Itelmen language
During a meeting with community members of Kovran in 1993, Erich Kasten and his team were urged to devote their attention to the preservation of the endangered Itelmen language. In the following years, he recorded texts in this language with its few surviving speakers (see below). Together with Klavdiia Khaloimova and Michael Dürr he produced learning materials using new digital media. School books were initially printed, after which audio and video material on CD followed in 2001 and, since 2015, on DVD, as well as an electronic dictionary with examples of different linguistic variants. These educational tools are also available in open access on the Internet.
The fieldwork for documenting Itelmen language were accompanied by several workshops in Germany and on Kamchatka. At these workshops, experiences with the implementation of the learning materials were discussed with local pedagogues and scientists in order to further optimise them.
In 2008, the project was entered in the UNESCO Register of Good Practice in Language Preservation.
Recordings in Itelmen language:
- Remembrances of my childhood in Sedanka (Valentina Uspenskaia)
- Remembrances of my childhood in Moroshechnoe (Galina Zaporotskaia)
- Remembrances of a trip to the reindeer herders (Georgi Zaporotski)
- Kutkh and Miti (Liudmila Pravdoshina)
- Tylval (Agrafena Ivashova)
- Karalka (Vera Khan)
- Itelmen songs (Tat'iana Gutorova)
These Itelmen language recordings are also stored under the title Documentation of the Itelmen Language in Kamchatka (Kasten, Erich 2019) at the Endangered Languages Archive (ELAR), SOAS, London. On its Deposit page the project is presented in more detail.
Itelmen Talking Dictionary
Editors: Michael Dürr (FU Berlin) and Erich Kasten
The online Itelmen Talking Dictionary presented here includes about 550 entries useful for both educational and research purposes. The Russian edition is intended primarily for schools and for interested others in Kamchatka. It provides an easy-to-use means to access valuable sound documentation from the last speakers of the Itelmen language.
The following publications on Itelmen language are available on this website:
- Istoriko-etnograficheskoe uchebnoe posobie po itel'menskogo yazyku (Historicalethnographical teaching materials for the Itelmen language).
- Itelmen Language and Culture
- Metodicheskie rekomendatsii (materialy) uchiteliu itel'menskogo yazyka. (Methodical recommendations [materials] for the teacher of Itelmen language.
- Itel'menskie skazki – sobrannye V. I. Iochel'sonom v 1910-1911 gg. (Itelmen texts - collected by V. I. Jochelson 1910-1911)
- Itel’menskie teksty (Itelmen texts)
- Govoriashchii itel’menskii slovar’ (Itelmen talking dictionary)
In Kamchatka, in particular Viktor Ryzhkov strives to preserve the Itelmen language by offering language courses in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. The beginnings of his work were supported by the Society for Threatened Peoples and the Foundation for Siberian Cultures.