≠Akhoe Hai//om

Creators: DOBES Archive

Hosting institution:: Leibniz-Institut für Deutsche Sprache (IDS)

Description

In this project anthropological and linguistic expertise is brought together in an interdisciplinary research team working towards an in-depth, thorough description, documentation and multi-media compilation of linguistic and cultural materials for ≠Akhoe Hai//om. Between 2003 and 2006 field research for this project is carried out in Namibia in conjunction with speakers of the ≠Akhoe Hai//om community as well as with teachers from local schools and with WIMSA (the Working Group of Indigenous Minorities in Southern Africa).

Additional details

DOBES Code of Conduct v.2

Everyone will respect the Intellectual and Cultural Property Rights of the individual consultants and their communities. Wishes with respect to protecting the privacy of individuals will be respected. No one is allowed to offend the religious feelings of the consultants or communities. No missionary or political activities are allowed to be carried out under the umbrella of the DOBES documentation task. No one is allowed to use the recorded and analyzed data for commercial purposes without permission from the speech community. a. It is the speech community that deals with the issue of commercial uses. The speech community not only gives permission, but also decides all aspects involved in the commercial use (copyrights, sharing profits, etc). b. If the speech community does allow a user to make commercial uses, then the user should present a contract agreed with the speech community. This contract should be officially recognized by the required authorities (including authorities in the country where the speech community lives). This is to ensure that the whole process is made in a legal and transparent way. All parties must respect the national laws and the rules of the authorized organizations in the different countries. All parties will support the general frameworks as defined by the UN, UNESCO and WIPO where they are applicable. The consultants and communities will be informed openly and seriously about the goals of the DOBES program and about the possibilities of misuse. In general fieldworkers will document the agreed mutual understanding about the nature of the research and the formal consent achieved with the consultants by means of a signed document. The parties will support efforts for revitalizing the languages within the limits of their possibilities. Fieldworkers should operate in such a way as to ensure future fieldwork and the reputation of their field. The parties understand their participation as part of the great challenge to preserve cultural heritage for future generations. This includes the obligation to make material as accessible for interested non-commercial users as possible. The parties will record and archive the data according to professional standards, but taking in consideration the limitations of the field work. The archivist will take appropriate steps to ensure long lifetime of the data. The users of DOBES data will respect the intention of the recordings and acknowledge the work that the archivist and especially the collectors have invested. In general this is to be documented by making references in publications and by mentioning the names of the consultants if this is wanted. The users will give copies of all added data that will enrich the corpus to the archive and make it available to other interested and serious users maximally within three years after the analysis work has been started. A transfer of DOBES data to third persons or organizations is generally forbidden. Read more

Created:: September 12, 2025
Modified:: September 12, 2025