Towards flexible cross-resource exploitation of heterogenous language documentation data

This paper reports on challenges and solution approaches in the development of methods for language resource overarching data analysis in the field of language documentation. It is based on the successful outcomes of the initial phase of an 18 year long-term project on lesser resourced and mostly endangered indigenous languages from the Northern Eurasian area, which included the finalization and publication of multiple language corpora and additional language resources. While aiming at comprehensive cross-resource data analysis, the project is simultaneously confronted with a dynamic and complex resource landscape, that especially results from a vast amount of multi-layered information stored in the form of analogue primary data in different widespread archives on the territory of the Russian Federation. The described methods aim at solving the tension between the needs for unification of heterogenous data sets and vocabularies on the one hand and maximum openness for the integration of future resources and the adaption of external information on the other hand.