*"Konkani going places; first Wikimania, next Wikipedia" - DNA / Dainik
Bhaskar*
http://daily.bhaskar.com/article/BAN-konkani-going-places-first-wikimania-n…
http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_konkani-to-be-heard-in-wikipedia-after…
*Mangalore/Bangalore: For the first time, the world will hear Konkani spoken
by people in the coastal states of Karnataka, Kerala, Goa, Maharashtra and
Gujarat. And it will be heard at Wikimania, the world conference on language
interface and web media being organised by the Wikipedia group at Haifa in
Israel starting on August 2.*
*
*
*For the first time, Konkani will be interfaced with other Indian languages,
which will be shown to the world. Thanks to the research done on
inter-script transliteration programme by the Konkani Language and Cultural
Foundation at the World Konkani Centre located here, experts around the
world will have a glimpse of the rich literature, traditions, music, theatre
and culture of Konkani people in 'plug in' form.*
*
*
*"It means a whole lot of things to the development of Konkani. The new
research programme, which has fructified just recently, will open a new
world to the Konkani language and culture," said director of the Konkani
Language and Cultural Foundation Basti Vaman Shenoy.*
*
*
*"For the first time, Konkani language will break away from the barriers of
scripts, giving it a universal acceptance and understanding," Shenoy said.*
*
*
*Two Konkani scholars Gurudutt Buntwalkar, who is also assistant director of
the World Institute of Konkani at Mangalore, and Hariprasad Nadig have
conceptualised this inter-script transliteration programme in 'plug in'
version. By doing do, they have clearly emerged as pioneers in this concept
for Konkani.*
*
*
*Giving an exclusive preview to DNA, Gurudutt articulated on the concept.*
*
*
*"Usage of multiple scripts in Konkani language has been hindering sharing
of knowledge between the communities which speak the same language but are
separated by usage of script. In the advent of Internet, technology has
enabled an accessible knowledge-sharing platform for Indian languages
through Unicode. The ability to 'search' in Indic scripts as well as to do
'transliteration' and 'translation' for the Indian language content has
enabled more avenues," said Gurudutt.*
*
*
*An initial effort to create a Konkani Wikipedia lost its momentum because
of script conflict.*
* *
*It was a real obstacle to the users to create four different pages in four
scripts for each content page without which the content created in the
language would limit itself for the specific region which the script is in
use.*
*
*
*Hence, the Konkani language Wikipedia is still at the incubator stage.*
*
*
* *
Regards
Tinu Cherian
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/In_the_news