Documentary Corpus of Brokskat, an Endangered Indo‑Aryan (Eastern Dardic) Language Spoken in Ganokh Village in Pakistan
| Language | Brokskat |
| Depositor | Muhammad Ilyas, Abdul Rehman, Safeer Hussain |
| Affiliation | University of Baltistan Skardu |
| Location | Pakistan |
| Collection ID | 0860 |
| Grant ID | SG1174 |
| Funding Body | ELDP |
| Collection Status | Forthcoming |
| Landing Page Handle | http://hdl.handle.net/2196/09ae06d2-9de7-4561-bb8d-48378a5ff024 |
Summary of the collection
This project aims to document Brokskat, an endangered Indo-Aryan language. The resulting corpus will consist of approximately 18 hours of naturalistic video recordings, complemented by 50 photographs that provide rich situational context. The corpus will include 10 hours of data with IPA phonetic transcriptions and English translations, as well as 5 hours of interlinear glossing using FLEx.
Group represented
The group represented in this deposit is the Brokpa, a small minority community residing in Ganokh Village within Kharmang District. Ganokh is located on the Pakistani-administered side of the Line of Control, bordering Indian occupied Ladakh. The Brokpa represent a distinct cultural and linguistic heritage in the region. According to local oral traditions, their ancestors are believed to have migrated from the northern and western parts of the Gilgit region of Gilgit Baltistan, Pakistan.
Language information
Brokskat is an endangered Indo-Aryan language spoken primarily in Ganokh village in Kharmang, Gilgit-Baltistan, Pakistan. The number of fluent speakers is rapidly declining, placing the language at risk of extinction. The number of speakers is estimated around 300 to 1000, although we cannot be sure of the actual number of speakers due to lack of census figure.
Acknowledgement and citation
I am sincerely grateful to Professor Nathan Hill, Director of the Trinity Centre for Asian Studies, for his guidance and support in shaping my academic career and supervising my PhD dissertation, which enabled me to apply for this project. I am also thankful to Mr. Abdul Rehman, Lecturer at the University of Baltistan, Skardu, and Dr. Safeer Hussain, Head of the Department of Languages and Cultural Studies at the University of Baltistan, Skardu, for their willingness to support the data collection, transcription, and uploading processes in the present project. I am further obliged to the Broskat speakers, Mr. Zaheer, his grandfather, and Mr. Saleem, for their willingness to participate in this project at the initial stage.
To refer to any data from the collection, please cite as follows:
Ilyas, Muhammad. 2026. Documentary Corpus of Brokskat, an Endangered Indo‑Aryan (Eastern Dardic) Language Spoken in Ganokh Village in Pakistan. Endangered Languages Archive. Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/2196/08b166ad-c495-45d7-b668-32aebd44ad74. Accessed on [insert date here].
