Category: FEL_EC

In this blog post, we introduce another member of the FEL executive committee.

Eda Derhemi

I live in Champaign, Illinois, USA and was born in Albania, where I completed my undergraduate education and then worked for five years at the University of Tirana. After this, I lived for five years in Sicily, and then completed my graduate studies in linguistics and communications at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) where I now teach linguistics and Italian language in the Department of French and Italian.

I first encountered linguistic endangerment in practical terms, and then theoretically, during my years in Sicily, and have often visited two strongholds of the endangered Arbëresh language (related to Albanian), Piana degli Albanesi and Contessa Entellina. I have conducted sociolinguistic studies on Arbëresh (in 50 villages) that are not just descriptive accounts of different linguistic systems of the language, but are led by a theoretical framework of language endangerment guided by the pioneering studies of Fishman and Dorian. In the last five years I have undertaken fieldwork on Arvanitika, another Albanian language spoken throughout Greece, working mostly in Attika, Thives, Levadia and Hydra. Arvanitika is a severely endangered language; its speakers and socio-political conditions show traits that are completely opposite to those of Arbëresh.

I am also active in Albanian public communication as a writer, essayist, and literary critic, and have recently translated poetry and prose, including Miele sul coltello by Romeo Çollaku (co-translated from Albanian to Italian with Francesco Ferrari). I have served as a FEL executive committee member since 2018, and recently agreed to contribute regularly to the Ogmios newsletter and assist Chris Moseley, the editor.

In today’s post, we introduce another member of the FEL Executive Committee.

Chris Moseley

My interest in endangered languages began in my native Australia, but formal involvement with language minorities began with my fieldwork on the Livonian language of Latvia (1987-1993). Simultaneously I worked as co-editor of the Routledge Atlas of the World’s Languages, now in its third edition (in preparation). Since 2008 I have been editor of the UNESCO Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger, soon to become the World Atlas of Languages.

I work as Teaching Fellow in Estonian language at the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London. I also teach Latvian there. Apart from that I work as a freelance translator. On the Executive Committee of FEL I have served as Treasurer, later as editor of the Ogmios newsletter, and most recently as the Advocacy and Campaigns Officer. Over the years I have helped in the preparation of annual conferences, and assessing applications for grants. I believe that our Foundation has an irreplaceable and valuable role to play, even on a relatively modest scale, in protecting the world’s language diversity.

This post introduces another member of the FEL Executive Committee.

Muhammad Zaman Sagar

I live in Islamabad, Pakistan, and work as a Senior Advocacy Officer for Forum of Language Initiatives (FLI) and Executive Director of the Gawri Community Development Programme (GCDP). I have been working on language development since 1992, and with FLI since 2004. I am a language and education activist, researcher, linguist, advocate, and mobilizer for the marginalized language communities of Pakistan. I have more than a dozen publications on language issues.

My expertise is also in the field of Mother Tongue-based Multilingual Education (MTB-MLE) and the use of the guide and tools for Planning the Future of Our Language (PFOL) developed by SIL International.

In today’s post, we introduce another member of the FEL Executive Committee.

Joseph Babasola Osoba

I live in Nigeria and teach English Linguistics as an Associate Professor at the Alex Ekwueme Federal University Ndufu-Alike, Ikwo, Abakaliki, Ebonyi State. I taught at the Department of English, University of Lagos, Akoka from 1999 to 2016. I have also taught at the Elizade University, Ilara- Mokin as an Associate Professor and Acting Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and at the Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba- Akoko, Ondo State, as a Lecturer and an Adjunct Senior Lecturer. I have given a couple of lectures relating to language attitudes and preferences. For more information see here.

My current research relates to the causes of and solutions to language endangerment in Nigeria.  As a promoter of mother tongue education, I believe that indigenous languages can, when standardised, become sources of employment, commerce, and social and political advancement through their value. My slogan is: That our languages may not disappear.

In today’s post, we introduce another member of the FEL Executive Committee.

Cassie Smith-Christmas

I live in Ireland and am a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Action Fellow in the Roinn na Gaeilge at the National University of Ireland, Galway. I have done  extensive research within the sociolinguistic sub-field known as ‘Family Language Policy’ and previously worked at the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, the Irish Research Council, the Institute for the Advanced Studies in the Humanities at the University of Edinburgh, and Soillse, the inter-university Scottish Gaelic research network, at the University of the Highlands and Islands (more details are here).

My interest in endangered languages began when I was six or seven years old. My parents were always playing Scottish and Irish music at home, including songs in the Scottish Gaelic and Irish languages. I quickly came to love many of those songs (although saying that my favourite song in the world was ‘Fear A’ Bhàta’ certainly didn’t help me fit in with my peers at school in Virginia, USA!).  In my third year of university, I took a class with Peter Mülhäusler, University of Adelaide, during study abroad, and since then, I have studied issues related to endangered languages, particularly looking at language transmission in the family.  I am the author of Family Language Policy:  Maintaining an Endangered Language in the Home and co-editor Gaelic in Contemporary Scotland:  The Revitalisation of an Endangered Language and New Speakers of Minority Languages: Linguistic Ideologies and Practices.

I am co-editor of the FEL blog, and am keen to facilitate a space for speakers of endangered languages to share their stories, as well as create a forum for academics working on minoritised languages to share their thoughts in an accessible, engaging way.  If you have an idea for a blog post, don’t hesitate to get in touch with me!

In today’s post, we introduce another member of the FEL Executive Committee.

Tjeerd de Graaf

I live in the Netherlands and am associated with the Mercator Centre of the Fryske Akademy in Ljouwert (Leeuwarden). My current interest is the digitisation and description of analogue sound recordings and their use for scientific and educational purposes. Some of my own material is related to the language of the Siberian Mennonites who spoke Plautdietsch, a variety of Low German, which is related to dialects in the North of the Netherlands. 

In 2019 we finished the publication of a volume with articles on historical data for several languages in Eurasia, including Uralic languages in a book on North and East Tartary by the Amsterdam scholar Nicolaas Witsen. My work is also related to the Foundation for Siberian Cultures and the publication of Regional Dossiers on the teaching of minority languages by the Mercator Centre of the Frisian Academy. We prepared several issues in this series, such as one on the teaching of Hungarian in Slovakia, Romania, Slovenia and Ukraine, as well as of some endangered languages of Russia (Nenets, Khanty, Selkup, Udmurt). More information is available on my website at the Mercator Centre.

In today’s post, we introduce another member of the FEL Executive Committee.

Maya David

I live in Malaysia and am Honorary Professor in the Asia-Europe Institute, University of Malaya. I have been examining the Sindhi Hindu community in different parts of the world. My studies show that many of this diasporic community have shifted away from the use of their ethnic language.  We now need to know the reasons for the shift and how we can revitalise the use of the language.  For my studies on minority communities in Malaysia I was awarded the Linguapax Prize in 2007.  For more information see my website.

I am involved in helping  FEL to evaluate grant applications and abstracts for the yearly conferences. I am also a member of the Linguapax Committee, another NGO that researches language choice, shift, and endangered languages.

In today’s post, we introduce another member of the FEL Executive Committee.

David Nathan

David is a linguist and digital specialist for the Anindilyakwa Land Council‘s  Groote Eylandt Language Centre on Groote Eylandt, Australia, where the island’s Indigenous population are first-language speakers of the Anindilyakwa language. Previously he was co-ordinator for the Centre for Australian Languages and Linguistics (CALL) at Batchelor Institute, and the Director of the Endangered Languages Archive (ELAR) at SOAS University of London, where his team developed new approaches to archiving digital language documentation and trained a generation of linguists in technologies and methods for documentary linguistics. He has 25 years experience of collaborative production of multimedia, apps, online materials and platforms supporting language maintenance, revitalization, education and publishing. He is co-author (with Peter Austin) in 1996 of the web’s first ever hypertext dictionary, for Gamilaraay, spoken in northern New South Wales, and a Founding Editor of EL Publishing. He has also taught computing, linguistics, cognitive science, and multimedia, and his publications include the textbook Australia’s Indigenous Languages and journal articles on archiving, language documentation, audio, multimedia, internet, and lexicography. Currently he is editor of the FEL website.

The Foundation for Endangered Languages has an Executive Committee (EC) that governs the operation of the Foundation and organises events and activities. In this and following posts we will introduce readers to the current EC members, with information about their backgrounds, interests, and links to relevant web pages.

Serena d’Agostino

I am an Italian independent researcher (graduated from University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’ in 1997) who spent many years in Quebec, Canada. I have been honoured to acquire Indigenous Knowledge and believe that this wisdom is vital for the future of our species on earth. Since 2003 I have volunteered in the field of endangered languages for FEL, Centro Editorial de Literatura Indígena, Asociación Civil (CELIAC) in Oaxaca, Mexico, and I am a founder of FEL Canada. Now back in Italy, I share what I have learnt on what First Nations people call Turtle Island, and enjoy living in my mother tongue. I am currently involved in managing the FEL Facebook page.