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2025:Program/Preserving linguistic diversity using Internet-in-a-Box. Experiences from the UNHCR refugee camp of Minawao (Cameroon)

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Session title: Preserving linguistic diversity using Internet-in-a-Box. Experiences from the UNHCR refugee camp of Minawao (Cameroon)

Session type: Lecture
Track: Diversity & Inclusion
Language: en

đŸŽ„ Session recording: https://w.wiki/F8mT đŸŽ„

Linguistic diversity is at risk, with many of the world’s 7,000 languages facing extinction, particularly among displaced populations in sub-Saharan Africa. Forced migration, loss of ancestral lands, and shifting aid policies threaten cultural continuity. This presentation explores how open-source, offline technologies like Internet-in-a-Box (IIAB) can empower refugee communities to document and preserve their languages. Nowhere is this more true than in Minawao, a UNHCR refugee camp in Cameroon, home to 80,000 people from linguistically diverse backgrounds. In February 2024, we launched “Minawao Youth – Our Cultures for Our Future,” training 30 volunteers to create community-driven, evolving, offline language archives using IIAB. IIAB enables local knowledge preservation despite digital barriers, and we highlight its role in safeguarding endangered languages and advocate for integrating refugee-led initiatives into global knowledge-sharing networks.

Description

The preservation of linguistic diversity is facing an urgent crisis, with many of the world’s 7,000 languages at risk of extinction. Many of the most vulnerable are found in contexts in sub-Saharan Africa where forced migration, loss of ancestral lands, and shifting international aid policies disrupt cultural continuity. This presentation highlights the potential of open-source, offline technologies—particularly Internet-in-a-Box (IIAB)—to empower refugee communities in documenting and preserving their languages.

Our activities center on Minawao, a UNHCR refugee camp in northern Cameroon, home to approximately 80,000 people, many from the Mandara Mountains of eastern Nigeria. This region, known for its extraordinary linguistic diversity, has seen entire communities uprooted by Boko Haram’s atrocities. In Minawao, at least 25 languages are spoken, many with only a few thousand speakers remaining. Without intervention, these languages, and the rich cultural knowledge they carry, risk disappearing within a generation as most youth learn only languages of higher social capital in the camp environment, such as Hausa, English, and French. For many in the community, this looming loss is met with a sense of inevitability and deep frustration.

To address this challenge, we launched the pilot project “Minawao Youth – Our Cultures for Our Future” in February 2024. With minimal international support, this initiative uses IIAB to create accessible, community-driven language archives. IIAB, a portable digital library requiring minimal infrastructure, enables local volunteers to collect, store, and share linguistic and cultural materials without relying on internet connectivity.

A key aspect of our project is training young refugee volunteers—currently numbering about 30—in audiovisual documentation, metadata encoding, and IIAB system management. Equipped with essential skills and tools, young refugees are producing videos, with subtitles in multiple languages, featuring key traditional practices, from the use of certain speech styles to pot-making and house-building techniques. This grassroots approach fosters local ownership and enhances intergenerational transmission,preventing knowledge loss, even in displaced settings.

Beyond its technical function, IIAB represents a broader model of open, collaborative knowledge sharing. In contexts where access to education and digital resources is severely limited, IIAB provides a lifeline for preserving community knowledge. In addition, IIAB provides the refugee community with educational reference material such as the offline Wikipedia in several languages and a mediawiki instance for organizing materials. This project demonstrates that open-source, offline technologies should be at the forefront of global efforts to support linguistic diversity, especially in crisis-affected regions.

Our presentation outlines the progress made in Minawao and explores key challenges for long-term sustainability. We discuss innovative applications of IIAB, including how it can complement Wikimedia projects to expand local content creation in underserved languages. We also explore how we can add mechanisms for sharing remote, local resources with a broader community. Finally, we advocate for greater integration of refugee-led initiatives within global knowledge-sharing networks, ensuring that displaced communities are not passive recipients of aid but active agents in the preservation of their cultural heritage.

How does your session relate to the event theme, Wikimania@20 – Inclusivity. Impact. Sustainability?

Voices from refugee camps are certainly under-represented, and for camps in Africa even more so. This presentation is based on work in such a camp. We also cannot underestimate the impact of preserving linguistic and cultural diversity for speakers of these languages, for their descendants, and for a broader audience. The long-term sustainability of our project lies in both active community engagement and greater integration of refugee-led initiatives within global knowledge-sharing networks.

What is the experience level needed for the audience for your session?

Everyone can participate in this session

Resources

Speakers

  • Pierpaolo Di Carlo
Pierpaolo Di Carlo is an anthropological linguist who has worked in the domain of language documentation for the past nineteen years in Pakistan and Cameroon. He is now a grantee of the Endangered Languages Documentation Programme at the University “L’Orientale” of Naples, Italy, and his project aims to document two endangered languages spoken in the camp of Minawao (Dghwede and Chinene) in tight collaboration with local communities.
  • Tim Moody
I am a principal developer of Internet in a Box and a member of the board for Wiki Project Med.
  • John
Goudi John is a refugee from Nigeria’s Borno State currently living in Minawao. He is the co-founder and President of the “Association of Nigerian Refugee Student Volunteering for the Development of Minawao” (ANRSVDM) and oversees the management of technical equipment in the camp for the "Minawao Youth" pilot project. DAFI Scholarship Program allowed Goudi to earn a BA in Project Management (Yaounde) and participate in a six-month Refugee Youth Leadership Training program.
  • Jeff Good
Jeff Good is Professor of Linguistic at the University at Buffalo, with research interests on the documentation of endangered languages of Cameroon.
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