OUR GREATEST CONSERVATION CHALLENGE

Most of the world's languages have never been written down anywhere or scientifically described. We do not even know what we stand to lose- for science, for humanity, for posterity-when languages die. An immense edifice of human knowledge, painstakingly assembled over millennia by countless minds, is eroding, vanishing into oblivion.

VOICES

Despite the fact that spoken word comes before literacy; documenting languages in its oral form is rare.
Perhaps it is time to use the resources we have to document what we can.

THE SCRIPT: THE NORTH WIND AND THE SUN

The North Wind and the Sun is an Aesop fable used by the International Phonetic Association for phonetic descriptions of languages to illustrate spoken languages. It goes like this...

"The North Wind and the Sun were disputing which was the stronger, when a traveler came along wrapped in a warm cloak.
They agreed that the one who first succeeded in making the traveler take his cloak off should be considered stronger than the other.
Then the North Wind blew as hard as he could, but the more he blew the more closely did the traveler fold his cloak around him;
and at last the North Wind gave up the attempt. Then the Sun shined out warmly, and immediately the traveler took off his cloak.
And so the North Wind was obliged to confess that the Sun was the stronger of the two."

RECORD & UPLOAD YOURS

Upload your version (language or dialect) of The North Wind and the Sun

TRANSCRIBE

Transcribe your audio or help transcribe others!

BROWSE AND LISTEN

Try listening to what others have recorded.

SEARCH AND CONNECT

Find and connect with others who speak the same languages as you do .

RATE

Rate the recording on quality.

How you can help...

Below are recordings of the fable The North Wind and the Sun.

Record yourself, grandparent or a native speaker, upload it and share it with others.

The objective is to create an archive of dying languages.

Click on a bar below to listen or upload your own version, add tags to your audio to make it searchable.

Note, this site is still in early stages so expect a few bugs. I welcome any bug reports, comments, suggestions and criticism to the email address below.

Thank you.

---

Katy

info@pangr.org

http://pangr.org

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