失われゆく言語の記録と保存をどう支えるか：未来に向けての人材育成のモデル

Margaret CAREW

Language documentation training at Batchelor Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education, NT, Australia

Batchelor Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education (BIITE) is based in the Northern Territory of Australia. BIITE operates within a philosophy of Both Ways education which places Indigenous pedagogies and life patterns at the centre of education and training delivery. This presentation will give an overview of BIITE’s language and linguistics courses: a Bachelor of Arts (Languages and Linguistics) and the Certificates I/II in Own Language Work. A profile of one community level Own Language Work program will demonstrate that a long term commitment to relationship building, coupled with a project based and cross-disciplinary approach, contributes to participant engagement in the remote community training context.

Ganesh DEVY

Language Conservation Experiments of Bhasha Research Centre

I intend to present an outline of the language conservation efforts of the Bhasha Research Centre and the Adivasi Academy. The languages with which these two institutions are engaged are the languages of the indigenous people and the nomadic communities in various parts of India. The experiments undertaken range from lexical and digital documentation, community mobilization and setting up of cultural festivals, curricular and educational reforms, institutionalization of threatened languages to creating popular campaigns, establishing reconciliation networks, policy changes and effecting legislation. In recent years, I have initiated a People’s Linguistic survey of India (PLSI) as a logical progression of the experiments undertaken previously. My presentation will offer a comment on the complexities, challenges and the social implications of the PLSI for the language diversity in India.

Akhunzada FAKHRUDDIN

Capacity Development in Language Documentation and Conservation

Forum for Language Initiatives (FLI) is a non-profit organization building capacity among disadvantaged language communities in northern Pakistan to solve language development and literacy issues through awareness raising, advocacy and networking. The informal curriculum is based on specific research i.e. basic linguistics, cultural research, project management, and leadership development. All trainers are nationals mentored by foreign consultants. Training sessions are usually 3-day to 2-week long, except for a 1-year Discovery program ran every 4-5 years. Training effectiveness is gauged by trainee initiatives for research, establishment of multi-lingual education projects, quality articles and/or books. More collaboration with like-minded organizations and funding sources would increase program effectiveness.

Margaret FLOREY

The Resource Network for Linguistic Diversity: building an international strategy

The Resource Network for Linguistic Diversity was initially created as a web-based volunteer organization primarily serving the Asia-Pacific region. In six years, it has grown into a staffed peak body with some 475 members in 43 countries. The RNLD is funded by the Australian government to support Australia’s Indigenous languages, particularly through grassroots training activites.

This presentation will discuss the growth of this international agency and its comprehensive approach in supporting language activities through networking, resource sharing and the development of capacity. Particular emphasis will be placed on discussing the innovative Documenting and Revitalizing Indigenous Languages (DRIL) training program.

Carol GENETTI

The Institute on Field Linguistics and Language Documentation

The Institute on Field Linguistics and Language Documentation (InField) is a biennial summer institute which provides training in language documentation, maintenance, and revitalization. InField purposely brings together linguists and members of endangered-language communities for shared teaching and learning in an environment that is inclusive and supportive of all participants. InField consists of a two-week set of workshops covering diverse topics such as technologies, lexicography, orthography development, the use of archival materials, and language activism. This is followed by a four-week course in field training, designed to introduce students to the practice of language documentation and to serve as an intensive introduction to linguistic field methods.

Lungtaen GYATSO

Development of Orthography for Tshanglalo

Bhutan, which has a total area of 38,394 square kms and a population of less than 700,000, has about 19 different languages spoken across the rugged terrains. 18 out of the 19 languages belong to the Tibeto-Burman language family whereas one language belongs to the Indo-European language family. Interestingly, only Dzongkha the national language and the Nepalese language have written forms. The rest are just spoken languages without any documentation, as of now, of which some are in the verge of extinction.

Tshanglalo (language of the Brahma), which is also known as Sharchopkha (language of the east) is spoken by a sizeable proportion of the Bhutanese population. I have taken the initiative to carryout a research project to develop the orthography of Tshanglalo with the aim of giving this language a written form. It is envisaged that one day the native speakers could be able to use this language in their day-to-day communication as any other language.

My presentation will basically highlight the development process of the orthography as well as the challenges involved along with some selected samples.

Kathleen HEUGH

Collaboration in Language Training Programs: risks and opportunities

In this paper I shall compare approaches to language training programs for teachers, teacher educators and educational officials in South Africa and Ethiopia. This will draw attention to mechanisms and policies which have resulted in community empowerment and those which have resulted in the reverse. The programs to be discussed were designed to extend the use of (local) languages in formal education, which complements language documentation and revival. By way of supporting language documentation and revival, I shall include recent evidence of the superior academic achievement of students in poor and remote areas, where local languages are included in formal education.

Peter J KEEGAN

Language Documentation and Conservation in New Zealand

This paper provides an overview of language documentation and conservation activities in New Zealand. New Zealand does not yet have any specific training programmes or courses in language documentation and conservation. Researchers in various organizations are involved in language documentation activities on the indigenous language, Maori. Examples of this include the MAONZE (Maori and NZ English project) http://www.ece.auckland.ac.nz/~cwat057/MAONZE/index.html and Te Ipukarea (National Maori Language Institute) www.teipukarea.maori.nz. Other researchers are working with languages in wider Pacific region. The lack of training programmes is partially explained by Maori already being reasonably well documented and being subject to extensive revitalization efforts in the last three decades resulting in Maori-medium programmes in the education sector, Maori broadcasting (including Maori television) and increased provision of Maori in government sectors. In addition to this the philosophy of language documentation and conservation has not yet been widely embraced by linguistic departments in New Zealand universities and other relevant government/Maori language organisations.

Daryn MCKENNY

Miromaa Aboriginal Language Technology Centre

The importance of empowerment for Indigenous people in language preservation and reclamation can never be underestimated, the importance of skills transfer can never be underestimated. Daryn will highlight how 9 years ago when embarking on an Australian Government funded language program there was next to no support for Indigenous run programs. The money was there but the support on what to do and how to do it was not. From language documentation to training, it was missing. We were on our own in many respects. Now today the work of Miromaa Aboriginal Language Technology Centre has been a key figure in developing support through technology, especially in the development of the computer program Miromaa, through to training and developing key strategies which all hinge on two things, empowering Indigenous people to be at the centre of maintaining their languages and encouraging methods for strong transfer of skills and language to Indigenous people. All this today funded by the Australian Government’s Maintenance of Indigenous Languages and Records Program (MILR).

Further Information:

Miromaa: http://www.miromaa.com.au/

ACRA: http://www.acra.org.au/

Rozenn MILIN

Sorosoro, so the languages of the world may prosper!

Sorosoro is an NGO born in France in 2008. The first activity of the organisation is a patrimonial activity, consisting in setting up an audiovisual documentation for endangered languages, in collaboration with linguists and anthropologists. The field teams collect around 30 hours of rushes per language, ranging from narratives and songs to ritual ceremonies, traditional medicine, daily life scenes and interactions, basic terms, identity and contemporary issues etc. That data is then digitized and safely preserved and indexed. Alongside with the academic work provided by linguists, it can later be used for revitalisation purposes.

Toshihide NAKAYAMA

Linguistic Dynamics Science Project (LingDy)

Linguistic Dynamics Science Project (LingDy) is an institutional strategic project at the ILCAA, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. The goal of this project is to invigorate research on linguistic diversity and documentation of under-studied languages. The main focus of our activities is to build a lasting academic infrastructure by providing trainings and by building academic communities and collaboration networks. Our activities to date includes: hosting of Fieldling, an academic community of junior field linguists; offering a number of workshops and conferences on various aspects of language documentation and description; providing support for collaborative documentation projects.

Misako OHNUKI

A Practical Example of the ACCU’s book development project “Folk Tales from Asia”

Asia-Pacific Cultural Centre for UNESCO(ACCU), with the strong demands raised among UNESCO Member States in Asia, planned and produced numerous children’s books written in their indigenous languages under the programme of ACP (Asian/Pacific Copublication Programme). So far published 29 titles since 1971-2008, among which “Folk Tales from Asia” (Volume 1-6) the collection of stories that had been orally told in 14 countries in Asia was the most successful series – the total number of copies of the translated versions amounts to more than 2.1 million in 37 languages. My presentation will focus on the know how and outcomes of this project as an practical examples.

Suwilai PREMSRIRAT

A Model for Capacity Building in Language Documentation and Language Conservation: Community-based Language Revitalization in Thailand

The indigenous languages in Thailand are at risk of extinction by the end of this century, like many other minority languages around the world. Out of the 70 + indigenous languages of Thailand, fifteen are seriously endangered, whereas the others are not safe. Over the past decade, linguists at Mahidol University have developed a model of community-based training which both documents endangered languages and at the same time encourages language revitalization through community empowerment. According to this model, linguists cooperate with community members in a community-own research project on language revitalization. In the early stage, awareness–raising is a crucial activity. Thereafter, the linguists and community members work together on phonological analysis which leads to the development of a writing system. The script gives the community the basic tool for compiling dictionaries, composing creation books on folktales, traditional medicine, everyday life etc. and other materials that serve to document and conserve the language, for its transmission to the younger generation through the formal school system and community learning center.

Victoria RAU

Training in language documentation and conservation in Taiwan

This presentation describes the two graduate courses on Austronesian Linguistics and Field Methods I am teaching at my institution in Taiwan in fall 2010. My Austronesian linguistics course features the Yami language and culture, drawing on the online resources I have developed from the ELDP grant, with a goal of applying linguistic theories to solve language problems in indigenous communities. My field methods course covers both traditional and documentary fieldwork. The participants are practicing the linguistic gratuity principle by assisting local community members to document their own languages, modeling after the language documentation training center at University of Hawaii (http://www.ling.hawaii.edu/~uhdoc/index.html).

Yusuf SAWAKI

What is it to be shared with speech communities about language documentation? Learning from the Wooi and Iha documentation projects

Center for Endangered Languages Documentation (CELD) Papua, together with speech communities and university personnel (lecturers and students), frame what is so-called ‘triangular-participatory approach’ in the language documentation. We believe that working closely to speech communities and university personnel is a strategic approach to combine and to contribute ‘knowledges’, i.e. indigenous knowledge through speech communities, academic-structured knowledge (university) and practical knowledge (CELD) to the field of language documentation and conservation. A knowledgeable and state-of-arts training (incl. philosophy, methodology and curriculum) is a vehicle to share and to empower the ‘knowledges’ of these three parties that will be implemented in the field.

Narayan SHARMA

Endangered Language Documentation and Conservation: Evidence from Nepal

Language documentation has just emerged with the aim of documenting and conserving world’s endangered languages. To undertake documentation, the researchers must properly be trained in the techniques of recording (sound and video), transcribing, analysing, multi-tier annotating, relevant metadata on context and translating languages that have never been studied before.

Apparently, speech community and researcher-based training would be the most effective for building capacity and successful documentation. They can be trained to be engaged in data collection themselves, and they could feel pride over their own language. Moreover, funds should be available to train more researchers, and to graduate more students in the field of linguistics to undertake language documentation works effectively.

Akatsuki TAKAHASHI

UNESCO policy instruments

UNESCO supports the protection of endangered languages and multi-lingual education one of its intersectoral platform and training programs through different modalities, such as on-line resources (World Endangered Languages Atlas), networking among universities and specialized centers, small grant for Member States initiatives/projects, pilot training workshops which have been implemented in partnership with external entities and experts. I will talk about the promotion of UNESCO policy instruments such as the Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity (2000), the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (2001) in the Pacific carried out by the UNESCO Office for the Pacific States and its future project for language documentation and safeguarding.

Nick THIEBERGER

Training for LD&C

In this talk I outline several initiatives I have been part of in order to illustrate the overall process of training for the production of good records of languages, methods for preservation of those records, and adaptation of existing records for new uses. I suggest that we need to provide a service of advice and data conversion for those for whom it is simply too difficult to do this work themselves. It should always have been part of the discipline to produce good research data, but the use of digital recorders, storage and archives, together with the development of suitable standards for data and metadata construction, have all combined to refocus our efforts in this direction.

Anne-Marie WANAMP

University of Goroka, Papua New Guinea with BOLD

Language is the key to indigenous systems. Oral history is important to people’s identity and existence in oral societies. The University of Goroka (UOG) has undertaken an exciting experiment to use the technique of Basic Oral Language Documentation (BOLD) with Alekano, after a BOLD:PNG workshop in February this year, 2010. UOG is the first and only university in PNG to teach an indigenous language – Alekano. This paper will describe the experiences of the BOLD experiment with Alekano and its methods as used by the lecturers, students and the Alekano community.

WANG Feng

Language documentation and conservation in Peking University

This presentation will briefly outline the three methods that have been tried at Peking University for training people in language documentation work: training students in standard courses, doing academic projects on endangered languages, and establishing language laboratories in the areas where the languages are spoken in collaboration with local academic institutions. This talk will examine the advantages and drawbacks of the three methods based on the experiences of Peking University. It is concluded that collaboration with local institutions may be the most effective method under the current conditions in China, especially for minority languages.