Alaska is home to North America's two largest language families, comprising at least twenty distinct languages. Languages of the Inuit-Yupik-Unangan family are spoken from the furthest reaches of the Aleutian Islands across the Arctic to Greenland. The Dene, or Athabascan, languages are spoken from Interior Alaska down through Western Canada to the Desert Southwest of the United States. Yet it is in Alaska where one finds the greatest diversity among these great language families, for it is in Alaska that these languages developed and evolved before spreading east and south across the continent.

Modern documentation of the Alaska Native languages began with the arrival of Co-PI Michael Krauss at the University of Alaska in 1960. Krasss' work on the Tanana language changed the field of Athabascan historical linguistics. His work with the last speakers of Eyak creating lasting documentation which today serves as the primary record of the language. And his work with Central Yup'ik (Yugestun) writing systems paved the way for decades of Yup'ik language education materials. Yet arguably, Dr. Krauss' most significant contribution to Alaska Native languages was his early recognition of the need to gather and preserve everything written in or about Alaska Native languages. Over time this collection would grow to include more than 15,000 documents and 5,000 audio recordings. In 2009 the collection was given official status within the University of Alaska as the Alaska Native Language Archive. 

The goal of this project was to make the vast collection of language materials housed in ANLA available in digital form, both for the purposes of long-term preservation and in order to facilitate access and use. To achieve this goal the project undertook three primary tasks:

• Cataloguing of the collection to facilitate resource discovery.
• Digitization of the manuscript collection and storage of resulting digital files.
• Creation of a dedicated digital repository infrastructure.

The resulting repository can be accessed at www.uaf.edu/anla. During fiscal year 2016, 30,534 sessions were initiated by 23,221 unique online visitors to the repository, viewing a total of 75,246 pages and downloading 15,792 digital files.

One of the great benefits of digitization is the ability to easily distribute multiple copies of materials at almost no additional cost, thus enabling the creation of Community Language Archives across Alaska. During the course of this project ANLA worked with several communities to repatriate language materials which then served as the basis for a locally based repository. These include:

• Alutiiq Museum, Kodiak
• C'ek'aedi Hwnax Ahtna Language Archive, Copper Center
• Dinjii Zhuh K'yaa Gwich'in Language Archive, Fort Yukon
• William L. Paul, Sr., Archives, Juneau.

Returning these materials to local communities has not only increased access but also provided greater community control of the materials. Community language archives are able to work closely with speakers and community members to enrich descriptions of existing materials, while at the same time ingesting new resources held by community members and not yet deposited in an archive. In this way the original ANLA materials provide a catalyst for further archival preservation and increased availability of language resources.

Through the digitization efforts conducted under this project ANLA has become a world-leader in a global effort to create digital language archives. As a founding member of the Digital Endangered Languages and Musics Archiving Network, ANLA strives to promote greater interoperability between language archives and thus create access to language resources for small and endangered languages across the world. In 2012 ANLA became a part of the Alaska & Polar Regions Collections & Archives at the University of Alaska Fairbanks Rasmuson Library, allowing ANLA to share its considerable experience in digital preservation and access with other archival departments. And in February 2015 ANLA staff were invited to share recommendations for digitization of arctic language resources at the Arctic Indigenous Languages Assessment Symposium in Ottawa.

Throughout this project ANLA has also provided outreach to Alaska Native language communities related to digitization and Native languages, both by providing training in digital heritage preservation and by conducting workshops on utilizing ANLA reources. 

Today, Alaska's Indigenous languages are in a precarious state. Some are remembered by only a handful of elderly speakers, and few are being learned by children. Yet a new generation is fighting back, determined to reclaim their linguistic heritage. Grant programs alone cannot bring back the languages of Native Alaska, and archival manuscripts cannot create new speakers. Nonetheless, by providing digital access to the ANLA collection, this NSF-funded effort has changed the linguistic landscape in Alaska. The ANLA digital repository now serves more than 20,000 users per year, contributing to a new future for Alaska's Native languages.

Last Modified: 11/09/2017
Modified by: Gary Holton