Revitalising Cook Islands languages with the help of technology

A new Cook Islands dictionary app is recovering words that were about to be lost forever from the Pacific nation community.

The app, which is a companion to the online bilingual dictionary of the Cook Islands languages, was launched this month in the Cook Islands and covers all languages and dialects of the islands.

The Mangaian, Rarotongan and Tongarevan (Penrhyn) dictionaries are comprehensive, while the dictionaries of the other languages are in various stages of development.

Director of AUT’s International Centre of Language Revitalisation, Professor Tania Ka’ai, said the project has saved a large number of words that had fallen out of common use.

The process started with the digitisation of a 1950s ethnographer’s handwritten index cards, which were typed into a spreadsheet and then checked by Mangaian speakers before being loaded onto a website.

“After a long process by a group of Mangaian elders … we ended up with about 13,000 purely Mangaian words,” explained Professor Ka’ai.

“[Elder] Mama Ina composed songs with the words, which have been reintegrated into the island’s everyday vocabulary … they’ve recovered these words that would have been lost forever and we’re so excited about that.”

At the launch of the app in the Cook Islands, AUT Professor Tania Ka’ai thanked everyone who helped make the app happen. Photo: Supplied

The knowledge from elders is an essential part of the process, according to Professor Ka’ai. “Technology doesn’t replace [the elders] ever. It gets their knowledge out into the international community where our people are everywhere.”

Glen Innes librarian, June Tangiia, who works closely with the Cook Islands community in the area, believes the app will be a good resource for New Zealand-born Cook Islanders trying to learn the language.

“Because we don’t have a lot of those resources in the library, having language materials like these from other sources is an excellent idea,” said Ms Tangiia.

Rita Maro, who is part Pukapuka, Mangaian and Rarotongan, said language retention is an issue for the Cook Islands community on the North Shore as well.

Ms Maro, who runs cultural and arts activities in the area, said her daughter is planning to set up some Cook Islands language evening classes next year, and the new app and dictionary will be a helpful resource.

“It’s good for our young ones to learn the language,” said Ms Maro.

The app, which is available for free download from Google Play for Android and the App Store for Apple devices, will be launched in New Zealand in October.

Professor Ka’ai said she hopes the Cook Islands community in New Zealand will “claim it” as their own.