Erzyan (Internet) Radio — podcasts «Erzyan' mel'» («Erzyan Self-Awareness». The radio program's motto: «Erzyan' mel'» — minyek raskyen't' oymenze («Erzyan Self-Awareness» — the soul of our people).

The Essence of the Phenomenon

The Erzya word "mel" is not merely a wish or an aspiration, a thought — "mel" is a feeling, an opinion, an emotion, a dream, a longing.

Recordings in the widely used .mp3 format are available for download on the radio's website.

Author's Notes

« During the celebration of the great holiday of the Erzya people — Erzyan Kelen Chi (Day of the Erzya Language) — every Erzya person strives wholeheartedly to contribute to the development and promotion of their Erzya language by telling those around them about it. Some gather with their families, read the "Erzya Bible" — the great and incomparable epic "Mastorava" — remember their ancestors, and give heartfelt thanks for the opportunity to speak their native language. Others gather with friends in Erzya and Finno-Ugric community organizations, talk about their people and their culture… they read the sonorous poems of Chislav Zhuravlev, recall the Erzya Inazor Purgaz from Kuzma Abramov's novel of the same name, "Purgaz," some leaf through a colorful album of works by Erzya sculptor Stepan Erzya, and at the end of the gathering watch the film "Rasken Ozks" and invite everyone to Erzyan Mastor this coming July…

I, too, had long dreamed of contributing to the development of my Erzya culture and language by creating my own radio program. I thought about it for a long time, consulted specialists, listened to opinions and suggestions… At the end of March, after visiting Erzyan Mastor, I came back with more than 10 hours of recorded interviews — several days of painstaking testing of my new recording equipment — and set to work… And then it was born! It came to pass! My deepest thanks to my friend Nikita Dorogavtsev for the jingles, to Eryushon Vezhay for proofreading and support, to Inazor Pirguzh and the Foundation for the Preservation of the Erzya Language (Saransk) for their advice and help in organizing the interviews! Thank you all!

The topic of the first program is not merely symbolic but conceptual — "Erzyan Kelen Chi," that is, it is dedicated to Erzya Language Day. The running time came out to 10 minutes and 40 seconds — I almost managed to fit it into the planned 10 minutes! I hope the programs will be released twice a week. So I look forward to your suggestions and topics for future programs. Not even a tenth of the segments I had planned made it into the first program.
 »


Program Schedule

Listen

The Erzya Epic "Mastorava" ("Масторава" эрзянь морокерькс)

Radio programme "Erzyan Mel'" dated 05.05.2007. Programme topic: the Erzya epic "Mastorava" ("Масторава" эрзянь морокерькс). Runtime: 13 min. 10 sec. Author and host: Petryan Andyu. File size: 11.73 MB

Erzyan Kelen Chi (Erzya Language Day)

Radio programme "Erzyan Mel'" ("Erzya Consciousness" — note by the author: the Erzya word "mel'" means feeling, opinion, sense, dream, aspiration). Programme topic: Erzya Language Day (Erzyan Kelen Chi). Author and host: Petryan Andyu, Saint Petersburg. Runtime: 10 min. 40 sec. File size: 9.77 MB

Listen

Official website

Two episodes

The "Erzyan Mel'" podcast feed was created on the RussianPodcasting platform on 26 April 2007. The following day, 27 April, the first episode was published — "Erzyan Kelen Chi", Erzya Language Day: ten minutes and forty seconds, a file of 9.77 megabytes.[1][2]

The second episode, "Mastorava", appeared on 5 May 2007 — thirteen minutes and ten seconds, 11.73 megabytes. There was no third episode. The author had announced that programmes would be released twice a week; the feed stopped at two recordings and two subscribers, and the platform itself went on for years inviting listeners to "ask" the host to return.[1][3][4][5]

The first episode was noticed the same day: the newspaper "Erzyan Mastor" left a comment beneath it — "Паро тев теят, Андю!" ("Good work, Andyu!").[2]

The files are gone. On the night of January 1, 2015, RussianPodcasting shut down — "mission accomplished," as the farewell message put it — and both recordings disappeared along with the platform. The episode pages survive in the web archive.[6]

Who made it

The author and host signed under the Erzya name Petryan Andyu and lived in Saint Petersburg; he had been a member of the Union of Journalists of Russia since April 2004. He started his "Erzya Journal" on LiveJournal on January 26, 2006, and wrote 275 entries there — it was also there that on April 27, 2007, he announced the launch of the radio program.[7][8]

The radio was part of a larger project. A week before the first episode, on April 18, 2007, the same circle launched the portal "Erzyan Rasken Valma" — "Erzya People's Window": a wiki encyclopedia, a Russian–Erzya–English dictionary, a photo gallery, a residents' database, a forum, and this very internet radio. The portal was built by Erzya volunteers from Russia, the United States, Latvia, and Germany, in three languages — Erzya, Russian, and English. It lasted about a year and a half.[9][10]

Erzya radio beyond the internet

Broadcasting in Erzya exists on the airwaves as well: Mordva has the program "Vaygel'" — "Voice," in both Erzya and Moksha. The total volume of indigenous-language broadcasting in the republic for 2021 was 335.3 hours, of which 175.8 fell to radio.[11]

Against this backdrop, "Erzyan mel'" is not a station but a personal experiment: two recordings by one person, and the first attempt to bring the Erzya language into podcast form. The same milieu also gave rise to the Erzya Forums.[1][11]

See also

Sources

  1. web.archive.org — Calendar of the "Erzyan' mel'" feed on erzian.rpod.ru: founded 26 April 2007, last podcast 5 May 2007 (web archive snapshot) (archive)
  2. web.archive.org — Episode "Erzyan' Kelen' Chi (Erzya Language Day)" dated 27 April 2007 on erzian.rpod.ru (web archive snapshot) (archive)
  3. web.archive.org — Episode "Erzya Epic 'Mastorava'" dated 5 May 2007 on erzian.rpod.ru (web archive snapshot) (archive)
  4. web.archive.org — Main page of the "Erzyan' mel'" feed on erzian.rpod.ru (web archive snapshot, 4 July 2014) (archive)
  5. web.archive.org — RSS feed "Erzyan' mel'" on erzian.rpod.ru: last updated 5 May 2007 (web archive snapshot) (archive)
  6. web.archive.org — RussianPodcasting: announcement of the platform's closure on 1 January 2015 (web archive snapshot) (archive)
  7. erzianj-jurnal.livejournal.com — Petryan' Andyu. Radio programme "Erzyan' mel'", dedicated to the Erzya language, 27 April 2007 (archive)
  8. erzianj-jurnal.livejournal.com — Profile of Petryan' Andyu's "Erzyansky Zhurnal" on LiveJournal: journal created 26 January 2006 (archive)
  9. erzianj-jurnal.livejournal.com — Petryan' Andyu. "Erzyan' Rasken' Val'ma" (Erzya People's Website) launched, 18 April 2007 (archive)
  10. web.archive.org — Portal "Erzyan' Rasken' Val'ma" on erzian.com: wiki encyclopedia, library, photo gallery, residents database, forum (web archive snapshot) (archive)
  11. cyberleninka.ru — Pakshina I. A., Maskaeva E. N. Ethno-languages in the media space of the Republic of Mordovia. Finno-Ugric World, 2024, vol. 16, no. 3, pp. 334–347