Page 4 - Donlin Spring 2020 Newsletter Digital

Vernon Chimegalrea recording the Yup’ik audio bible at KYKD studio.
THE YUP’IK AUDIO BIBLE PROJECT
Donlin Gold Staff Community Volunteerism
By Vernon Chimegalrea & Palmer Bailey
Donlin Gold encourages its employees to volunteer in community led projects and efforts within the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta region. Vernon Chimegalrea of the Community Relations team has been part
of a team of volunteer Yup’ik speakers working to record a Yup’ik audio Bible. Over the years, the Alaska Province of the Moravian Church headquartered in Bethel has led the effort to translate the Bible and many hymns into the Yup’ik language.
The village of Bethel was established in the late 1800s as a missionary outreach to the Native Yup’ik people of Western Alaska. One of the goals of that outreach was to bring the Bible to those people in their native language.
The first book of the Bible to be published in the Yup’ik language was the Gospel of Mark in 1915. By 1956 all of the New Testament and eight books of the Old Testament had been published in Yup’ik. In 1971, a project was undertaken to translate and publish the remaining 31 books of the Old Testament. That task was completed 44 years later when the entire Bible was finally printed in the Yup’ik language during the summer of 2015, exactly a century after the first portion of the scripture had been made available.
There are an estimated 15,000 people whose traditional language is Yup’ik and who live in about 60 widely spread villages in an area of Western Alaska. Many of these people would be described as “oral learners;” therefore, the best way to effectively bring the Bible to them is through an audio format.
In 2015, Palmer Bailey, the manager of radio station KYKD in Bethel and his wife Bonnie, responded to the need and began the daunting project of producing a professional quality recording of the entire Bible in the Yup’ik language. Some 20 different highly fluent Yup’ik volunteer readers have been involved in this project. During the last four-and-a-half years, the Yup’ik volunteer readers have recorded over 1,000 chapters, which is nearly 90% of the Bible.
KYKD expects the project to be completed during 2020 and is making plans to distribute the audio Bible in multiple ways including small audio players, combined solar-powered radios/players, flash
drive and memory sticks and via downloads from
a web site. KYKD broadcasts portions of the audio Bible each day from Bethel as well as from repeater stations in Aniak, Kalskag, Hooper Bay, Quinhagak, Togiak and its sister station KSCM in Scammon Bay.
4