The Hans Rausing Endangered Languages Project  The Hans Rausing Endangered Languages Project

News

  • Endangered Languages Week 2013.
    Endangered Languages Week 2013 will be held at SOAS 20th to 28th May and will include a variety of workshops, talks, films, demonstrations, a debate, and more. Detailed information, including a full programme, is available here.
    May 8th 2013, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Congratulations!.
    MA student Ellen Foote has been awarded a Wolfson scholarship for a PhD on 'Yangon Burmese Sign Language - How does Sociolinguistic Variation Affect Signed Discourse and Language Ideologies?' and Soung-U Kim has been awarded an AHRC Doctoral Scheme fees only scholarship to work on 'A corpus-based description and multi-modal documentation of Jeju, an endangered language of South Korea'. We congratulate them both!
    May 3rd 2013, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Third Dieri language revitalisation workshop.
    Peter Austin participated in the third Dieri Aboriginal Corporation language revitalisation workshop in Adelaide, South Australia, 4th April 2013. The revitalisation project blog now has 25 posts and has received over 1,400 visits.
    April 28th 2013, contributed by Peter Austin
  • LDD 11 on sale.
    Volume 11 of Language Documentation and Description was on sale for GBP 10 (25% off) via the SOAS online store. The sale ended 31st March 2013.
    March 25th 2013, contributed by Peter Austin
  • APLL6 conference.
    The full programme for the Austronesian and Papuan Languages and Linguistics conference APLL6 is now available. Online registration can be made via the SOAS online store. We look forward to seeing you in London in May.
    March 25th 2013, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Dieri language revitalisation project.
    Peter Austin is currently participating in a language revitalisation project with the Dieri Aboriginal Corporation in South Australia -- activities and news are described in this blog.
    March 24th 2013, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Workshop: New Tendencies and Methods in Language Documentation.
    Mandana Seyfeddinipur is a plenary speaker at the Volkswagen funded workshop New Tendencies and Methods in Language Documentation at the University of Campinas, Brazil. She will also be teaching two seminars on gesture studies with smal corpora.
    March 20th 2013, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • Workshop: Cross-modal typology.
    Mandana Seyfeddinipur presented at the workshop on cross modal typology organised by Ulrike Zeshan at iSLanDS, UCLAN.
    March 20th 2013, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • Video training in Florida.
    Mandana Seyfeddinipur is teaching a two day workshop on the nature of language use and capturing multimodal communication on video at the University of Gainesville, Florida
    March 16th 2013, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • ELAR occasional seminar.
    The next ELAR occasional seminar, by Meili Fang and David Nathan, will be on Friday 15th March at 4pm in Room 467.
    March 12th 2013, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Report on ELAR users.
    Find out here who is registering to use ELAR and why.
    February 28th 2013, contributed by Peter Austin
  • HRELP at ICLDC in Hawai'i.
    David Nathan (ELAR), Julia Sallabank (ELAP) and Mandana Seyfeddinipur (ELDP) are presenting papers at the International Conference on Language Documentation & Conservation.
    February 24th 2013, contributed by David Nathan
  • HRELP at Tokyo workshop.
    Peter Austin and David Nathan gave papers at the International Workshop on Special Genres in and around Indonesia at AA-Ken, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies.
    February 18th 2013, contributed by David Nathan
  • Drawn from the ground: documenting verbal art in Central Australia (Dr. J. Green) - ELAR Seminar Series.
    Dr. Jenny Green (Univ of Melbourne) presents her recent work on sand stories of Central Australia, a traditional form of verbal art in which a skilled narrator incorporates speech, song, handsigns, gesture, and drawing to create complex multimodal utterances. Drinks provided afterwards. 12 Feb, 3pm, G51.
    February 7th 2013, contributed by Kakia Chatsiou
  • HRELP training in Tokyo.
    Peter Austin and David Nathan are running the DocLing training workshop at AA-Ken, TUFS in Tokyo from 11-16 February.
    February 6th 2013, contributed by David Nathan
  • ELF grants round opens.
    The Endangered Language Fund has called for applications for its 2013 grant funding round.
    January 30th 2013, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Award for Prof Abbi.
    Former Leverhulme Visiting Professor Anvita Abbi has been awarded the highly prestigious Padma Shri by the Government of India. For a press report see here.
    January 29th 2013, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELDP grant round now closed.
    The 2013 ELDP grant round is now closed. Notification of results will be 15 June 2013. The next grant round will open 15 October 2013.
    January 15th 2013, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • Happy holidays.
    Best wishes for the holiday season and a happy and healthy 2013 to all our friends and supporters!
    December 21st 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR assistants and volunteer.
    Meet the ELAR archive assistants and volunteer at EL Blog
    December 10th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • TLA workshop: Lexus, Arbil and KinOath.
    Shakila Shayan, Andre Moreira and Peter Withers from The Language Archive (TLA) MPI Nijmegen delivered a workshop on new TLA tools development December 7th introducing Lexus, Arbil and Kinoath.
    December 6th 2012, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • Access and accessibility.
    Another blog post about access and accessibility.
    December 1st 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Meet an endangered language #3.
    Zander's third blog post introduces Eli Timan's work on Jewish Iraqi.
    November 29th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR and 'more open' access .
    A new post over on EL Blog about Open Access, describing ELAR and its mechanisms for access that transcend open/closed or free/pay binary choices.
    November 27th 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • Mike Franjieh's videos.
    The work of Mike Franjieh features in the latest EL Blog post.
    November 24th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Mike Franjieh on Lingua Franca.
    There is very interesting podcast interview by ABC Radio, Australia, with Mike Franjieh about his research in Vanuatu.
    November 17th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • HRELP-funded project news.
    There is a nice report on Murray Garde's project on Ha, spoken in Vanuatu, on this blog.
    November 14th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • FEL call for grant applications.
    The Foundation for Endangered Languages 2012 grant application round for revitalisation projects is open -- see the FEL website. Deadline: 31st December 2012.
    November 12th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • LDD 11 now on sale.
    Volume 11 of Language Documentation and Description is now available for pre-publication orders at 25% off the regular price.
    November 10th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Linda Barwick seminar.
    Linda Barwick (Univ of Sydney) presents on her innovative project recording Western Arnhem Land (Australia) songs, with examples and discussion of methodologies. Drinks provided afterwards. 12 Nov, 5pm, FG01. See hrelp.org/eos.
    November 5th 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • Every language matters.
    An evening of events for the general public about endangered languages, 9th November 4-7pm. Everyone welcome.
    November 3rd 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Open Access Week.
    David Nathan has blogged about last week's workshop on Open Access.
    November 1st 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELDP grant round 2013 now open.
    ELDP has opened the 2013 grant round. For more information on dates and how to apply go to here
    October 15th 2012, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • HRELP welcomes Jenny Martin.
    Jenny Martin has joined ELDP as its new Administrator. Jenny is responsible for the support of ELDP grantees and the administration of ELDP. The team is very excited about the new member. Welcome Jenny!
    October 15th 2012, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • ELDP grant application round opens next Monday.
    The 2013 grant application round for ELDP opens next Monday 15th October at 10am BST. For more information and application forms go here.
    October 10th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR blog: Meet an Endangered Language.
    ELAR's new blog now features a series introducing some of our interesting collections. The first is on Surel, a language of Nepal.
    September 28th 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • ELAR at Chiayi, Taiwan.
    David Nathan gave a seminar on Language Documentation and Archiving: New Perspectives on Methodologies and Participation at National Chung Cheng University, Taiwan.
    September 28th 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • ELAR blog post on Archive Interoperability.
    New ELAR blog post on Archive Interoperability Panel at the INNET conference in Cologne.
    September 13th 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • ELAR in Cologne.
    David Nathan and Kakia Chatsiou presented on Experiences from a social networking archive at the inNET conference at the University of Cologne, Germany.
    September 6th 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • EL Blog goes live.
    The Endangered Languages Archive blog called EL Blog went live today. We invite you to read, subscribe and comment on posts.
    August 24th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • The Notebooks of William Dawes.
    ABC radio program on new book by Ross Gibson based on The Notebooks of William Dawes - see website, a digitisation collaboration between ELAR and SOAS Special Collections.
    August 20th 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • ASEM Forum delegate.
    Peter Austin has been nominated as the UK Representative at the ASEM Language Diversity Forum on "Safeguarding and Promoting Language Diversity in Asia and Europe towards Sustainable Development" to be held in Jakarta, Indonesia 4-5 September
    August 17th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • New paper by Julia Sallabank.
    Julia Sallabank's paper "From language documentation to language planning: Not necessarily a direct route" has just been published in Potentials of Language Documentation: Methods, Analyses, and Utilization, edited by Frank Seifart, Geoffrey Haig, Nikolaus P. Himmelmann, DagmarJung, Anna Margetts, and Paul Trilsbeek.
    August 1st 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAP in Singapore.
    Peter Austin presented two seminars at Nanyang University, Singapore, on 13-14th August entitled "Going, going, gone? Eastern Australian indigenous languages: endangerment and revitalisation" and "Current issues in language documentation".
    July 20th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAP in Australia.
    Peter Austin presented a seminar on "Current issues in language documentation" on 7th August in the Department of Linguistics at University of Adelaide, and a seminar on "Language use and language choice in Lombok, eastern Indonesia" on 10th August in the Department of Indonesian, University of Sydney.
    July 20th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR in Hamburg.
    David Nathan presented "From Preserving Language Resources to Serving Language Speakers: New Prospects for Endangered Languages Archives" at Digital Humanities 2012 in Hamburg, Germany.
    July 15th 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • ELAP in Indonesia.
    Peter Austin gave a talk on 16th July 2012 to students of the Faculty of Education and Teacher Training, University of Mataram, Lombok, Indonesia on "Language diversity, cultural diversity and globalisation".
    July 15th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • SOAS-Smithsonian MOU.
    SOAS and the Smithsonian Institution Museum of Natural History have signed a Memorandum of Understanding for collaborative research. HRELP initiated the MOU and will be involved in joint projects in 2012-13.
    July 15th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Australian collaboration.
    The Dieri Aboriginal Corporation (DAC) of South Australia has been awarded an Indigenous Languages Support grant for 2012-13 for a language revitalisation project. Peter Austin will be a consultant on the project, developing reference and teaching materials. He will participate in a DAC workshop in Port Augusta 7-8th August.
    July 15th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR relocation.
    The Endangered Languages Archive has relocated from R201 to rooms 344 and 346 in the SOAS main building. Visitors to the new location are most welcome during normal office hours.
    July 14th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • At the 3L Summer School in Lyon.
    Julia Sallabank and David Nathan gave presentations at the International Conference of the 3L summer school in Lyon. David also gave lectures on data management and archiving, and Julia taught a course on language revitalisation during the summer school itself.
    July 13th 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • Condolences.
    HRELP is deeply shocked and saddened by the tragic events in London. We would like to extend our sincerest condolences to the Rausing family and the Kemeny family in these difficult days. HRELP was named after Hans Rausing senior and was created through the generous support of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin's Arcadia Fund.
    July 12th 2012, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • Job in ELDP.
    There is a job advertisement for a part time Programme Administrator in ELDP - closing date 16th July 2012
    July 2nd 2012, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • Kris Stenzel podcast.
    A podcast of Prof Kris Stenzel discussing her research on endangered langages in Brazil is now available on SOAS radio
    July 2nd 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR at CRASSH.
    David Nathan presented on ‘Archive fever’ at the latest Cambridge CRASSH workshop.
    July 1st 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • Language Landscape at CRASSH.
    The Language Landscape team presented on their project at the latest Cambridge CRASSH workshop.
    July 1st 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • HRELP public lecture.
    Kris Stenzel, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, gave a talk on "the pleasures and pitfalls of 'participatory' documentation projects". More details.
    June 14th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Online Anmatyerr multimedia materials.
    A team including ELDP grantee Jennifer Green have published striking multimedia materials in spoken and signed Anmatyerr from central Australia
    June 6th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • New ELAR hands on training.
    ELAR ran a hands-on training on accessing ELAR data and resources for SOAS staff and students, more information here.
    May 22nd 2012, contributed by Kakia Chatsiou
  • ELW podcasts.
    Now available: podcasts about Endangered Languages Week
    May 2nd 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Wolfson scholarship.
    Current MA in LDD student Charlotte Hemmings has been awarded a prestigious Wolfson Scholarship to undertake a PhD in Field Linguistics next year. Congratulations, Charlotte!
    April 26th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Travel bursary awarded.
    The Alliance of Digital Humanities Organisations has awarded PhD student Narayan Sharma a student bursary to present a paper at the DH2012conference, one of only 12 awards internationally. Congratulations, Narayan!
    April 25th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR now on Twitter and Facebook.
    You can now follow the activities of ELAR on Twitter at username @ELARarchive and on Facebook at username "ELAR archive"
    April 21st 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • BA grant awarded.
    Julia Sallabank has been awarded GBP 10,000 by the British Academy for a project on "Development of electronic language corpus and pedagogical support materials: Guernsey, Channel Islands". Congratulations, Julia!
    April 3rd 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • APLL5 conference 4-5 May.
    ELAP, in collaboration with Oxford Linguistics and Surrey Morphology Group, is organising the 5th Austronesian and Papuan Languages and Linguistics conference. Register here
    April 2nd 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • 7th European Australianists workshop 3-4 April.
    Candide Simard organised the 7th European Australianists workshop 2012 held at SOAS on 3-4 April.
    March 31st 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • The end of an era?.
    Endangered Language projects are becoming endangered -- see Peter Austin's blog post
    March 30th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Erasmus Staff Exchange.
    Professor Maria Koptjevskaja Tamm visited SOAS 21-23 March and presented three talks as part of a SOAS-Stockholm Erasmus Exchange.
    March 24th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Nahuatl film showing 29 March 6pm.
    An internationally acclaimed film: Silvestre Pantaleon, in Nahuatl (Aztec) with English subtitles was screened on Thursday 29th March at 6pm, SOAS, Room G2. For more information see the film description.
    March 16th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • 3L Summer School registration now open.
    The 3L Summer School 2012 website and registration form are now available. Registration closes on 31 March 2012.
    March 4th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR's 50th deposit now on line.
    Trevor Johnson's Auslan Corpus is the 50th deposit published by ELAR -- see also this blog post
    March 1st 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Peter Austin on International Mother Language Day.
    On 21 February Unesco featured an audio recording of Peter Austin talking about International Mother Language Day.
    February 22nd 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Workshop on language use and video recording.
    Mandana Seyfeddinipur taught a two day workshop at the University of Florida, Gainesville on the visual mode of language and video recording techniques in language documentation.
    February 19th 2012, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • ELAR documentation workshop.
    ELAR and ILCAA (TUFS, Japan) ran an international language documentation training workshop in Tokyo.
    February 16th 2012, contributed by David Nathan
  • AHRC grant awarded to ELDP director.
    Mandana Seyfeddinipur was awarded an AHRC grant of 60 000 GBP for the project "Skills development for language research and teaching in a multilingual world" in collaboration with Friederike Luepke and Noriko Iwasaki.
    February 6th 2012, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • Conference in Paris.
    Julia Sallabank and James Costa (U. Lyon) co-rganised a panel discussion on the role of linguists in endangered languages at the French Society for the History of Ideas in Linguistics at INALCO in Paris, 26-28 January.
    February 1st 2012, contributed by Julia Sallabank
  • Andaman research in the news.
    The research work of Anvita Abbi and her deposit on Great Andmanese in ELAR are mentioned in this recent article by Survival International.
    January 27th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • David Nathan on YouTube.
    Part 1 is now available of an interview about endangered languages with David Nathan made by Julian Lang of the Center for Indian Community Development (CICD).
    January 17th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Conferences at SOAS.
    ELAP staff are co-organising two upcoming conferences: 5th Austronesian and Papuan Languages and Linguistics conference (APLL5) and 7th European Australianists Workshop.
    January 16th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • HRELP at LSA meeting.
    David Nathan and Mandana Seyfeddinipur are attending the Annual Meeting of the Linguistic Society of America in Portland, OR, 5-8 January 2012
    January 5th 2012, contributed by Peter Austin
  • LDD 10 now available.
    Volume 10 of Language Documentation and Description is now available to order online at 25% off for orders placed before 31 January 2012.
    December 21st 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Jobs in ELAR.
    There are two job advertisements one for a Digital Content Curator and one for a Software Developer to work in ELAR - closing date 12th January 2012
    December 7th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Workshop in Canberra.
    David Nathan ran a workshop on Audio Theory and Practice for Language Documentation at the Australian National University on 4th December.
    December 4th 2011, contributed by David Nathan
  • Seminar in Scotland.
    Peter Austin gave a seminar at the University of Aberdeen on 24th November.
    November 22nd 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Prof Anvita Abbi in the news.
    See the recent article on BBC News and the post in The Independent about ELDP grantee, ELAR depositor and ELAP Leverhulme Visiting Professor Anvita Abbi and her work with the Great Andamanese.
    November 17th 2011, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • Activities this week.
    Tuesday: Chris Lucas' seminar, Thursday: Anvita Abbi's public lecture, Friday: LDLT-3 workshop and Saturday-Sunday: LDLT-3 conference.
    November 12th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Blogs.
    There are recent blog posts about endangered languages by Lameen Souag at the Jabal al-Lughat blog and by Peter Austin at the Endangered Languages and Cultures blog.
    November 8th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Potentials of Language Documentation workshop, Leipzig, 3-4 Nov 2011.
    Mandana Seyfeddinipur, Sophie Salffner and Julia Sallabank attended this workshop. Julia Sallabank presented on the use of documentary material in language planning.
    October 31st 2011, contributed by Julia Sallabank
  • Alumni award to Linguistics students.
    SOAS Alumni and Friends has made an award to students in the department to develop a website for their Language Landscapes project.
    October 26th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELDP grant round opens.
    The 2012 grant application round for the Endangered Languages Documentation Programme (ELDP) opens on 17th October 2011. The closing date for receipt of applications is 16th January 2012. Further information is available here or email eldp@soas.ac.uk.
    October 16th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • LDLT-3 early bird registration extended.
    Early bird registration for the Language Documentation and Linguistic Theory 3 conference has been extended to Friday 21 October 2011. You can pay by credit card online.
    October 9th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELDP grantee wins award.
    ELDP grantee Rosa Vallejos has won the highly prestigious Mary Haas award from the Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas (SSILA) for her PhD dissertation "that makes a significant substantive contribution to our knowledge of Native American languages".
    October 4th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Leiden talks.
    Stuart McGill presented on the Laru language of NW Nigeria at the 41st Colloquium on African Languages and Linguistics in Leiden on the 29th August. Talks were also given by two SOAS PhD students, Anja Choon and Hannah Gibson, as well as former MA student Steve Pepper.
    September 1st 2011, contributed by Stuart McGill
  • New book publication.
    The 4 volume 1792 page Endangered Languages collection of essential readings edited by Peter K. Austin and Stuart McGill has just been published by Routledge.
    August 31st 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • LDLT programmes available.
    Programmes for the LDLT conference and archive workshop now available.
    August 11th 2011, contributed by David Nathan
  • ELAR at Oxford.
    David Nathan gave a presentation about ELAR at the Discovering Babel Workshop: How to make your language resources discoverable, Oxford University on Friday 24th June.
    June 18th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Gresham College talk .
    Peter Austin talked about language documentation and revitalisation at a symposium on "Rare and Endangered Languages" on 15th June at Gresham College, London
    June 15th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Endangered Languages and Social Media.
    This article about endangered languages being used on Twitter and Facebook quotes Peter Austin
    June 14th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • SOAS Alumni Weekend.
    Stuart McGill, David Nathan and Candide Simard talked about Endangered Languages at the SOAS Alumni Weekend on Friday 10 June
    June 9th 2011, contributed by Alison Kelly
  • FFLR grant awarded for Kainji research.
    Elena Perekhvalskaya (St Petersburg State University), Kirill Babaev (Russian State University for Humanities) and Stuart McGill have been awarded a grant of $7600 from the Foundation of Fundamental Linguistic Research. This is to fund a joint project on the reconstruction of the Kainji languages of northern Nigeria, 2012-2013, as part of a wider Niger-Congo project.
    May 26th 2011, contributed by Stuart McGill
  • SOAS student podcast.
    London's linguistic diversity is the topic of a podcast by two SOAS MA students, Samantha Goodchild and Nicholas Stallman.
    May 6th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Eitt þúsund tungumál.
    The latest SOAS e-News has an article about Peter Austin's visit to Iceland and the publication of his book in Icelandic.
    May 6th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Talk in Cambridge.
    Julia Sallabank gave a presentation on 'Language revitalisation: issues and outcomes' to the Cambridge Group for Endangered Languages and Cultures on Tuesday May 3rd.
    April 27th 2011, contributed by Julia Sallabank
  • Workshop talk at MPI, Nijmegen.
    Oliver Bond presented a talk entitled 'Cognate Nominal Constructions and focus manipulation' at a workshop on Information Structure and Subordination: South America and Beyond at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen on 28th April 2011.
    April 12th 2011, contributed by Oliver Bond
  • Audio workshop in Jos.
    Stuart McGill ran a workshop on 'Audio recording for Language Documentation' on Monday 4th April at the Theological College of Northern Nigeria, University of Jos.
    April 5th 2011, contributed by Stuart McGill
  • HRELP at NWO conference.
    Jean McGarry and Mandana Seyfeddinipur attended the NWO conference on 'Language Documentation and Description in the Netherlands', 8-9 April at Leiden University.
    April 2nd 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Conference talk in Netherlands.
    Julia Sallabank is giving a talk on "What is meant by 'resilience' in endangered languages? A critical discussion of the situation on the island of Guernse" on 8 April at the Language of the Wider World conference in Leeuwarden, Netherlands
    April 2nd 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • HRELP at Cambridge conference.
    Peter Austin, David Nathan and Julia Sallabank presented talks at the Cambridge Conference on Language Endangerment on 25 March 2011.
    March 12th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR at Audiovisual Archiving Conference.
    Tom Castle and David Nathan attended the Screening the Future 2011 conference at Netherlands Institute of Sound and Vision, 14-15 March
    March 11th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Seminar at CSEAS.
    Peter Austin presented a seminar on 8 March at the Centre of South East Asia Studies.
    March 8th 2011, contributed by Alison Kelly
  • Leverhulme Visiting Professor.
    Professor Anvita Abbi has just arrived at SOAS to be Leverhulme Visiting Professor from 1st March to 31st December 2011.
    March 3rd 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • LDD now available for online purchase.
    All LDD volumes are now available for purchase by credit card securely online here. Postage and packaging is free (saving 20%) from now to 1st June.
    February 19th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELDP 2011 grant round now open.
    The ELDP grant round for 2011 has opened. Applications must be submitted by 28 March 2011. See the ELDP grants page for further information.
    February 10th 2011, contributed by Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • Lecture in Canterbury on language revitalisation.
    Julia Sallabank gave a guest lecture on Tues 1st February 2011 at Canterbury Christ Church University on 'Endangered language maintenance and revitalisation'.
    January 31st 2011, contributed by Julia Sallabank
  • East African Summer School in Language Documentation.
    East African and German students are invited to apply for a 2-week East African Summer School in Language Documentation: Methods and Technology, 4-16 July at Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia. Read more ...
    January 21st 2011, contributed by Friederike Luepke and Mandana Seyfeddinipur
  • Annual training course in Japan.
    Peter Austin and David Nathan co-convened with Anthony Jukes and Hideo Sawada, DocLing2011, training course, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, 18-24th February 2011. See also this report.
    January 15th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Indonesian languages workshop.
    Peter Austin presented a paper on Sasak at the Workshop on TAM and Evidentiality in Indonesian Languages, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, 17-18th February
    January 14th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • HRELP in Hawaii.
    Peter Austin and David Nathan presented talks at the 2nd International Conference on Language Documentation and Conservation in Hawaii, 11-13th February.
    January 13th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • UCGAL keynote.
    Peter Austin was a keynote speaker at the launch of the University Council of General and Applied Linguistics at the British Academy on 27th January 2011.
    January 10th 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Ed Garrett on language archiving.
    Ed Garrett gave a talk about language archiving at the London Linguistics Circle at the University of Greenwich on 19 January.
    January 9th 2011, contributed by David Nathan
  • ELAR & Metadata at LSA.
    David Nathan, Tom Castle and Ed Garrett presented a poster (also downloadable) on ELAR metadata at the LSA annual conference.
    January 8th 2011, contributed by David Nathan
  • HRELP at LSA annual meeting.
    Peter Austin and David Nathan presented talks at the annual meeting of Linguistic Society of America, Pittsburgh, 6-9 January. Mandana Seyfeddinipur also attended.
    January 1st 2011, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Archiving Orality and Connecting with Communities.
    David Nathan reported on ELAR access at this Cambridge WOLP workshop on 10 December. Peter Austin will chair a session at the workshop.
    December 4th 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • Call for papers: .
    Workshop on applied Language Documentation in sub-Saharan Africa, taking place Saturday 14 May, 2011.
    November 30th 2010, contributed by Alison Kelly
  • LDLT-2 papers available.
    Papers from the second Language Documentation and Linguistic Theory conference held at SOAS in 2009 are now available here.
    November 29th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Keynote in New York.
    On 20 November David Nathan gives the keynote address at the Trace Foundations's Minority Language in Today's Global Society: Alive and Digital.
    November 17th 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • Student award.
    PhD student Kay Johnson has been awarded a grant by The Leathersellers' Company Charitable Fund for her research on the Ske language of Vanuatu.
    November 12th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR in Singapore.
    David Nathan is presenting a talk on ELAR at the Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, on 9th November.
    November 9th 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • New documentation available at ELAR.
    The Endangered Languages Archive made 6 new deposits available in Sept/Oct, on Kayardild, Australia from Erich Round, Kouro, Indonesia (Margaret Florey), Chorote, Argentina (Nick Drayson), Reyesano, Bolivia (Antoine Guillaume), Mavea, Vanuatu (Valérie Guérin), and Jewish Iraqi (Eli Timan).
    October 31st 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • ELAR at RCLT.
    David Nathan is presenting a talk on ELAR at the Research Centre for Linguistic Typology, LaTrobe University on 4th November.
    October 29th 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • Visitors to HRELP.
    Prof Tania Kouteva, Dusseldorf University, is Humboldt Visiting Professor from 1st October 2010 to 1st April 2011. Prof John Haiman, Macalester college, St. Paul, USA, is visiting from 1st October 2010 to 1st February 2011. Prof William Foley, University of Sydney, Australia, is visiting in November 2010. These visitors will be presenting talks in the Linguistics Department.
    October 19th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR at ANU.
    David Nathan is presenting a talk on ELAR at the Australian National University on 15th October.
    October 12th 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • Berkeley talk.
    David Nathan is presenting a talk on ELAR at Fieldwork Forum, University of California at Berkeley on 6th October.
    October 6th 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • New York talk.
    David Nathan of ELAR is presenting a talk on 4th October entitled "Archiving for the future, today: the Endangered Languages Archive at SOAS" at the Endangered Language Alliance in New York City.
    September 28th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • HRELP in the news.
    Several ELDP grantees and an ELAP staff member appear in the video clip of this BBC story
    September 15th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • New documentation available in ELAR.
    The Endangered Languages Archive made three new deposits available in August: materials on Mansi (northwest Siberia) from Gábor Székely, Josh Wilbur's materials on Pite Saami and Simon Musgrave's recordings of Sou Amana Teru
    August 30th 2010, contributed by PKA/DJN
  • 15 language documentations now available.
    There are now 15 deposits available for access on the Endangered Languages Archive website. See here for information on how to access the deposits.
    August 10th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Arapaho language research.
    This story discusses the work by University of Colorado student Finn Thye on an ELDP-funded research project on Arapaho, a highly endangered language spoken in Wyoming, USA.
    August 8th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • British Council grant awarded.
    Dr Sophie Salffner, a recent graduate from the PhD in Field Linguistics, has been granted a £20,000 award by the British Council together with Dr Imelda Udoh (University of Uyo, Nigeria) and Dr Francis Oyebade (Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba, Nigeria). ...read more
    August 4th 2010, contributed by Alison Kelly
  • Language Endangerment: Documentation, Pedagogy, and Revitalization.
    The First Cambridge International Conference on Language Endangerment will be held at University of Cambridge on Friday, 25 March 2011. Peter Austin will be one of the plenary speakers.
    July 27th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Grant for developing African language teacher training.
    Friederike Luepke, Julia Sallabank, Itesh Sachdev and Noriko Iwasaki received GBP22,800 from the SOAS Knowledge Transfer Fund to conduct a survey of the needs of African language teachers in an number of West African countries and develop a training package for teacher trainers. The project involves partnership with the African Academy of Languages (ACALAN), and will be piloted with teacher trainers for the West African vehicular cross-border languages Hausa, Manding and Fulfulde. The package will be of great use to teachers of major African languages, and also help support minority languages.
    July 19th 2010, contributed by Friederike Luepke
  • 16th Himalayan Languages Symposium .
    will take place at SOAS from 2-5 September 2010. The Himalayan Languages Symposium was first held at Leiden University in 1995 and is now well-established as an annual open forum for scholars of all aspects of Himalayan languages. Peter Austin will be presenting a paper at this event. ...read more
    July 1st 2010, contributed by Alison Kelly
  • Medieval Tibeto-Burman Languages Symposium .
    will be taking place on 1 September 2010 at SOAS. A major aim of this meeting is to stimulate interaction among scholars working on different languages in Tibeto-Burman and approaching them from different perspectives. ...read more
    July 1st 2010, contributed by Alison Kelly
  • Archive website opens access.
    At 4pm on Wed 30 June ELAR launches the new version of our social-networking style website, enabling access to selected deposits. Come and join us if you are nearby! ...read more
    June 29th 2010, contributed by DJN
  • HRELP on hand in Ghana.
    David Nathan and Sophie Salffner will be teaching at this year's Summer School on Documentary Linguistics, organised by Felix Ameka and held in Winneba, Ghana 18-31 July.
    June 29th 2010, contributed by DJN
  • ELDP funded research in the news.
    Read about ELDP grantee Laura Dimock's research here
    June 4th 2010, contributed by Jean McGarry
  • Review of Zoom H2 .
    Bernard Howard and Stuart McGill have written a review of the Zoom H2 audio recorder from the language documenter’s perspective.
    June 2nd 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • FirthDay to be held at SOAS.
    The 17th June will be a day of talks and rememberances in honour of J. R. Firth, the UK's first Professor of General Linguistics (born on 17th June 1890).
    May 14th 2010, contributed by Stuart McGill
  • Language Contact, Change, Maintenance and Loss.
    Dr Friederike Luepke will give a keynote address at a one day research conference on language contact, maintenance and change at Westminster University. The programme is available here . Full event details and information on pre-registration for this free event can be found on the Westminster University website
    May 13th 2010, contributed by Friederike Luepke
  • ELDP Director begins.
    Dr Mandana Seyfeddinipur has joined HRELP in the new post of ELDP Director. HRELP staff warmly welcome her and look forward to the experience and exciting new directions she will bring.
    May 11th 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • Palatography workshop.
    Dr Sophie Salffner will be organising a Palatography workshop at SOAS on 24 May.
    May 7th 2010, contributed by Alison Kelly
  • British Academy grant.
    Julia Sallabank has been awarded a British Academy travel grant to present conference papers at ICLASP 12 in Brisbane and ICA 2010 in Singapore.
    April 29th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Cicipu orthography workshop.
    On 3rd April 2010 Stuart McGill ran an orthography workshop for the Cicipu language (northwest Nigeria).
    April 23rd 2010, contributed by Stuart McGill
  • Guernsey Field Trip.
    Julia Sallabank and a group of MA students are currently on a two-week fieldtrip to Guernsey documenting Dgernesiais -- see their blog.
    April 16th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • DoBeS grant awarded.
    Friederike Luepke and colleagues Moustapha Sall and Mathieu Gueye from Dakar, Senegal, have been awarded 246,500 euros by the Volkswagen DoBeS programme for the research project 'Pots, plants and people - a documentation of Bainouk knowledge systems" - see here for more details.
    April 6th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELDP Training .
    HRELP welcomes participants to London for ELDP grantee workshop 22-26 March.
    March 21st 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • 2nd West Kainji Languages Workshop.
    Stuart McGill co-organised the 2nd West Kainji Languages Workshop together with Roger Blench, from 8th-10th March 2010 in Kontagora, northwest Nigeria. Twenty-five linguists and language workers attended representing eight West Kainji languages.
    March 11th 2010, contributed by Stuart McGill
  • ELDP 2010 grant round opens.
    The ELDP grant round for 2010 has opened. Applications must be submitted by 1 April 2010. See the Application page for further information and application forms.
    February 15th 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • Documentation training course in Tokyo.
    Peter Austin and David Nathan, together with former ELAP post-doctoral fellow Anthony Jukes, ran an intermediate level training course on language documentation at Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, 2-5 February 2009.
    February 5th 2010, contributed by Peter Austin
  • HRELP welcomes Jean McGarry.
    Jean McGarry has joined ELDP as its new Administrator. Some people will know her from her previous dedicated work with ELDP. Welcome back Jean!
    January 18th 2010, contributed by David Nathan
  • KWEF grant.
    Stuart McGill has been awarded a field trip grant by the Kay Williamson Educational Foundation to conduct research on a number of West Kainji languages of northwest Nigeria from January-April 2010.
    January 11th 2010, contributed by Stuart McGill
  • February Workshop on Sustainability.
    Endangered Languages, Endangered Knowledge & Sustainability will explore sustainable approaches to endangered languages and to research practices. 27 Feb 2010 at SOAS. Keynote speaker: Lenore Grenoble. See call for papers and details.
    December 23rd 2009, contributed by David Nathan
  • Launch of LDD-R centre at Lyon .
    On 25 November Julia Sallabank represented HRELP/SOAS at the launch of a new cross-disciplinary research centre on 'Endangered languages: fieldwork, documentation, revitalisation' (LED-TDR) at the University of Lyon, one of our 3L partners. The programme is available via the Lyon DDL website.
    December 18th 2009, contributed by Julia Sallabank
  • HRELP at WOL Workshop.
    Peter K. Austin and David Nathan are both presenting papers at the World Oral Literature workshop, Cambridge University 15-16th December. The programme is available here.
    December 2nd 2009, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Point Sud launch.
    Friederike Luepke participated in the launch of the Point Sud Centre for Research on Local Knowledge in Bamako, Mali from 23rd to 27th November. The Centre plans to promote the establishment of a truly postcolonial academic community in Africa.
    November 29th 2009, contributed by Peter Austin
  • HRELP at ELIIP workshop.
    David Nathan represented the Endangered Languages Project at the Endangered Languages Information and Infrastructure (ELIIP) workshop. David also gave a talk in the Utah Linguistics Department on multimedia in endangered languages research.
    November 29th 2009, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Linguamon launches House of Languages.
    Peter Austin attended the launch on 20th November of the Linguamon House of Languages at Can Ricart and participated in the scientific committee meeting.
    November 29th 2009, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Dawes Notebooks online launched in Sydney.
    David Nathan of ELAR spoke together with the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs and Darug elders to launch the website and book of the Dawes manuscripts held at SOAS Special Collections and digitised by ELAR. See www.williamdawes.org.
    October 28th 2009, contributed by David Nathan
  • 1000 Languages goes multilingual.
    The book 1000 Languages edited by Peter K. Austin has been translated into several languages, including German, Dutch Italian, Japanese, Estonian, Icelandic, Polish, Rumanian and Spanish.
    July 1st 2009, contributed by David Nathan
  • Peter Austin podcast.
    Peter Austin was interviewed by Patrick Cox on The World in Words number 23 on 26 September 2008 http://www.theworld.org/pod/language/WIWpodcast23.mp3
    September 28th 2008, contributed by Peter Austin
  • David Nathan & Sophie Salffner at Summer School in Ghana.
    ELAR's David Nathan and ELAP PhD student Sophie Salffner were teachers at the recent West African Summer School on Documentary Linguistics, held at Winneba in Ghana and organised by Prof Felix Ameka of Leiden. For information about the event, see this page.
    August 19th 2008, contributed by David Nathan
  • Peter Austin talks in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
    Prof Peter K. Austin is visiting Argentina 12th-20th August and presenting talks at a Symposium on Language Contact and Language Documentation, a workshop on language documentation, and a public lecture at the Biblioteca Nacional.
    August 9th 2008, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELDP Funding Review.
    Professor Graham Furniss, chair of the ELDP panel is conducting a review of all ELDP grants and administrative procedures. The Board of Arcadia will discuss the report resulting from the review in November 2008. We are planning to change the timetable to allow candidates more time to submit their grant applications. It is also possible that certain types of grant will be modified and some new grant types added. This means that we are not advertising a funding round in July/August of this year, as has happened in previous years. There will be a further notice on this website at the end of November 2008 when we have heard the decision of the Arcadia Board.
    July 17th 2008, contributed by Anna Greedharee
  • HRELP out in force in Lyon.
    Peter Austin, Friederike Lüpke and David Nathan are all giving lectures and classes at the "3L" Summer School at University of Lyon 2 ... see details
    June 25th 2008, contributed by David Nathan
  • Peter Austin speaks in Paris.
    Peter Austin is an invited speaker at the conference Sorosoro - let the languages live! organised by the Chirac Foundation at the Musee du quai Branly in Paris on 9th June. The title of his talk is "How linguists and communities work together to document, archive and support endangered languages"
    June 8th 2008, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Edward Garrett joins ELAR.
    The Endangered Languages Archive is delighted to announce the arrival of Dr Edward Garrett, who joins the team as Software Developer. See Ed's page for further details.
    May 30th 2008, contributed by David Nathan
  • David Nathan speaks at NTU in Taipei.
    David gave a seminar to staff and postgrad linguistics students in the Graduate Institute of Linguistics and Dept of Foreign Languages and Literatures at the National Taiwan University in Taipei. The talk had two topics: history of endangered languages archives, and a gentle introduction to XML.
    May 30th 2008, contributed by David Nathan
  • David Nathan talks in Taipei.
    David was an invited speaker at The 7th Annual Wenshan International Symposium, held at National Chengchi University in Taipei on 19th May. The conference theme was spoken corpora ... conference web page
    May 30th 2008, contributed by David Nathan
  • Julia Sallabank talks at Lancaster University.
    Julia Sallabank has been invited to be a keynote contributor at a one-day workshop 'Observing and Documenting Language Revitalisation' at the Centre for Language in Social Life, Lancaster University, Friday 16th May 2008.
    April 18th 2008
  • Julia Sallabank talks in Amsterdam.
    Julia Sallabank gave a paper entitled 'Endangered language maintenance and social networks' on Friday 4th April 2008 at the Sociolinguistics Symposium 17 held at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.
    April 8th 2008, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Irina Nikolaeva speaks at Manchester.
    Irina Nikolaeva is presenting a seminar on Tuesday 8th April 2008 at the University of Manchester Department of Linguistics and English Language. The title of her talk is ‘Topicality and nonsubject marking‘, details available here.
    April 7th 2008, contributed by Peter Austin
  • First two ELAP PhD students complete.
    The first two ELAP PhD students have completed their studies at SOAS. Henrik Bergqvist passed the examination of his dissertation on Temporal Reference in Lakandon Maya in January and Serge Sagna passed the examination of his dissertation on Noun classification in Gújjolaay Eegimaa in March. Serge has been awarded an ELDP post-doctoral fellowship to work on “The documentation of the Gújjolaay Eegimaa, an Atlantic-BAK Jóola Language of Senegal” at the University of Manchester Department of Linguistics.
    April 5th 2008, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Peter Austin on TV.
    The documentary "In Languages We Live: Voices of the World" which includes interviews with Prof Peter K. Austin was shown on SBS Television in Australia at 7:30pm on Friday 4th April 2008.
    April 5th 2008, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Peter Austin visits Hawaii.
    Professor Peter K. Austin visited the Linguistics Department at the University of Hawaii at Manoa for the week of 10th to 14th March 2008 and gave a series of talks on endangered languages and language documentation. You can download a poster showing the events.
    April 2nd 2008, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Gerardo De Caro talks in Tehran.
    On 23rd February PhD student Gerardo De Caro gave a talk on the Taleshi language at the Iranian Institute for the National Encyclopaedia in Tehran. Gerardo discussed his current PhD research, the ELAP programme and the research tools and methods used by ELAP researchers.
    February 24th 2008, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Gerardo De Caro presents a conference paper in Tehran.
    PhD student Gerardo De Caro presented a paper on 'Alignment in Taleshi' at a conference at the Iranian National Heritage Institute in Tehran. He notes that Iranian linguists have adopted the expression zabanha-ye darxatar ‘endangered languages’ and mostanadsazi-e zabani ‘language documentation’ and the Director of the Linguistics Section made explicit reference to the necessity of ehiya ‘revitalisation’. After Gerardo's talk he was interviewed by the Iranian TV network Kanal 2.
    February 23rd 2008, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Oliver Bond speaks at Lancaster University.
    Oliver Bond has been invited to give a seminar in the Department of Linguistics and English Language at Lancaster University on Thursday 28th February 2008. His talk, entitled 'Negation within canonical typology' reflects work carried out as part of his current NegTyp research project in ELAP.
    February 13th 2008, contributed by Oliver Bond
  • Australia's parliament apologises to Indigenous peoples.
    On Wednesday, 13 February 2008, the Prime Minister of Australia apologised to the Indigenous peoples of Australia for previous policies, especially those responsible for what is known as the Stolen Generations. These policies have also done enormous damage to Australian Indigenous languages.
    February 13th 2008, contributed by David Nathan
  • Aboriginal languages back on mainstream agenda.
    Aboriginal languages are back on the agenda in Australia's mainstream media, reflecting the change of sentiment after the last national election. This article from the ABC links languages to the survival of indigenous heritage and praises NSW state government policies.
    February 4th 2008, contributed by David Nathan
  • Training Course in Japan.
    Peter Austin and David Nathan will be going to Japan 10th to 18th February to present an intensive training course on Language Documentation at ILCAA, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. The course will be attended by 18 staff and post-graduate students and cover topics such as audio and video recording, annotation, metadata, ethics and intellectual property rights, applying for research funding and software tools for language documentation.
    February 1st 2008, contributed by Peter Austin & David Nathan
  • Report on new book by ELDP grantee.
    The Swarthmore College on-line student newspaper The Phoenix reports in its 22nd March edition (http://phoenix.swarthmore.edu/2007-03-22/news/17033) on the recently published book When Languages Die by ELDP grantee K. David Harrison (see http://www.hrelp.org/grants/projects/index.php?projid=41)
    April 15th 2007, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELDP Singhpo project.
    There is a report about the research work of Dr Stephen Morey in Assam funded by ELDP in The Telegraph newspaper published in Calcutta on 13th April with the title "Chronicles of a vanishing tongue - Australian linguist documents endangered Singpho language in Assam" -- see http://www.telegraphindia.com/1070413/asp/northeast/story_7639745.asp
    April 15th 2007, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Peter Austin blog entry.
    Peter Austin has contributed an item about fieldwork and health and safety issues to the Endangered Languages and Cultures blog -- see http://blogs.usyd.edu.au/elac/2007/04/theres_fieldwork_and_theres_fi.html
    April 12th 2007, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Endangered Languages and UNESCO.
    There is a special edition of the UNESCO magazine The Intangible Heritage Messenger on endangered languages available at: http://portal.unesco.org/culture/en/ev.php-URL_ID=32207&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html
    December 22nd 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Interview with Nick Ostler, President of FEL.
    There is an interview with Nick Ostler, President of the Foundation of Endangered Languages recorded on 11th September 2006 at http://audio.wbez.org/wv/2006/09/wv_20060911a.mp3 He discusses world language ecology and the loss of languages.
    December 22nd 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • SOAS Director launches OREL.
    Prof Paul Webley, the Director of SOAS, today officially launched OREL, Online Resources for Endangered Languages (http://www.hrelp.org/languages/resources/). OREL is a new and unique resource - a library of over 200 annotated and categorised links to websites for people interested in endangered language documentation and revitalisation. OREL also includes specialist endangered languages pages in Arabic.
    November 22nd 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Researchers and language revitalisation.
    There is an article by Tony Tysome entitled "Drop 'raiders of the lost argot' act" published on page 7 of the 20th October issue of The Times Higher Education Supplement which discusses the role of researchers in language documentation and revitalisation work. After presenting contrasting view from Yaron Matras (Manchester University) and Nicholas Ostler (Foundation for Endangered Languages) Peter Austin is quoted to the effect that: "A lot of work needs to be done to understand the values of the communities whose languages are dying. We need to find a balance between those who say let the languages die and those who want to save everything". The full text of the article is available at
    http://www.thes.co.uk/search/story.aspx?story_id=2033312
    Non-subscribers will need to sign up for a free 30-day trial in order to read it.
    October 26th 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Aboriginal language course wins national Teaching Award.
    A team from Charles Darwin University with Yolngu Aboriginal community leaders has won the Australian Prime Minister’s Award for University Teacher of the Year; see http://www.cdu.edu.au/newsroom/story.php?nID=627
    David Nathan of ELAR was co-author of the course's multimedia CD Gupapuyngu and developed the software. The CD teaches and tests pronunciation, spelling, grammar at thirteen different levels, and presents three hundred stories of staged difficulty, a dictionary, and a kinship chart, which interactively links the 44 Yolngu kinship terms from the point of view of gender and group; text throughout is connected to sounds.
    August 30th 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • BBC Radio 4 Word of Mouth.
    Peter Austin appeared on the BBC Radio 4 programme Word of Mouth broadcast on Monday 14th August 2006 at 11pm discussing linguistic purity and minority languages - see http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/wordofmouth.shtml
    August 15th 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • The nature of space in Australian Sign Language or Auslan.
    There is an interesting interview with Trevor Johnston, ELDP grantee (see http://www.hrelp.org/grants/projects/index.php?lang=10), at http://www.abc.net.au/rn/linguafranca/stories/2006/1692095.htm#
    August 9th 2006, contributed by Jean Tullett
  • British Academy Research Grant.
    The British Academy has awarded a grant to Professor Peter Austin for research on the Iraqi Jewish language. The project extends over a year beginning in July 2006 and involves preparing an annotated corpus of audio-visual recordings of speakers living in London, Canada and Israel through collaboration with Mr Eli Timan, a member of the London Iraqi Jewish community.
    July 28th 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Linguamón – Casa de les Llengües.
    Peter Austin visited Barcelona 10th to 13th July at the invitation of the Catalonia government to participate in the innaugural meeting of the Scientific Committee of Linguamón – Casa de les Llengües "House of Languages", a new initiative to develop a gallery of languages and to highlight linguistic diversity around the world - for more information see http://www10.gencat.net/www.linguamon.cat/
    July 13th 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Research Grants Funding Round Open.
    The latest grant funding round is now open. See http://www.hrelp.org/grants/
    June 26th 2006, contributed by Jean Tullett
  • Peter Austin speaks at LENCA-3 Symposium.
    Peter Austin was an invited speaker at the International Symposium on the Grammar and Pragmatics of Complex Sentences (Subordination and Coordination) LENCA-3 (http://www.ling.helsinki.fi/uhlcs/LENCA/LENCA-3/lenca-3.html) held in Tomsk, Siberia, 27-30th June 2006. He presented a paper on "Hierarchies of clause linkage"
    June 5th 2006
  • HRELP participates in DoBeS workshop.
    Peter Austin, as Chair of the DoBeS Linguistics Advisory Board, attended the DoBeS 2006 workshop 14-15th June 2006 in Nijmegen, the Netherlands (http://www.mpi.nl/world/OLDDOBES/workshop/DoBeSWorkshop2006.pdf) At the Workshop DoBeS teams discussed current issues and challenges in their research projects. The Workshop was funded by the Volkswagen Foundation.
    June 5th 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELDP training course June 2006.
    A training course for ELDP grantees will be held at SOAS 21-27th June 2006 (http://www.hrelp.org/events/workshops/eldp2006_6/). The course will be attended by 17 grantees and will be taught by staff from ELAP, ELAR, and ELDP grantee K. David Harrison, along with other specialists in film and video recording and editing.
    June 4th 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • HRELP co-sponsors Austronesian conference.
    HRELP and the Surrey Morphology Group are sponsoring the second Austronesian Languages and Linguistics conference held at St Catherine's College 2-3 June 2006 (see http://www.surrey.ac.uk/lcts/bill.palmer/UKARG_site/2006_conf/call.htm). ELAP PhD student Mary Raymond presented a paper on "Volcanoes, migrations and the south-east wind: directional verbs in Arop-Lokep and Karnai".
    June 1st 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • HRELP participates in LREC conference.
    David Nathan, representing ELAR, attended the LREC 2006 conference (http://www.lrec-conf.org/lrec2006/) and gave a paper with colleagues from The Netherlands and Sweden on the collaborative DAM-LR project. Daan Broeder, Freddy Offenga, Peter Wittenburg, Peter van der Kamp, David Nathan, Sven Strömqvist "Technologies for a Federation of Language Resource Archives" David also attended a workshop on annotation.
    May 30th 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Annual Lecture.
    HRELP's annual public lecture was delivered by Dr Dietrich Schüller see: http://www.hrelp.org/events/publiclecture2006/
    February 10th 2006
  • UK Premiere of In Language We Live - voices of the world.
    The UK Premiere of the film In Language We Live - voices of the world; was hosted by HRELP. See: http://www.hrelp.org/events/inlanguageswelive/
    February 6th 2006, contributed by Robert Munro
  • Endangered African Languages on BBC.
    The BBC Africa Service broadcast a programme on endangerment of indigenous African Languages on 4th January 2006 - see http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/4536450.stm Peter Austin was a studio guest for this programme.
    January 3rd 2006, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Endangered languages film on Scandanavian television.
    The 59 minute film "I sproget er jeg" (In language we live) produced by the Voices of the World project (http://www.olestig.dk/endangered-languages/films.html#vow) was broadcast on 21st November (repeated 27th November) on television in Sweden and Denmark. It features interviews with Peter Austin and David Crystal, along with documentary coverage of 42 countries and 20 languages. Contact Final Cut Productions (byrge@final-cut.dk) Forbindelsesvej 7; DK-2100 Copenhagen, Denmark for more information.
    December 5th 2005, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Wenner-Gren Foundation Grant.
    The Wenner-Gren Foundation has awarded a grant of $9,000 to JC Smith, Oxford University, in collaboration with Prof Peter Austin, ELAP, to aid the third Oxford-Kobe Linguistics seminar entitled "The Linguistics of Endangered Languages" - for more details see http://www.kobeinst.com/3lg01.htm
    November 17th 2005, contributed by Peter Austin
  • Leverhulme Visiting Professorship awarded.
    The Leverhulme Trust has awarded a Visiting Professorship to Assoc Prof David Bradley, La Trobe University (http://www.latrobe.edu.au/linguistics/stbradley.htm), to carry out research at SOAS for four months from February 2006. Prof Bradley is an expert on sociolinguistics and the languages of South-East Asia and will present a series of lectures and participate in workshops and seminars during his visit.
    November 17th 2005, contributed by Peter Austin
  • ELAR accessions first deposit.
    After a long wait for building works and equipment installation to be completed, ELAR began data archiving on 28 October by accessioning its first deposit, from Dr Knut Olawsky (see http://www.hrelp.org/grants/projects/index.php?projid=34).
    October 28th 2005, contributed by David Nathan
  • PhD students win scholarships.
    Four students have been awarded scholarships to undertake PhD studies in the Endangered Languages Academic Programme beginning in October. Sophie Salffner (who will work on a Nigerian language) and Gerardo de Caro (who will work on Talyshi, a northern Iranian language of Azerbaijan) received SOAS PhD scholarships, Mary Raymond (who will work on an Austronesian language) received an AHRC PhD award and Stuart McGill (who will work on a language of northern Nigeria) was awarded an ELAP scholarship. These students will join the five PhDs already enrolled in ELAP (see http://www.hrelp.org/aboutus/students/).
    September 23rd 2005, contributed by Peter Austin
  • BBC Radio Broadcast.
    28th September 7-10:30pm, BBC Radio 3 broadcast a special programme on language in Africa. Peter Austin was a studio guest during the broadcast.
    September 14th 2005, contributed by Peter K. Austin
  • Exhibition on endangered languages.
    Endangered Voices, an exhibition exploring the themes of language endangerment opens at SOAS. Details: http://www.hrelp.org/events/endangeredvoices/
    June 28th 2005, contributed by Robert Munro
  • ELAP Workshop: The what, how and why of data collection in the field.
    see: http://www.hrelp.org/events/workshops/datacollection/
    June 26th 2005
  • Grant funding round open.
    The latested grant funding round is now open. See: http://www.hrelp.org/grants/
    May 31st 2005
  • Multimedia workshop begins.
    The 2nd ELAR multimedia workshop "multimedia development for endangered languages" begins at SOAS.

    see: http://www.hrelp.org/events/workshops/elar2005/
    April 25th 2005, contributed by Robert Munro

  • ELDP Grants 2005 Announced.
    ELDP announces the first batch of grants awarded in 2005. Further FTG grants will be announced by June. see http://www.hrelp.org/grants/grants2005.html
    April 20th 2005, contributed by Najma Hussain
  • New Phd bursary.
    ELAP announces a new Phd bursary - the application deadline is Monday 16th May 2005. see: http://www.hrelp.org/courses/phd/bursaries.html
    March 9th 2005
  • ELAP workshop: "Language contact and variation in language documentation" completed at SOAS.
    see http://www.hrelp.org/events/workshops/elap2005/
    February 11th 2005
  • The HRELP Annual Public Lecture.
    HRELP's annual public lecture was delivered by Colette Grinevald. See http://www.hrelp.org/events/publiclecture/
    February 10th 2005, contributed by Robert Munro
  • ELAP workshop "Multidisciplinary approaches to language documentation" completed at SOAS.
    see http://www.hrelp.org/events/workshops/elap2004/
    December 9th 2004
  • ELDP Grantee Training workshop was completed.
    September 20th 2004
  • 25 new students enrol on ELAP courses.
    September 19th 2004, contributed by Zara Pybus
  • £1,000,000 awarded to document endangered languages.
    see http://www.soas.ac.uk/news/newsdetail.cfm?newsid=186
    July 30th 2004
  • Dr Lisbet Rausing receives honorary degree.
    see http://www.soas.ac.uk/news/newsdetail.cfm?newsid=184
    July 30th 2004
  • ELDP's third round of applications opens.
    see http://www.hrelp.org/grants/index.html
    June 28th 2004
  • ELAP staff and students complete the first year of the new MA and PhD programmes.
    June 28th 2004
  • ELDP announces funding for 21 new language documentation projects in the second round of applications.
    April 22nd 2004
  • ELAR CD & Multimedia Workshop.
    see one group's project on linguistic prosody: http://www.hrelp.org/student_projects/guess_the_stress/index.html
    April 22nd 2004
  • ELAP appointed Dr Friederike Lüpke as Lecturer in Language Documentation.
    April 22nd 2004
  • ELAR appointed Robert Munro as Software Developer.
    March 28th 2004
  • HRH The Princess Royal opens new research.
    see http://www.soas.ac.uk/news/newsdetail.cfm?newsid=163
    March 28th 2004