-chartDownload

ꛞ꛰ ꛤ꛰ ꛜꛄ꛰ꛜꛄ꛰ꛄ꛰ꛑ ꛅꚧꚳ꛰ ꚳ꛰ꛤꚩꚤꚳ꛰

This book, just published in 2022, is now available in select libraries. It is a small volume of Bamum poetry in French, English, and the Bamum script: https://www.worldcat.org/title/1343948386?oclcNum=1343948386

Presentation by Dr. Deborah Anderson given at LocWorld 46

Here is a link to a PDF of a presentation given by Deborah Anderson of the University of California-Berkeley to a group of localization experts at a conference last year, on the subject of African scripts. Enjoy!

Dr. John Gay, 1928-2022 and Dr. David Dalby, 1933-2022

Both men were deeply influential in their fields, and although I never met either of them in person, I have benefited greatly from their insights. They leave behind strong legacies. A finding aid to Dr. Gay’s papers may be found here: https://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/findingaids/view?doc.view=entire_text&docId=VAB8799, and a list of Dr. Dalby’s publications may be found here: https://sites.google.com/site/daviddalbyorg/publications.

J. Moore Crossey, 1932-2022

We remember Moore’s contributions and honor him. Here is a link to his obituary: https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/nhregister/name/john-crossey-obituary?id=36073048

Loma texts from Wozi

There is a set of Liberian Loma texts that I received in PDF form from a linguist who gave them to me on USB at a conference in Paris in 2017. I have checked on possible successor institutions to the literacy center that likely produced them, and have heard no objection to posting the texts here.

UPDATE: I have just come to realize that I was mistaken about the provenance. The images of texts that I received in Paris are a different set of files.

UPDATE #2: The content above has been edited.

UPDATE #3: Yale has secured permission to publicly upload the digitized microfilm of 132 Loma texts from Wozi. They can be found here: https://collections.library.yale.edu/catalog/32605000, here: https://collections.library.yale.edu/catalog/32602977, and here: https://collections.library.yale.edu/catalog/32603148, from three separate reels, with a table of contents on the first reel.

Two-part interview series coming up

The Library of Congress will be hosting an interview in two parts with James Armstrong, a former field director who served in Nairobi, on January 6th and January 20th. Here are the links:

 January 6, 2022

https://www.loc.gov/item/event-403270/building-africana-collections-a-visit-to-the-nairobi-field-office/2022-01-06/

January 20, 2022

https://www.loc.gov/item/event-403274/building-africana-collections-encounters-with-african-scholars-and-researchers/2022-01-20/

More memorials

As 2021 gives way to 2022, let us remember more of those who have passed on in recent months:

-November 11, 2021. F. W. de Klerk, former president of South Africa, who shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Nelson Mandela for bringing about an end to apartheid. He declined a Harper Fellowship at Yale Law School in 1997.

-November 29, 2021. Robert Farris Thompson, professor emeritus of art history at Yale, specializing in cultural flows from Africa across the Atlantic.

-December 15, 2021. bell hooks, who taught at Yale as an assistant professor of African and Afro-American studies, as well as English.

-December 24, 2021. Kenya Siana Flash, a librarian of government and political science at Yale, passed away.

-December 26, 2021. The Most Reverend Desmond Tutu, Archbishop of Cape Town.

-January 2, 2022. Richard Leakey, former director of the National Museums of Kenya.

Update on Yale Zoom series on Ethiopian & Eritrean cataloging and digitization

Since March of this year, a series of sessions has been hosted on a quarterly schedule covering various aspects of metadata and text processing in Ethiopic script. The materials from each session can be found here:

1.) Presentations by Gabeyehu Adugna, Tesfaye Wolde-Medhin, Charles Riley, and Pietro Liuzzo from March 13, 2021: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1enKxD9L1qh35C94txWMPr0YMNb0gcwsq

2.) Presentations by Isabelle Zaugg, Daniel Yacob, and Martha Yifiru Tachbelie, from June 26, 2021: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B676k1sJgAM

3.) Presentations by Steve Delamarter, Jeremy Brown, and Kaleab Demeke (Part 1), from September 25, 2021: https://youtu.be/PFoV7FdVJHk

Presentations by Kesis Melaku Terefe and Ashlee Benson (Part 2), from September 25, 2021: https://youtu.be/xRl_gkWbkN0

Presentations by Jonah Sandford, Ralph Lee, and Garry Jost (Part 3), from September 25, 2021: https://youtu.be/CtoslFUll3U

Presentations by Carolina Melis, Dawit Muluneh, and Jeremy Brown (Part 4) from September 25, 2021: https://youtu.be/pk1Ae01dhlg