Language revitalization theory suggests that one way to improve the health of a language is to increase the number of domains where the language is used. Social network platforms provide a variety of domains where indigenous-language communities are able to communicate in their own languages. Although the capability exists, is social networking being used by indigenous-language communities? This paper reports on one particular social networking platform, Twitter, by using two separate methodologies. First, Twitter statistics collated from the Indigenous Tweets website are analysed. The data show that languages such as Basque, Haitian Creole, Welsh, Irish Gaelic, Frisian and Kapampangan do have a presence in the "Twittersphere". Further analysis for te reo Mäori (the Mäori language) shows that tweets in te reo Mäori are rising and peak when certain events occur. The second methodology involved gathering empirical data by tweeting in te reo Mäori. This served two purposes: it allowed an ancillary check on the validity of the Indigenous Tweets data and it allowed the opportunity to determine if the number of indigenous-language tweets could be infl uenced by the actions of one tweeter.

Te reo Māori, the Indigenous language of Aotearoa New Zealand, is a distinctive feature of the nation’s cultural heritage. This paper documents our efforts to build a corpus of 79,000 Māori-language tweets using computational methods. The Reo Māori Twitter (RMT) Corpus was created by targeting Māori-language users identified by the Indigenous Tweets website, pre-processing their data and filtering out non-Māori tweets, together with other sources of noise. Our motivation for creating such a resource is three-fold: (1) it serves as a rich and unique dataset for linguistic analysis of te reo Māori on social media; (2) it can be used as training data to develop and augment Natural Language Processing (NLP) tools with robust, real-world Māori-language applications; and (3) it will potentially promote awareness of, and encourage positive interaction with, the growing community of Māori tweeters, thereby increasing the use and visibility of te reo Māori in an online environment. While the corpus captures data from 2007 to 2020, our analysis shows that the number of tweets in the RMT Corpus peaked in 2014, and the number of active tweeters peaked in 2017, although at least 600 users were still active in 2020. To the best of our knowledge, the RMT Corpus is the largest publicly-available collection of social media data containing (almost) exclusively Māori text, making it a useful resource for language experts, NLP developers and Indigenous researchers alike.

Indigenous and minority language groups are increasingly embracing the power of web-based technology as they struggle to ensure the continued health and survival of their own languages. Māori, the indigenous race of New Zealand, are no exception. Initiatives involving the Microsoft Corporation, Moodle and Google Inc. have resulted in a range of localized interfaces now available in the Māori language. More recently, the Māori language has been made available on mobile devices, physical self-service machines and social media technology.This research investigates the development of online Māori-language communities using Twitter. The investigation was made possible by the information capture and trending functionality of the Indigenous Tweets website. It is evident that the development of vibrant online indigenous and minority language communities is underpinned by the ease in which the speakers are able to find each other amidst the sheer volume of global languages that dominate social media. It is also evident for te reo Māori that the bulk of Māori-language tweets arise from initiatives that seek to disseminate translated information rather than illicit interaction from other users. Whether or not this could be deemed suitable for developing online language communities is yet to be determined. However, some individuals were identified who were focused on engaging users in online conversations in te reo Māori. Research objectivesLong-term, this research aims to determine the impact of micro-blogging in Twitter on the use of Māori language online. In the short-term, this research has investigated the extent that te reo Māori is being used in this medium. It seems clear that the continued health of te reo Māori is underpinned by the use of the language in as many forums as possible. The development of a vibrant online community, sharing information and ideas using te

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Major languages dominate contemporary technologies. For Mäori, there is opportunity to engage with some technologies using their language and to participate within Mäori-language communities in various digital media. A smartphone launched by Two Degrees Mobile Limited provides a Mäori-language interface option. An initial pilot study indicated users will engage with this interface, but when pushed for time will switch the interface to the English-language option. This paper reports on a study undertaken to test the usability of the smartphone Mäori-language interface. Participants reported diffi culties and some frustration as they struggled with new words and unfamiliar uses of words. They also expressed disappointment at poor translations and arbitrary truncations. The feedback highlights perceived shortcomings encountered when technologies that are normally developed and used in a major language are translated for use in minority Indigenous languages. Mäori-language strategies that consider using translated application interfaces should be cognisant of such issues.