In collaboration with Quinn Dombrowski, I have been working on a project that involves the electronic adaptation of parts of the Bulgarian Dialect Atlas (Български диалектен атлас (II-IV), ed. by Стойко Стойков. 1981).
So far, we have materials pertaining to the reflexes of syllabic /r/ in approximately half of Bulgaria. This feature is of particular interest because of the bewildering diversity of reflexes of syllabic liquids in Bulgarian. This diversity is manifested both through a large aggregate number of distinct reflexes and in complex dialect-internal distributions. This complexity has hindered attempts to draw more nuanced conclusions about this feature in Bulgarian dialects. Our project is an attempt to enable more sophisticated analysis of the superficially overwhelming data through the use of XML markup to enable search by various parameters.
This is also intended as a case study designed to illustrate and explore the ways in which modern technological approaches can be harnessed to maximize the utility of older data sets.
