Uyghur language learning and translation, literature, films, songs, culture… plus comparison with the closely related Uzbek language, and the medieval literary language called Chaghatay. Whatever you are looking for, type it into the search bar and you never know – we might just have it!
The transcript of Disc 1, Scene 2 of the movie Alimjan Bolumsizmu? is now up here. On YouTube, the scene starts here. If you missed Disc 1, Scene 1 then start here. In Disc 1, Scene 2 we learn more about Alimjan through his interactions with his mother, Xasiyet, at home. Alimjan likes to sleep in while his elderly mother has long been up and working hard. He bitterly complains
The best situation for language acquisition is, of course, “immersion” or being a “growing participant” in a particular language community (that’s how you learned your first language!) When I started learning Uyghur in earnest I was in fact part of several new (to me) language communities. Quite early on someone introduced me to Uyghur movies, and in particular, to the Uyghur comedy film Alimjan Bolumsizmu? (“Is Alimjan Good-For-Nothing?”). Now, Uyghur
One aspect of the current war on Uyghur identity and culture is the mass disappearance of Uyghur publications and attempted rubbing out of Uyghur literary traditions. Seeking to play my small part in “saving the books” I recently added a new page to this website called eLibrary. On this page I have started putting up reasonably good pdf scans of physical books that I and my friends have in our
One of Memtimin Hoshur’s longer short stories, This Is Not A Dream (بۇ چۈش ئەمەس), could be described as a romantic tragedy. The story was turned into a movie by director Shirzat Yaqup, with music by Mexmut Sulayman (currently one of the coaches on the The Voice of the Silk Road). My translation of This Is Not A Dream will hopefully be published in the near future. In the meantime,
Memtimin Hoshur has been writing stories for more than five decades and it is no surprise to find works of very different kinds in his corpus. This story was written in 1961, in a period of intense socialist construction in China, complete with radical labels and slogans. The political background weighs heavily upon this story, effectively turning it into a propaganda piece. It is impossible to imagine Hoshur writing such
Asterix translator Anthea Bell on literary translators. One language is not enough for bookworms. If you want to read books in the original, ironically enough you qualify yourself to be a translator. There are in fact no special qualifications. I feel upset when young people write to me saying they’ve never done a post-graduate course in translation theory; can they still become translators? Translation theory is probably fun in its
This site has something for English-speakers with a general interest in Uyghur language and culture as well as for Uyghurophiles and budding uyghurshunaslar who are looking for resources to help them take their Uyghur language to another level.
