Gun Wikimedians Working Group

The Gun Wikimedians Working Group (GWWG) is a coordinating body for the growth, promotion, and development of the Gun language languages on Wikimedia projects. This group was formed on the 1st of July 2022 in line with the recommendation of native speakers of the Gun language at Celtic Knot Conference 2022 held in Badagry, Lagos State, Nigeria.

About Gun language

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The Gun is a language in the Gbe languages group, spoken by the Ogu people in Benin, and southwestern Nigeria. The language is part of the Fon cluster of languages inside the Eastern Gbe languages; it is close to Fon, especially its Agbome and Kpase varieties, as well as to the Maxi and Weme (Ouémé) languages. It is used in some schools in the Ouémé Department of Benin. Gun is the second most spoken language in Benin. It is predominantly spoken in the south of the country, in Porto-Novo, Sèmè-Kpodji, Bonou, Adjara, Avrankou, Dangbo, Akpro-Missérété, Cotonou, and other cities where Ogu people live. It is also spoken by a minority of Ogu people in southwest Nigeria near the border with Benin, particularly Badagry, Maun, and Tubé.

Mission

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The mission of the Gun Wikimedians Working Group is to project, increase and preserve content related to Ogu (Egun) people. And also ensure that the sum of all human knowledge is freely accessible in the Gun/Ogu language.

It will achieve that by:

Connecting and reaching out to native speakers of the Gun language with the aim of enriching Wikimedia projects in Gun language.
Partner with mission-aligned organizations, scholars, researchers, authors, and teachers of Gun language
Collaborate with organizations and individuals involved in the promotion, revitalization, and recording of Gun language.
sharing experiences and providing feedback to one another with a view to inspiring and enriching each others' events and programs
Creating, expanding, and improving Wikimedia projects in Gun languages
Collaborate with software developers in designing good infrastructures and tools that would make it easier for volunteers to contribute to Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects in Gun language
Carrying out advocacy works to promote the Gun language

Role of the working group

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The role of the Gun Wikimedians Working group is to serve as an infrastructure to support the growth and development of Wikimedia projects in the Gun language. It is an international body to collect and shares best practices, lessons learned, and methodology for developing the Gun language Wikimedia projects It will offer support to people interested in developing initiatives and new projects. It will become the point of contact to set up cooperation with other organizations working towards the same goals, and it will actively seek such cooperation opportunities.

Documenting 180 years Christmas in Badagry

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Accessing information about the Ogu people has been very difficult to find over time as information about the group has been published mainly in print formats with limited circulations, thus, limiting access to the information. Members of the Gun Wikimedians Working Group have decided to battle for cultural survival through documentation of information about the Ogu/Gun people by closing the content gap of the Ogu people on the internet through Wikipedia projects. From the 24th to the 27th of December 2022, members of the Gun Wikimedian Working Group joined the people of Badagry to document the celebration of 180 years of Christmas in Badagry. The event started with a rally from the Badagry Roundabout with hundreds of people wearing beautiful Christmas outfits.

Activities from the event