9. Forthcoming Meetings

1st International Conference on African Languages, Maseno, Kenya, 10-12 May 2000: Developing African Languages for Education & Technology in the 21st Century

Presenters Of Lead Papers:
1. Prof. Beban Sammy Chumbow, Vice-Chancellor, University of Dschang, Cameroon.
2. Prof. Dr. H. Ekkehard Wolff, Chair, Institute of African Studies, Leipzig University, Germany.
3. Prof. Kwesi Kwaa Prah, Director, the Centre for Advanced Studies of African Society (CASAS), CAPE TOWN, South Africa.
4. Dr. Neville Alexander, Director, Project for the Study of Alternative Education in South Africa (PRAESA), Univ. of Cape Town, South Africa.
5. Prof Okoth Okombo, Chair, Dept. of Linguistics & Literature, University of Nairobi.

The Venue
Maseno, the venue of the conference, is about 20 km from Kisumu. You can fly right into Kisumu, where you will be picked up from the airport to the conference venue. It will be easier to fly into Kisumu if you are flying either Kenya Airways or KLM since these airlines have flights up to Kisumu. All the other airlines have flights only up to Nairobi, from where you will have to book onward flights to Kisumu.

D.O.Ang'iella,
Chair, Organising Committee
F.A.S.S maseno-fass(at)swiftkisumu.com

7th Annual SILC "Language Across the Community" 11-14 May 2000, Toronto, Canada

At Toronto Colony Hotel , organized by Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto.

Contact:
Barbara Burnaby, Mod. Language Centre
OISE/UT, 252 Bloor Street West Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5S 1V6
Fax+1(416)926-0469 or silc(at)oise.utoronto.ca
http://www.oise.utoronto.ca/MLC/silc

Workshop on "Developing language resources for minority languages: re-usability and strategic priorities" 30 May 2000 Athens, Greece

(Preceding Second Language Resources and Evaluation Conference) More at: http://www.cstr.ed.ac.uk/SALTMIL/lrec00.html

14:30 Registration, preparing posters

14:50 Welcome

15:00 "Strategic priorities for the development of language technology in minority languages" (Kepa Sarasola, University of the Basque Country)

15:20 "Language engineering resources for minority languages" (Harold Somers, University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology, UK)

15:40 "Linguistic Exploration: New Methods for Creating, Exploring and Disseminating Linguistic Field Data" (Steven Bird, Linguistic Data Consortium, USA)

16:00 "Funding for research into human language technologies for less prevalent languages" (Bojan Petek, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia)

16:40 General discussion of talks

17:15 Posters

18:45 SALTMIL SIG first meeting

20:00 Finish

The Scots Leid Associe (Scots Language Society): Annual Collogue, 27 May 2000

The Annual Collogue o the Associe wull tak place on Seturday 27t Mey 2000. Steid: Lecture Theatre, AK Bell Library, Perth, Scotlan.

A Chairitie Registrate in Scotlan CR42507

Theme o the day: "Ar Scots-speakin Neibors Dounhauden?/Is the Scots-speaking Community Oppressed?"

The Associe is cawin for abstracks o papers for or agin the abuin theme. Abstracks shuid be aboot 150 wurds lang an can be on onie subjeck that taks tae dae wi the abuin theme, includin the airts, braidcastin, ceivil richts, eddication, the papers or politics. Abstracks shuid be sent tae Dr D Horsbroch, The Aiberdeen Univairistie Scots Leid Quorum, C/O Lithuli House, 56/58 College Bounds, High Street, Aberdeen AB2 3DS, Scotland, nae later nor Fryday 14t Aprile.

The hinmaist papers shuid last 25 meinuts. Aw papers gien on the day wull be set furth in the Associe Antrin Papers. Papers can be in aether Scots or Inglis.

For mair infurmation e-mail masel, Dr Dauvit Horsbroch on Dauvit(at)aol.com

Issues in training linguists to work with endangered languages. Margaret Florey and Nick Thieberger. Australian Linguistics Institute, University of Melbourne, Australia, 3-14 July 2000.

Issues in training linguists to work with endangered languages is a class which will be taught by Margaret Florey (University of Newcastle, Australia) and Nick Thieberger (University of Melbourne) as part of the Australian Linguistics Institute, to be held at the University of Melbourne, Australia, 3-14 July 2000. The class will be taught in the first week of the Institute, from 9.00-10.30am, Monday 3 - Thursday 6 July.

Researchers in the field increasingly find themselves working with minority languages which are under threat. Endangered languages (ELs) commonly exist in a socio-political environment of conflict, transition and transformation. Thus the fieldworker is often confronted by a wide range of issues beyond the scope of her academic task and training. The linguist may be perceived as a means through which the aspirations of the community might be realised or as a target for community frustrations. On the one hand, she may find herself involved in advocacy and community development while on the other hand may be confronted by the enormity of the task of trying to record the wide range of knowledge encoded in an EL.

It is clear that linguists need more specific training to work with ELs. In this course we will discuss key issues which are encountered in working with ELs. The presenters draw on their experience in working in both indigenous and immigrant settings with minority (Austronesian and Australian) languages ranging from those represented by very few remaining speakers to more vibrant speech communities.Topics will include:

Professional issues · Our responsibility as a profession to ELs
· What skills do we need to work with ELs?
· How do we encourage people to go out and work with ELs?
· How we train our students?
· Revaluing the role of linguists in language maintenance activities
· Endangered knowledge
· Rethinking linguistics as a discipline
· Interdisciplinary and teamwork approaches
· Extending our research to incorporate fields such as ethnobiology, musicology, anthropology
· Data management
· Well-formed data
· Return of materials
· Intellectual property
· Archiving of data and long-term data management
· Computer-based tools

Further information about the Australian Linguistics Institute, including registration details, can be found at the ALI site .

Sheffield Multilingual City Conference 5 July 2000

University of Sheffield Student Union Western Bank S10
Speakers - Estelle Morris MP - Lid King Sheffield community schools
Workshops in the morning Working groups in the afternoon Vince Taylor, Sheffield First, will lead the plenary
Cost to participants £30 Unwaged/low waged £10 Exhibitions and displays Celebration of Languages
Sheffield Hallam University July 6th 7 - 9.30pm Compere Ony Bright, radio Sheffield

Enseignement et acquisition des langues minoritaires de l'Europe : Colloque multinational 7-8 juillet 2000

L'Institut Britannique de Paris, en collaboration avec el Instituto Cervantes et l'Institut finlandais de Paris, organise un colloque sur deux journées.

A la différence d'importants travaux récents portant sur l'enseignement dispensé aux enfants dans les langues en question, ce colloque se préoccupera de l'enseignement de ces langues aux adultes de tous âges, des défis d'un tel enseignement, du rôle qu'il joue dans la conservation de la langue, et de l'évaluation des enseignements, tant au niveau régional qu'au niveau européen. Cet appel à communications porte sur tout sujet se rapportant à la situation qui vient d'être décrite, et notamment sur :

· la situation sociolinguistique de groupements autochtones minoritaires en Europe et son rapport à l'acquisition et /ou à la pédagogie de la langue ;
· le rôle des programmes d'enseignement aux adultes dans la conservation de la langue ;
· les facteurs psycholinguistiques (ex: motivation, typologie et traitement langagiers, style l'apprentissage) qui influent sur les apprenants des langues en question ;
· des comparaisons entre l'acquisition et/ou la pédagogie de ces langues et celles de langues de grande communication ou appartenant à des groupements d'immigrés au sein d'un pays ou d'une zone langagière européenne ;
· l'élaboration des programmes, les méthodes pédagogiques et la conception d'outils pour les apprenants des langues en question, considérées d'un point de vue théorique ;
· les différences entre la pédagogie et l'acquisition d'une deuxième langue et la pédagogie et l'acquisition d'une langue étrangère se rapportant aux situations que l'on vient de décrire.

Ce colloque se tiendra à l'Institut Britannique de Paris, 11 rue de Constantine, 75340 Paris Cedex 07, France [Esplanade des Invalides, Métro/RER Invalides].

Dates du colloque : les vendredi 7 et samedi 8 juillet 2000

NB: La langue de travail sera le français. Les auteurs de communications sont vivement encouragés à les présenter en français.

Les droits d'inscription au colloque s'élèveront à 100FF. (Cette somme comprend le déjeûner, le café et un cocktail-contact). Afin d'assurer la qualité des discussions, le nombre des participants sera limitée à 40. Il sera possible de participer à ce colloque sans y présenter de communication.

Dr. Susan Foster-Cohen, English Department, The British Institute in Paris, 75340 Paris Cedex 07, France.
fosterco(at)ext.jussieu.fr, pispoli(at)club-internet.fr télécopie: (+33) 1 4550 3155

Crossing Boundaries Anthropology, Linguistics, History and Law in Native Title: 19-20 Sept 2000

A workshop organised by the Australian Anthropological Society and held in conjunction with the AAS Annual Conference at UWA in September 2000

This two-day workshop will be held on 19 and 20 September, preceding the AAS conference. It will focus on theoretical, conceptual and practical aspects of native title in Australia, and provide a forum for anthropologists, linguists, historians and lawyers to discuss a broad range of issues across disciplinary boundaries. This will include an examination of the relationships between these disciplines in the native title context, as well as an examination of the practical issues which arise in the involvement of these professions in legal and administrative domains. Papers are invited on any relevant theme, including (in no particular order):

* anthropological, linguistic and historical evidence in native title process
* commonalities and tensions in the roles of anthropologists, linguists, historians and lawyers
* communication in the native title process: translating and exchanging cultural and linguistic information
* the results of the native title process for Indigenous communities
* anthropologists, linguists and historians as expert witnesses in court
* relationships between professional experts and legal practitioners
* relationships between professional experts and Indigenous claimants and witnesses
* issues in the preparation of documents and reports
* the relationship between research for cultural heritage studies, statutory land claims and native title cases
* the role of professional peer review processes for native title documents
* the question of advocacy in native title research
* the question of academic analysis and publication of native title research
* availability of professional services to all parties in native title applications

Membership of the AAS is not a requirement of participation in the workshop. Abstracts of 300-500 words should be provided by June 30, 2000. It is expected that papers presented at the workshop will be published in an edited volume. For registration, please use the AAS conference registration form.

Interested participants may wish to contact workshop convenors for further information. Sandy Toussaint John Henderson Department of Anthropology Centre for Linguistics The University of WA The University of WA Nedlands WA 6907 Nedlands WA 6907 Phone (08) 9380 3884 Phone (08) 9380 2870 Fax (08) 9380 1062 Fax (08) 9380 1154 toussain(at)cyllene.uwa.edu.au, john.henderson(at)uwa.edu.au

http://www.arts.uwa.edu.au/
anthropwww/aas2000/workshops.htm

LASSO: Minority Languages in the Americas, Puebla, Mexico, 13-15 October 2000
The 29th annual meeting of the Linguistic Association of the Southwest (LASSO) will be held October 13-25, 2000, in Puebla, Mexico, hosted by Benemerita Universidad Autonoma de Puebla. The theme of the meeting will be "Minority Languages in the Americas" and Yolana Lastra (UNAM) will present the Plenary Address. Abstracts are now welcome, particularly on the conference theme. All proposals for papers, special sessions, panels, or other program features should be submitted to Harmon Boertien, Dept. of English, Univ. of Houston, Houston, TX 77204 (hboertien(at)uh.edu). Papers may be given either in English or in Spanish. The deadline for abstracts is June 1. For information about travel, lodging, and other local arrangements, contact Jim Fidelholtz at jfidel(at)siu.buap.mx. Information about the meeting can also be found at the LASSO website:
http://www.tamu-commerce.edu/swjl/asso.html

Standardisation of the Germanic languages University of Sheffield, UK, 4-7 Jan 2001

The emergence of a standard language is an experience common to all the Germanic languages, but it occurred at very different times in different places. By 1750 German can, by general agreement, be said to have achieved written standardisation. By contrast Faroese was not standardised until the late nineteenth century, and Luxemburgish is arguably still on the way. Questions of language standardisation have often tended to be a national, or at least language-specific, preoccupation, a tendency often reinforced in recent research by scholars' own language-specific specialisations. By focussing on issues of standardisation across all the Germanic languages, this international conference seeks to promote awareness of standardisation issues in a number of different, but related, languages, and so encourage reflection on common, or perhaps universal aspects of language standardisation processes.

Papers of 20 minutes' duration are invited on any aspect of language standardisation in a Germanic language or languages. Possible topics include the role of grammarians, writers, and institutions such as church, state, or schools, as well as of particular regions in contributing to and determining a standard; contemporary linguistic and metalinguistic reflection on the nature or status of the language; debates on standardisation; responses to problems such as the relationship between spoken and written language, the relationship with other, competing standard varieties, attitudes to loan vocabulary, etc. Papers with a comparative approach are particularly welcome. The conference will take a primarily historical perspective, but contributions related to ongoing standardisation processes are also welcome. The language of the conference is English, and it is intended to publish the papers either in book form or on a dedicated website following the conference.

Abstracts of not more than 300 words should be sent to the appropriate organiser, as indicated below, by 31 May 2000. Please contact one of the organisers as soon as possible to indicate your interest in the conference and to be placed on the mailing list.

English and Scandinavian Languages:
Dr Andrew Linn, English Language and Linguistics
University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TN, England
Tel: +44-114 222 0216, Fax 276 8251
E-mail: A.R.Linn(at)Sheffield.ac.uk

Other Germanic Languages:
Dr Nicola McLelland, Germanic Studies, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland
Tel: +353 1 608 1894 Fax: +353 1 677 2694
E-mail: nicolamc(at)tcd.ie

Further information and the booking form will be available in due course. http://www.tcd.ie/Germanic_Studies
/StandardGermanic.html

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