Seminar on FLEx computer program for exegetical advisers
March 18, 2013

12-15 March 2013 IBT hosted a workshop, whose participants were mostly exegetical advisers. The seminar was devoted to the study of a special software programme called FLEx (full name - FieldWorks Language Explorer), a product of SIL. This programme allows the user to record lexical material, and then to manage, create and export glossaries, to create interlinear texts to analyze features of the discourse of the language, to study the morphology of the language, and also to collect and organize materials related to the target language culture.

IBT together with SIL organized this seminar for training on the FLEx program. It was attended by eight people, mostly exegetical advisers from different Bible translation projects, as well as IBT Moscow office colleagues. The four-day program of the workshop had been carefully thought out by the trainers, who had developed a set of special exercises for the gradual reinforcement of each studied function.

One of the most important requirements for exegetical advisers is knowledge of the language into which the Bible is being translated. Among the languages ​​into which the Bible is translated by IBT, many languages ​​have not been well described. Grammar manuals are outdated, and dictionaries do not provide complete information about the lexical and semantic systems of the language. Through FLEx exegetical advisers can learn the language of the translation or improve their knowledge. They can create dictionaries (or even prepare them for publication), and analyze and learn about the intricacies of the grammatical structure of the language. The better the exegetical adviser knows the language of the translation, the more productive his work with other members of the translation group becomes.