Documentation Of Uro Project (Fieldtrip Vlog)

Added: 2026-05-18

[00:00:05]What happens when 28 undergraduate decide to save a language? This is the story of Uru.

[00:00:12]I'll tell you everything as we're on our way. We are just students from OAU great linguistics and African languages department. And then we had a big idea.

[00:00:25]Can students really document a language on their own? Well, we tried and here is what happened.

[00:00:33]Uro is spoken in Aawa Koko Uno state about 150 km from LA. We had no funding, no car, no equipment sponsors and we know language documentation is expensive.

[00:00:49]So what did we do? We planned we borrowed feed equipment from the department phonetics laboratory.

[00:00:57]Every single one of us contributed 10,000 NRA and honestly that amount shouldn't be enough for a project like this but we are stronger linguist we figure things out. So we reach out to someone living close to the community and they showed up for us. They gave us accommodation welcomed us and made this possible.

[00:01:21]Then we selected four people to go fully on field. So our love >> for the lack of language. I mean, it's worth it.

[00:01:31]>> Hi, my name is Akila and I am on the forcation project.

[00:01:35]>> Hi, my name is and I am project.

[00:01:44]>> Hi, I'm Alex and I am on the for the documentation project. Ura is spoken in Ura Jawa, one of the eight communities that formed the Aawa town. Each of these communities has its own language. This multilinga situation has greatly contributed to Uro's endangerment as Yoruba, a language of wider communication in southwest Nigeria, is used as the common lingua franker in the town.

[00:02:15]However, the first thing we learned on field is how the Uro people greet each other. They say and they reply.

[00:02:27]We documented the beauty of their language and culture, stories, Bible readings, word list for a dictionary, folklore, their numeral system, and even how the beautiful women of Uru make Gary.

[00:02:43]Beyond the lack of fonts, almost everything went wrong. We forgot our printed word lists, got lost more than once, and even had a road accident on the field.

[00:02:56]But the warmth of the king, the chiefs and the entire community made this experience truly beautiful.

[00:03:06]We visited the Igashi village as well because the people of Uro reported that Iashi is the speech community that speaks a language closest to them. So back to our question, can undergraduate document a language? Yes, we can because we did. Apparently, it takes more passion than money to document a language. So here is where we say thank Amen.

[00:03:38]>> Amen.