How the Wikitongues Project Actively Seeks to Save Endangered Languages From Complete Extinction

Mariano Carranza of Great Big Story accompanied Wikitongues founder Daniel Bögre Udell around different New York City neighborhoods to record speakers of various languages that need rescue complete extinction. While Urdell is based in New York, the project itself stretches around the world with hundreds of volunteers who are helping to revive the languages of their ancestors for their children.

With only a handful of speakers and no active movement to revive the language, they could be lost to time. Thankfully, Daniel Bögre Udell is listening. The co-founder and director of Wikitongues is working with volunteers from all around the world to create an open video archive of people speaking and signing rarely used languages so they can be preserved and passed on to future generations.

Here are some examples of such recordings for Wikitongues.