OLAC Record: Akie in Tanzania – documenting a critically endangered language

OLAC Record
oai:www.mpi.nl:1839_00-0000-0000-0021-766B-4

Metadata

Title: Honey6 - Harvesting honey in a baobab

Honey6

Akie in Tanzania – documenting a critically endangered language

Contributor (researcher): Christa

Contributor (speaker): Bahati

Nkoiseyyo

Coverage: Tanzania

Date: 2014-01-24

Description: Honey is the key issue in the Akie culture. As hunter gatherers, the Akie men collect wild honey in the wilderness. Honey is the basis for the beer they brew. They love honey in every aspect, as food, as the basis for beer, as the main tool for their income. The ancestors can only be calmed with beer made of honey. The traditional bride price is paid in honey. There is a complex interaction with the honey guide in order to find the places where there is plenty of honey ripe to be harvest. Unlike many other bee keeping societies in Africa, Akie collect the honey in the wilderness. They do not use beehives. The baobab tree plays an important role in the honey collection since it’s a tree which bees love to choose as their traditional home. In acrobatic undertakings the Akie men will climb up the baobab to the bee caves, sometimes more than 10 meters above ground. Baobab trees are inherited by the clan. This is also an exception: The basically egalitarian Akie society typically shares items. However there will be severe punishments if an Akie harvests a Baobab which doesn’t belong to his clan. For climbing the Baobab ropes are being made and a ladder made of pegs is hit into the tree.

Akie in Tanzania – documenting a critically endangered language The Akie of Tanzania are a traditional hunter-gatherer society whose language is seriously endangered. The language, presumably a member of the Kalenjin branch of the Southern Nilotic languages, is still actively spoken in three villages of northeastern Tanzania, but the majority language and culture in the Akie-speaking area is Maa (speaking the Maasai dialect), which belongs to the Eastern Nilotic branch of the Nilotic family. The total number of Akie people is estimated at roughly 2500 people, but the number of people still speaking the language is presumably below 200. The massive impact of Maa language, culture, and life style plus the increasing influence of Bantu languages, including Swahili, the national language of Tanzania, contribute to a rapid erosion of the linguistic and ethnic identity of the Akie, as the people themselves are well aware. The present project aims at documenting the Akie language, which is virtually unknown. The project will involve two core researchers, the principal applicant (PA) being Karsten Legère, Universität Wien, and the co-applicant (CA) Christa König, Universität Frankfurt. Both have extensive experience of language documentation in East Africa, and both have contributed to the documentation of endangered African languages in Kenya, Tanzania and Namibia. Whereas the PA has contributed mainly to the documentation of Tanzanian Bantu languages, the PA has contributed to the description of the Maa language (which was the topic of her M.A. and Ph.D. dissertations). In addition, the project will involve intensive cooperation with and participation of colleagues in East Africa, mostly of the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. This participation will involve such domains as linguistics, history, sociology, and musicology. Finally, the project will also involve a Ph.D. student of the University of Dar es Salaam, and a number of Tanzanian field assistants, most of them being Akie people. At the center of documentation work will be the (manual, audio, and video) recording of texts of different genres, conversations, folktales, fables, songs, oral traditions, proverbs, riddles, etc..A second component of field research will be devoted to lexical documentation of semantic fields, in particular of kinship terms, body parts, material culture and artifacts, traditional economy (hunting and gathering), toponyms, greetings, etc. Various special documentation studies within the project will deal with the intimate interaction of Akie people as hunter-gatherers with nature (bees and gathering honey, plant names and uses), gender based issues (food and its preparation, child care and traditional medicine, initiation rites). Furthermore, the project will aim at devising a practical orthography of the Akie language and at preparing a bilingual Akie – Maa dictionary. The original Akie texts to be collected will be edited and translated into the national language Swahili. The project is designed for a three-years’ period. In the first and the second year, both the PA and the CA will be carrying out field research in the Akie-speaking area, while field work is restricted to a shorter research visit to Tanzania.

Bahati prepares everything for harvesting honey, making fire, straw bundle being burned for fumigation, climbing up the baobab, hanging in front of the bee comb, collecting honey, putting the honey into the honey bag, climbing down again

One of two Akie who went to school. Knows how to read and write Akie. Main informant Unmarried Son of Nkuyaki Lekibigo and Nkokooyai Kalisya. Very knowledgable in all respects about nature, honey, hunting, traditional tales, very good singer Successful hunter and honey collector

One of two Akie who went to school. Successful family faher, many children, successful hunter and honey collector, knows how to read and write Akie

Format: video/x-mpeg1

audio/x-wav

text/x-pfsx+xml

text/x-eaf+xml

Identifier: oai:www.mpi.nl:1839_00-0000-0000-0021-766B-4

AZ 86405

Publisher: Karsten Legère

Johann Wolfgang Goethe Universität Frankfurt

Subject: Discourse

Procedural

Mosiro language

Subject (ISO639): mwy

Type: video

audio

OLAC Info

Archive: The Language Archive at the MPI for Psycholinguistics

Description: http://www.language-archives.org/archive/www.mpi.nl

GetRecord: OAI-PMH request for OLAC format

GetRecord: Pre-generated XML file

OAI Info

OaiIdentifier: oai:www.mpi.nl:1839_00-0000-0000-0021-766B-4

DateStamp: 2017-02-14

GetRecord: OAI-PMH request for simple DC format

Search Info
Citation: Christa (researcher); Bahati (speaker); Nkoiseyyo (speaker). 2014-01-24. Karsten Legère.
Terms: area_Africa country_TZ iso639_mwy

Inferred Metadata
Country: Tanzania
Area: Africa

http://www.language-archives.org/item.php/oai:www.mpi.nl:1839_00-0000-0000-0021-766B-4
Up-to-date as of: Wed Apr 12 6:18:54 EDT 2017

Metadata
Title:		Honey6 - Harvesting honey in a baobab
		Honey6
		Akie in Tanzania – documenting a critically endangered language
Contributor (researcher):		Christa
Contributor (speaker):		Bahati
Contributor (speaker):		Nkoiseyyo
Coverage:		Tanzania
Date:		2014-01-24
Description:		Honey is the key issue in the Akie culture. As hunter gatherers, the Akie men collect wild honey in the wilderness. Honey is the basis for the beer they brew. They love honey in every aspect, as food, as the basis for beer, as the main tool for their income. The ancestors can only be calmed with beer made of honey. The traditional bride price is paid in honey. There is a complex interaction with the honey guide in order to find the places where there is plenty of honey ripe to be harvest. Unlike many other bee keeping societies in Africa, Akie collect the honey in the wilderness. They do not use beehives. The baobab tree plays an important role in the honey collection since it’s a tree which bees love to choose as their traditional home. In acrobatic undertakings the Akie men will climb up the baobab to the bee caves, sometimes more than 10 meters above ground. Baobab trees are inherited by the clan. This is also an exception: The basically egalitarian Akie society typically shares items. However there will be severe punishments if an Akie harvests a Baobab which doesn’t belong to his clan. For climbing the Baobab ropes are being made and a ladder made of pegs is hit into the tree.
		Akie in Tanzania – documenting a critically endangered language The Akie of Tanzania are a traditional hunter-gatherer society whose language is seriously endangered. The language, presumably a member of the Kalenjin branch of the Southern Nilotic languages, is still actively spoken in three villages of northeastern Tanzania, but the majority language and culture in the Akie-speaking area is Maa (speaking the Maasai dialect), which belongs to the Eastern Nilotic branch of the Nilotic family. The total number of Akie people is estimated at roughly 2500 people, but the number of people still speaking the language is presumably below 200. The massive impact of Maa language, culture, and life style plus the increasing influence of Bantu languages, including Swahili, the national language of Tanzania, contribute to a rapid erosion of the linguistic and ethnic identity of the Akie, as the people themselves are well aware. The present project aims at documenting the Akie language, which is virtually unknown. The project will involve two core researchers, the principal applicant (PA) being Karsten Legère, Universität Wien, and the co-applicant (CA) Christa König, Universität Frankfurt. Both have extensive experience of language documentation in East Africa, and both have contributed to the documentation of endangered African languages in Kenya, Tanzania and Namibia. Whereas the PA has contributed mainly to the documentation of Tanzanian Bantu languages, the PA has contributed to the description of the Maa language (which was the topic of her M.A. and Ph.D. dissertations). In addition, the project will involve intensive cooperation with and participation of colleagues in East Africa, mostly of the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. This participation will involve such domains as linguistics, history, sociology, and musicology. Finally, the project will also involve a Ph.D. student of the University of Dar es Salaam, and a number of Tanzanian field assistants, most of them being Akie people. At the center of documentation work will be the (manual, audio, and video) recording of texts of different genres, conversations, folktales, fables, songs, oral traditions, proverbs, riddles, etc..A second component of field research will be devoted to lexical documentation of semantic fields, in particular of kinship terms, body parts, material culture and artifacts, traditional economy (hunting and gathering), toponyms, greetings, etc. Various special documentation studies within the project will deal with the intimate interaction of Akie people as hunter-gatherers with nature (bees and gathering honey, plant names and uses), gender based issues (food and its preparation, child care and traditional medicine, initiation rites). Furthermore, the project will aim at devising a practical orthography of the Akie language and at preparing a bilingual Akie – Maa dictionary. The original Akie texts to be collected will be edited and translated into the national language Swahili. The project is designed for a three-years’ period. In the first and the second year, both the PA and the CA will be carrying out field research in the Akie-speaking area, while field work is restricted to a shorter research visit to Tanzania.
		Bahati prepares everything for harvesting honey, making fire, straw bundle being burned for fumigation, climbing up the baobab, hanging in front of the bee comb, collecting honey, putting the honey into the honey bag, climbing down again
		One of two Akie who went to school. Knows how to read and write Akie. Main informant Unmarried Son of Nkuyaki Lekibigo and Nkokooyai Kalisya. Very knowledgable in all respects about nature, honey, hunting, traditional tales, very good singer Successful hunter and honey collector
		One of two Akie who went to school. Successful family faher, many children, successful hunter and honey collector, knows how to read and write Akie
Format:		video/x-mpeg1
		audio/x-wav
		text/x-pfsx+xml
		text/x-eaf+xml
Identifier:		oai:www.mpi.nl:1839_00-0000-0000-0021-766B-4
Identifier:		AZ 86405
Publisher:		Karsten Legère
Publisher:		Johann Wolfgang Goethe Universität Frankfurt
Subject:		Discourse
		Procedural
		Mosiro language
Subject (ISO639):		mwy
Type:		video
Type:		audio
OLAC Info
Archive:		The Language Archive at the MPI for Psycholinguistics
Description:		http://www.language-archives.org/archive/www.mpi.nl
GetRecord:		OAI-PMH request for OLAC format
GetRecord:		Pre-generated XML file
OAI Info
OaiIdentifier:		oai:www.mpi.nl:1839_00-0000-0000-0021-766B-4
DateStamp:		2017-02-14
GetRecord:		OAI-PMH request for simple DC format
Search Info
Citation:		Christa (researcher); Bahati (speaker); Nkoiseyyo (speaker). 2014-01-24. Karsten Legère.
Terms:		area_Africa country_TZ iso639_mwy
Inferred Metadata
Country:		Tanzania
Area:		Africa