Regional Languages in Cyberspace

Abstract

© 2017 IEEE. This article focuses on the functionality of the Tatar language in cyberspace. Tatar is a regional co-official language of the Republic of Tatarstan, second only to Russian in the term of the number of speakers in the Russian Federation. The aim of this work is to identify the strengths and weaknesses of Tatar on the Internet: a key challenge that Tatar is currently facing. Regional languages are becoming increasingly vulnerable in the context of the globalised world, making sociolinguistic analysis of their functional power, potential perspectives and threats extremely important. The paper provides an overview of the readiness of applied tools and software to enable the Tatar language to function in cyberspace. The research results can be useful for improving the language policy and language development processes in Tatarstan and Russia in general. Tatarstan's experience in supporting and developing its title language can benefit other multinational states and regions in managing language functionality.