Designing for Meaning and Trust in Digital Community-Based Swahili Language Repositories

Context

Role: UX Researcher
Timeline: 6 Weeks
Digital Community Initiative: Swahili Verse Project

Project Overview

This project explored the existing digital Swahili glossary to understand how users search, interpret, and trust language data online. Many repositories prioritize lookup efficiency over clarity, contextual meaning, or dialectal variation, limiting comprehension, engagement, and trust.

The research aimed to uncover user needs, frustrations, and interface gaps, informing the design of a UX-forward, community-driven digital Swahili language repository — laying the foundation for what would become Swahiliverse.

Role & Responsibilities

As the UX Researcher, I led:

Led user research across diverse Swahili-speaking communities, conducting interviews and participatory workshops to understand how people use, translate, and interpret non-standard or dialectal Swahili.
Identified key user pain points around inconsistent meanings, lack of dialect visibility, and gaps in existing language technologies—shaping the platform’s core problem statement.
Developed user personas (e.g., translators, language students, dialect speakers, technologists) to guide feature prioritization and ensure the product reflects real user needs.
Co-designed and facilitated participatory design workshops with translators and students to co-create the structure of the lexicon, meaning categories, usage examples, and metadata fields.
Supported the development of an accessible, community-centered platform, ensuring users could search, contribute, and learn from rich, context-aware Swahili entries.

Problem Statement

How can a digital language platform provide clarity, trust, and contextual understanding, while supporting diverse users — learners, native speakers, and translators — in ways that existing repositories do not?

Research Objectives & Question

Investigate how users currently interact with digital glossaries
Identify gaps, frustrations, and unmet needs in existing platforms
Generate actionable UX design principles for comprehension, trust, and exploration

Methodology

5.1 User Interviews

Participants: 12 users (5 native speakers, 4 learners, 3 translators)
Focus: How users search, interpret, and trust digital language repositories

Outcome: Captured mental models of users and their subjective evaluation criteria.

5.2 Competitive UX Analysis

Platforms: 6 widely used Swahili digital glossaries and dictionaries
- Layout, hierarchy, and information grouping
- Contextual examples
- Contributor transparency
- Interaction patterns (lookup vs exploration)

Outcome: Identified structural and UX gaps limiting comprehension, trust, and engagement

Findings & Insight

Users value explanatory depth over flat definitions
Trust increases when meaning is contextualized culturally and linguistically
Learners feel underserved by static, dense layouts
Native speakers expect dialectal and regional distinctions
A single “correct” translation is insufficient for diverse audiences

Design Implications & Recommendations

Based on research insight, a UX-forward digital repository should:

Navigation & Discovery
Provide filters by domain or topic. Enable exploration with related content suggestions and breadcrumbs.
Context-Rich Content Layout
Organize entries into distinct sections for definitions, examples, dialects, and notes. Use hierarchy for readability.
Trust & Credibility Signals
Show contributor roles, verification, and metadata.
Scalable Information Architecture
Use modular, expandable components to accommodate new content. Ensure growth without clutter.
Search Feedback & Refinement
Responsive & Accessible Design
Ensure mobile-friendly layouts and accessible typography. Use high-contrast themes for inclusive use.

Outcome & Impact

These insights informed the conceptualization of Swahiliverse, a community-driven, UX-optimized digital Swahili language repository that:

Offering exploration-based navigation rather than simple lookup
Presenting rich, contextual, and culturally grounded entries
Building trust through transparent contributor information
Supporting scalable, modular content for evolving language
Delivering an accessible and responsive experience across devices

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