Welcome to the home of the Texas Czech Legacy Project!
The goal of our Project is to create a central place documenting the language, culture, and history of ethnic Czech Moravians in Texas. The first stage of our Project involves creating the Texas Czech Dialect Archive (TCDA), a repository of audio-recordings gathered from ethnic Czech Moravians in Texas since the 1970s through the 2000s. The Texas Czech Legacy Project would not have come to existence had it not been for the generous financial support from the Czech Endowment in the Department of Slavic and Eurasian Studies at the University of Texas at Austin as well as the Humanities Texas media grant.
Our Project's mission is to create a community resource for Texas Czechs, as well as a scholarly resource for anyone fascinated by this population’s language, culture, and history. As a legacy archive, the TCDA will be a central repository for irreplaceable oral histories, spoken in the Texas Czech dialect, reflecting the change in the historically Czech Moravian communities of Texas as remembered by the speakers from their childhood through the present day. We are always on the lookout for new collaborators as well as supporters! If you are interested in working with us in some capacity and/or in supporting the Project, please visit our Giving to TCLP page and/or contact us.
We dedicate the Project to Professor Svatava Pírková Jakobson who, fascinated with Czech Moravian communities in East Central Texas, began documenting their rich history by collecting folkloric, language and musical materials during her tenure at the University of Texas at Austin (1967-1978).
The Texas Czech Legacy Project (TCLP) aims:
- To create the Texas Czech Dialect Archive documenting the unique Texas Czech dialect for current and future generations of Czech Moravians in Texas
- To document the history and development of the original settlements to the present day through oral histories and various other cultural artifacts gathered from Texas Czechs
- To aid in any revitalization efforts acknowledging the Texas-grown variety of the Czech language as a resource in language learning by Czech heritage speakers in Texas.
- To inspire more attention to the dying dialect of Texas Czechs in scholarly research both in the United States and the Czech Republic.
- To inspire and nurture concrete collaborative projects between activists in Texas Czech organizations, local educators enthusiastic about bringing the community legacy into the classroom, and scholars at the University Texas at Austin and in the Czech Republic.
Check Our News for any updates & to follow our progress as we build the site, enhance it with new tools, and continue expanding our Texas Czech Legacy Archive.