Author: Mieke Hofmeyr

Ms Andiswa Bukula is the isiXhosa Researcher for SADiLaR. As a researcher, she is passionate about her field of research and works towards a better future for the isiXhosa language in a digital learning space.

She is currently working on two articles. One with Dr. Roald Eiselen on the use of Named Entity Recognizers in the isiXhosa. The second article which she will be submitting for the writing retreat in June, is with a colleague from UNISA, Mlamli Diko, which will be looking at the representation of female characters in the isiXhosa drama book, Indlala inamanyala.

Author: Respect Mlambo (SADiLaR Xitsonga Researcher)

This blog is written to describe the interjection functions as part of speech in Xitsonga and the notion it expresses. Interjections in Xitsonga, as in other languages, are used to express the present mental state of the speaker.

Manghenelo

Rihlamari i xihluvi xa mbulavulo lexi kongomisaka eka marito lama ma tirhisawaka ku komba kumbe ku humelerisa matitwelo ma xivulavuri hi xiyimo xo karhi xa nkarhi wolowo. Ameka & Wilkins (2006:2), va hlamusela rihlamari hi mikhuva lowu:

Interjections are words which conventionally constitute utterances by themselves and express a speaker’s current mental state or reaction or attitude towards an element in the linguistic or extra-linguistic context.

Author: Nomsa Skosana (isiNdebele Researcher)

The literary history of isiNdebele

(Skhosana, 2003)

The blog trace back to the history of the first few written work in isiNdebele, it also shows the years in which isiNdebele was firstly introduced in schools as the language of teaching and learning in the area that was formerly known as KwaNdebele. This history was written by the late Dr. P.B Skhosana in 2003 in the journal article titled “The literary history of isiNdebele.”

Author: Mmasibidi Setaka (SADiLaR Sesotho Researcher)

The South African Centre for Digital Language Resources (SADiLaR) organised a workshop (originally expected to be held at the LREC 2020 conference in Marseille, France) in the field of African Indigenous Language Resources. This workshop aimed at bringing together researchers who are interested in showcasing their research and thereby boosting the field of African indigenous languages. It provided an overview of the current state-of-the-art and emphasises availability of African indigenous language resources, including both data and tools. Additionally, it allowed for information sharing among researchers interested in African indigenous languages as well as starting discussions on improving the quality and availability of the resources. Many African indigenous languages currently have no or very limited resources available and, additionally, they are often structurally quite different from more well-resourced languages, requiring the development and use of specialised techniques. By bringing together researchers from different fields (e.g., (computational) linguistics, sociolinguistics, language technology) to discuss the development of language resources for African indigenous languages, we hoped the workshop would boost research in this field.