Phraselators for Cherokee
August 29th, 2006CITIZEN-TIMES.com: High-tech language lessons from tribe
The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians will use a federal grant to buy hand-held computers that translate English into Cherokee.
The computers, called Phraselators and made by Maryland-based VoxTec International, will help the tribe teach members how to speak Cherokee.
The Phraselator is a small hand-held translation device. In the articles I’ve read about the device, it’s mostly been used in combat (if I recall correctly it was first developed for the military). It’s nice to see it being used in a language preservation situation.
With about 20,000 speakers, Tsalagi, the Cherokee Language, is one of the most-spoken Native American languages.