Language Documentation: Tools and Digital Technologies

Endangered languages are disappearing rapidly, making systematic documentation more critical than ever. This course guides you through the foundational concepts, modern software tools, and ethical frameworks required to build high-quality, sustainable language archives. What you'll learn: • Understand the core principles, terminology, and ethical considerations of language documentation. • Learn to use specialized software like ELAN for transcription and time-aligned annotation. • Explore phonetic analysis tools such as Praat to analyze speech sounds. • Apply lexicon-building workflows using tools like FieldWorks Language Explorer. • Structure linguistic metadata using modern industry standards. • Configure secure digital preservation workflows and collaborative cloud archives. Starting with fundamental linguistic concepts, the course transitions into step-by-step written explanations for configuring software, managing data lifecycles, and ensuring long-term community access. This course is designed for beginners, aspiring linguists, anthropologists, and community advocates with no prior technical experience. Begin your journey into digital language preservation today.