Here’s the press release, in suitably official press release language: Half the world’s languages are in imminent danger of extinction—but Chittenden County word game lovers have the chance to help stop that decline. On Wednesday, December 13, area residents of the Champlain Valley region are invited to join the non-profit Endangered Alphabets Project at the […]
Here, thanks to a ridiculous amount of time on Photoshop (yes, I have been told it would have been easier in Illustrator, Indesign, or even Word), is what must surely be the first Word Search puzzle ever composed in Marma, one of the endangered indigenous languages of Bangladesh. The words, mostly for animals and fruit […]
No fewer than two opportunities to see the Endangered Alphabets (and me) this week if you’re in Vermont, upstate New York or Quebec. On Thursday evening at 6 p.m., the Alphabets are part of a double-exhibition at Norwich University in Northfield, Vermont. One part features artwork from 19th-century expeditions led by Norwich grads; the Alphabets […]
Here we go—the Endangered Alphabet Game Kickstarter campaign is now live at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1496420787/endangered-alphabet-games! I must admit, I’m kicking myself that it has taken me seven years to realize that one of the best ways to revive an endangered language, written or spoken, is by creating games. But here we are now, and this Kickstarter is […]
COMING SOON: my Kickstarter to raise money to create board games in endangered alphabets for indigenous kids. The image in this photo is one of my series of faux-Scrabble tiles, in Sundanese, from western Java. The tiles were recently on display at the LocWorld34 conference in Barcelona and at Mundolingua in Paris–a big hit. Seriously, […]
The ten tiles of the Endangered Alphabets Board Game, just needing a few coats of finish and a professional photo shoot. These tiles, each 10″x12″, are for exhibition; the aim is to use them as a springboard to raise $5,000 to make alphabet board games in endangered languages for indigenous schoolchildren in Bangladesh. Watch out […]
If you’re on Facebook, you’ve been seeing hints and clues about my next series of carvings, and here are the first prototypes: Scrabble tiles in endangered alphabets. Here’s my thinking: After my very serious and poignant Mother Tongue series, I wanted to do something more playful, but still full of intent. After all, it’s the […]
It’s a rare interviewer who asks me questions I’ve never been asked before: https://soundcloud.com/dougarobinson/saving-endangered-alphabets-with-tim-brookes.
Two carvings for my forthcoming exhibition at Champlain College in Burlington, Vermont, on International Mother Language Day. Both say “mother tongue,” the top one in Thai Lanna, the lower one in Mandaean. The woods are monkey pod and olive respectively. The exhibition will open the day before International Mother Language Day–namely, February 20th–and will be […]
At the end of my recent Kickstarter campaign I posted a photo of a carving I had been working on over the last 48 hours, which read “Sunrise” in classic Mongolian vertical bichig script. My Facebook friend Kellar Alsup asked me why I carve anything in bichig script, given that it has official recognition in […]
