Nigeria is a multicultural country with numerous indigenous language speakers. As the world continues to advance technologically, languages are evolving alongside these innovations.
However, Nigerian indigenous languages face the risk of decline if proactive measures are not taken to support their growth and preservation. This is why the Nigerian Languages, Data, and Science Technology Conference (NLDSTC) serves as a vital platform for language experts, scholars, and professionals in science and technology to come together and address these pressing issues.
One of the major challenges facing indigenous languages is their limited presence and recognition at the global level. This year’s conference is tagged Nigerian Languages in the Global Context: Highlighting Developmental Efforts and Challenges. It will focus on these challenges and explore strategies for enhancing and preserving these languages through collaborative discussions, workshops, and presentations.
Ultimately, participants will gain access to initiatives aimed at promoting digital literacy and inclusion, ensuring that Nigerian indigenous languages have a stronger presence in global science and technology. By equipping communities with the skills and resources to engage with digital platforms in their native languages, digital exclusion can be minimised, paving the way for the sustainable growth of our indigenous languages.
We invite you to contribute to the discourse by submitting session proposals aligned with the four conference sub-themes:
Language Digitisation and Preservation
Language digitisation and preservation involve converting oral and written languages into digital formats to ensure their survival in the modern world. This includes creating digital dictionaries, text-to-speech applications, and machine-readable corpora that allow indigenous languages to be used in AI systems, search engines, and educational tools. Digitisation efforts help prevent language extinction by making texts, audio recordings, and cultural archives accessible to future generations and global audiences.
Indigenous Language Content Creation
Indigenous language content creation focuses on producing multimedia resources—such as books, podcasts, videos, social media posts, and interactive learning tools—in native languages. This process enhances linguistic visibility and cultural representation while fostering pride among speakers. By generating engaging and relevant content, indigenous languages can thrive in digital spaces, ensuring that younger generations continue to learn and use them.
AI and Dataset Creation and Collection
Artificial Intelligence (AI) relies on large datasets for training models in natural language processing (NLP), speech recognition, and machine translation. However, many indigenous languages lack sufficient digital resources. Collecting, structuring, and annotating datasets in these languages is essential to improving AI-driven tools such as voice assistants, chatbots, and translation engines, ensuring they serve diverse linguistic communities.
Digital Inclusion
Digital inclusion ensures that marginalised and linguistically diverse communities have equal access to technology, the internet, and digital resources. It involves overcoming barriers such as language limitations in software, low digital literacy, and lack of internet connectivity. Promoting digital inclusion allows speakers of indigenous languages to fully participate in the digital economy, education, and governance.
Language Rights Advocacy and Policies
Language rights advocacy involves championing policies that protect and promote linguistic diversity, ensuring that indigenous and minority languages receive legal recognition and institutional support. This includes pushing for multilingual education, language-friendly AI development, and government-backed digitisation efforts. Advocacy work also helps prevent language discrimination and promotes linguistic equity in media, business, and public life.
Language Services
Language services include translation, interpretation, transcription, localisation, and subtitling, enabling effective communication across linguistic barriers. These services are essential for making information accessible to indigenous language speakers, particularly in healthcare, legal systems, education, and digital platforms. High-quality language services ensure that speakers of underrepresented languages can fully engage with global opportunities without linguistic exclusion.
Submit a session proposal, join us at 2025 NLDSTC and be a part of this transformative journey.
Session Formats
There are 6 formats for presentation of sessions:
Workshop (60 minutes) - This format is for hands-on or showcase of an idea or concept on a particular topic. It gives the facilitator the opportunity to showcase a project, idea or concept that aligns with the various sub-themes.
Classroom (60 minutes) - This session format is solely for a single presenter who is vast in a particular subject matter. Just like the name, the format is like a classroom where the teacher teaches and students ask questions. For 10 minutes, participants will be split into rooms and the ‘teacher’ gives the ‘student’ an assignment. However, the students are not expected to submit the assignment, they only need to brainstorm or try their hands on it after the session.
Panel (60 minutes) - Up to three panelists are allowed on this format. The proposer has the permission to include three panelists in his/her session. Panelists from the various sectors (i.e, tech, linguistic/language enthusiast, innovators etc,) and language communities (Hausa, Igbo, Yorùbá and others) must be represented. 10 minutes must be set aside for question and answer segment.
‘We We’ (60 minutes) - This format is for like-minds to gather and discuss issues that affect each and every member of the said community. It could be a session for students, lecturers, software developers, broadcasters, translators/interpreters, and others.
Serious Joke (30 minutes) - All work and no play makes Adamu a dull boy. This format is for serious issues in a jovial form. In 30 minutes, the presenter will present a case that is serious but has not been taken seriously. It is a thought-provoking format that aims to finger the brain of participants to focus on a particular subject and make a change.
Jack of all trade (60 minutes) - This is a combination of all the other session formats; all and everything together, hence this format allows a combination of any of the other formats for a proposed session. Proposers are encouraged to be creative in combining the formats to suit their sessions.
N.B: Priority will be given to sessions presented in any of the Nigerian indigenous languages; Hausa, Igbo, Yorùbá and etc.