It's ISP Time!

Classes are done as of today and we are now all starting to work on our independent study projects (ISP). I have from today until Dec. 7 to finish it.

I have finally figured out what I am going to do my project on, after talking to a ton of people and visiting the SIL (Société Internationale de Linguistique)Center here in Dakar. SIL International is "a faith based organization that studies, documents, and assists in developing the world's lesser-known languages." They do this mainly through linguistic research, and literacy and translation projects.

In Kedougou I visited a translation team who has been working with the Bassari people group and their language. Right now, they have just finished all the lingistic research required to START the translation phase of the project. And they have been there for 5 years. It takes a lot longer than you would think to complete a translation project. With Bible Translation, on average it takes 10 to 20 years just to translate the New Testament.

So, before a team ever even starts doing the linguistic research part of the project, they do an ethnographic study of the people they plan to work with. There is a group in Southern Senegal below The Gambia in the Casamance region called the Bayots. This group has been a top priority of SIL for a long time but because of years of conflict and uprisings in the area, they have been unable to send a team there. It is still a very dangerous area to go to. The American Embassy here strongly urges Americans not to travel to that area. But I am going anyway.

Just kidding! No worries, I will be staying in Dakar for my project and interviewing members of a group of Bayots that live here. SIL has several contacts with Bayots that travel back and forth between Dakar and the Casamance region. So basically I will be trying to find out as much info as possible about this people group in order that someday, hopefully soon, a language project can get started. Because of the years of conflict, SIL may try to start a project out of Guinea Bissau, just south of Senegal.

So yeah, that is my project in a nutshell, but it gets more complicated and if you have any questions about it or want to know more, let me know. I am excited to get started and be able to do a project that is actually worthwhile and productive, instead of it just being something I HAVE to do for school.

I am living with my family till the 16th and then moving into an appartment with 3 or 4 other girls for 3 weeks. The appartment is actually only a half a block away from my house. This will be really nice cause I love my family and the friends I have made in my neighborhood and I still want to see them a lot, but it is impossible to get any work done in my house. Too many people and too much noise ALL THE TIME.

OK, I wrote a lot today. I'm done for now.