[Assam] 1st English-Assamese online dictionary (The Assam Tribune, 14.06.2008)

[kamal deka]

Hi Buljit
Congratulation.Job well done.
KJ Deka,Texas



On 6/14/08, Buljit Buragohain <buluassam at yahoo.co.in> wrote:
>
> 1st English-Assamese online dictionary
> By A Staff Reporter
> GUWAHATI, June 13 – It is good news for the Internet-savvy Assamese fond of
> his or her language, for there has emerged a worthy cause. Xobdo, a
> non-profit organisation of volunteers spread across the globe, is inviting
> others to help develop what it calls the "World's first and only
> English-Assamese online dictionary". Even though the dictionary project (
> www.xobdo.net) is already on, the team behind it is dreaming big. There is
> an aim to make it an online access tool to as many languages of Northeast as
> possible in the near future.
>
> The vision of Xobdo has been stated as, "…to demolish language barrier and
> thereby fuel mutual understanding and cooperation among the people of the
> entire North-East India and to bring the languages of the region to the
> fore-front of the IT age."
>
> Xobdo is the brainchild of Bikram M Baruah, a petroleum engineer now based
> in Abu Dhabi. With more volunteers coming together following its launch in
> 2006, 10,000 words were gathered by December 2007. The target for 2008 is to
> collate 20,000 words.
>
> According to Buljit Buragohain of Xobdo, the online dictionary seeks to
> document the languages as they are used today in their original forms. There
> is no attempt to enforce or express Xobdo's own viewpoint about any spelling
> or semantics being right or wrong.
>
> Significantly, it has also been said that Xobdo does not seek to follow any
> specific dictionary or any glossary or word-list published by any authority
> or entity; neither does it accept opinions of experts. Rather, it considers
> the present-day meaning to be the standard as it is evidenced in
> 'contemporary use'.
>
> In case of doubts, volunteers opt for a discussion in which the words and
> their meanings are agreed on. Some of Xobdo's volunteers, significantly,
> come with sound background in linguistics studies.
>
> For the information of volunteers, any word to be added in Xobdo must have
> 'contemporary use'. In case of a new word coined recently, Xobdo will not
> add it unless it appears in at least one publication of repute.
>
> Buragohain revealed that anybody could become a member and contribute words
> to the online dictionary. One can also challenge the spellings or meanings
> featured in the dictionary. Through discussions with other members of Xobdo
> a consensus decision has to be taken within a reasonable time frame and the
> entry has to be updated accordingly.
>
> Next on Xobdo's agenda is to include words from a variety of NE languages,
> with the belief that unless that is done, many of the words and their usage
> would disappear, causing irreparable harm to a culture defined by rich
> linguistic diversity. Xobdo is particularly keen that volunteers
> well-acquainted with Boro, Rabha, Karbi and other languages joined its
> efforts to build in a large corpus of words and their meanings.
>
> (The Assam Tribune,14.06.2008)
>
> http://www.assamtribune.com/scripts/details.asp?id=jun1408/at08
>
>
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