Federal Lezghi
National and Cultural Autonomy

Innovative Lezghi dictionary

The compiler of the Lezghi-Russian dictionary

 

It is not a secret that despite the deep processes of globalization worldwide and particularly in the Caucasus, interest of mountaineers in the native languages surely have been growing recently. Many of the young people wish to learn their native languages. Unfortunately this positive phenomenon faces absence or insufficiency of technical means for studying the languages. Recently we have managed to contact Zaur Agamov - the compiler of the electronic Lezghi-Russian dictionary. Electronic Lezghi dictionaries appeared relatively long ago and are used by a large number of people interested in learning the Lezghin language.

 

Zaur, tell us about yourself, please. Where do you come from?

I come from Makhachkala, but I have not been living there for 8 years already. Since 18 I had lived in Saint Petersburg and 2 years ago I moved Dubai. My family’s native village is Kartas-Kazmayar in Magaramkhur district.

Zaur, how did you decide to create the electronic dictionary?

I work for the IT Company that has the technology of translation - Multillect, I am engaged in the development of this technology for smartphones on the basis of Android OS. And I noticed that until now nobody has made a good quality dictionary with big base of words, none of the Dagestan languages is covered.

Please, tell us more about the project.

Presently the Lezghi translator has mobile applications for two platforms - Android and iOS (for iPhones). The iPhones application is now being prepared for publication, but it isn't available yet. The main functionality of the appendix is searching for a word, then viewing its translation and examples of its use. So far there is only the Lezghi-Russian translator, and the Russian- Lezghi version is on the way.

The dictionary in a PDF-format, which can be downloaded on any Lezghi site, was taken as a basis. I could not find the author of the file. That is why I had to do quite a big amount of work placing this dictionary in a database format.

I work at the project in the evenings after working hours, whenever I have free time.

 

What about the development of the project?

I plan to develop the project, just now everything rests against my time constrains. As I have already said, I would like to make a certain platform so that proactive people could participate in "construction" of the dictionaries. The project is unprofitable and it is not supposed to have any ads on its site, nobody finances it. It was made purely for academic purposes and only out of a desire to keep richness of the language. If someone has any ideas, remarks, offers, complaints – please contact me at zaur@agamov.ru .I will reply to you with pleasure.

 

 

Good luck to you, Zaur. I am sure you will find many Lezghi intellectuals and young talents who will be willing to help you implement this useful project.

Interviewed by Murad Shikhakhmedov

 

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