Savrigul is a Leading Global Expert of Shugni, which is one of the many languages of Central Asia at severe risk of becoming extinct.
Savrigul firmly believes that an understanding of the association and preservation between language and culture is inextricably associated and if not preserved, an entire community can lose generations of knowledge, culture, humor, spirituality, traditions and conversation styles thus disabling that community to becoming valuable and contributing members of civil society.
As language speakers of these regions have moved and settled globally to seek new opportunities of a better quality of life, it is thought that Shugni language speakers are decreasing due to globalization. The Shugni language and its associated cultures are being lost, thus there is a critical need to refashion and preserve the language using different words, sounds and grammatical structures augmenting what is currently a language dating back 5000 years.
Savrigul has worked for the last 20 years plus within the Tajik and Shugni speaking communities in Tajikistan, Malaysia, Indonesia, and the United States and has noticed a considerable language shift over the last two decades which has proved that this inevitable refashioning that is taking place, even when cultural identity is preserved, has prompted an abrupt loss of traditions. The cultural forms of the West, through various media forms is slowly replacing the culture and traditions of Shugni.
Therefore, it is Savrigul’s professional recommendation that for proper and formalized language revitalization to take place, education and accessibility must be established through technological solutions to preserve Shugni.