The CEL, Sikkim University has prepared descriptive grammars of Magar, Rai-Rokdung, Sherpa and Gurung. The data on the basis of which these grammars has been prepared were elicited as primary data collected during the various filed trips conducted by the Centre. It is the culmination of the efforts of the Centre for Endangered Languages, Sikkim University, over the last three years. These grammars are primarily aimed to be a sketch grammar for linguists and researchers interested in these languages and also to give the basics of the these languages as spoken in Sikkim. The objective is to initiate documentation of the endangered languages. The research project is basically a language documentation activity which involves collection of lexical items and elicitation of sentences and narrations, as well as collection of socio-linguistic and ethnolinguistic data and the documentation of cultural aspects like rituals, dances, songs etc. from a linguistic point of view. Thus, the end result aimed at the Centre for Endangered Languages is the production of a dictionary (in both print and digital mobile app format), a grammar, a sociolinguistic sketch, documentaries of video recordings on rituals, songs and dances, etc.
The Magar grammar consists of 77 pages, Rai-Rokdung comprises of 54 pages, Sherpa Grammar with 30 pages and Gurung Grammar with 40 pages.
The Centre for endangered languages has also prepared the dictionaries and lexicons of Bhujel, Magar, Gurung, Sherpa and Rai-Rokdung. The Bhujel dictionary comprises of 301 pages, followed by Gurung with 89 pages, Magar with 254 pages, Rokdung with 80 pages and Sherpa with 189 pages.
The Centre has also developed the Android application of the same which can be freely downloaded as a multi-modal Android app from the Sikkim University website.
The dictionaries of these five different languages contains a number of useful information about the words and phrases used by the speakers of these languages. A typical entry in the dictionaries contains the following information:
- Headword: A headword in a dictionary is the heading of an entry. All the related dictionary entries appear under this heading.
- Pronunciation in IPA: This is the pronunciation of the word represented in the International Phonetic Alphabet.
- Parts of Speech: Classification of word in language that can be distinguished based on their function and form.
- Sense division: An alternate sense of the headword is provided.
- Meaning(s): Meaning of the particular word in English.
- Meaning(s): Meaning of the particular word in Nepali.
- Semantic Domain: A domain to which the headword belongs to semantically.
- Translation of the example sentence in English.
- Translation of the example sentence in Nepali.
The Centre has made all the collected materials available publicly through the Sikkim Darjeeling Himalayas Endangered Languages Archive (SiDHELA), a regional archive maintained by the Centre for Endangered Languages, Sikkim University and Central Library of Sikkim University, for public use.