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RNLD FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions
A major source of information on working with endangered languages is the Electronic Metastructure for Endangered Languages Data (E-MELD) set of pages.
Who
can I talk to about working
with endangered languages? Where
can I find out more about
language X? Where
can I do linguistic
fieldwork in the region? What's
different about
language documentation with endangered languages? How
can I work on my language? What
type of recording equipment
should I use? What
software should I
use to make a dictionary? How
can I set up a language
program? How
can I find a linguist to
work with me? Where
can I get training for
working with endangered languages? What work can I
do without a
linguist or linguistic
training?
What if my language isn't spoken anymore? This
network is specifically set up to assist with queries related to
working with
endangered languages. The mailing list (see http://www.linguistics.unimelb.edu.au/RNLD/RNLDlist.htm)
is the venue for asking questions related to practicalities of working
with
endangered languages, but you can also address the convenors of the
network by
emailing reneld@hotpop.com It might
also be useful for you or your organisation to take part in a meeting,
workshop
or conference focused on endangered languages. For example, the
Foundation for
Endangered Languages has an annual conference at which language
maintenance
practitioners discuss both theoretical issues and very practical
concerns. There are
a number of good websites which can help get you started in learning
more about
a language. Return
to FAQ list There are many
minority languages in
Australia, Indonesia, East Timor and the Pacific that need concerted
study.
This website can put you in touch with linguists in linguistics
programs which
have an emphasis on language endangerment and language documentation.
See also
the university web links under the question on " Where can I find out
more
about language X?". Linguists
and language maintenance practitioners working with endangered
languages have
discovered many levels of complexity about this task - some of them
linguistic,
and some of them socio-cultural and political. There are some
references at the
end of this section which can provide you with more insights into the
issues we
raise here. Fieldwork
with endangered languages involves a certain urgency to optimise
documentation
as this might be the only opportunity to document a particular language
and
associated cultural practices. While all language documentation ideally
is as
rich as possible, there is a special onus on the recording of
endangered
languages to include information in different genres, spoken by men and
women
of different ages, and including traditional knowledge specific to the
local
culture and environment. The different genres should include monologic
storytelling, the most usual type of discourse recorded by linguists,
but also
other kinds of interactions using the language. These could include
village or
community meetings, performances, conversations, songs, religious
events and so
on. Fieldworkers
may confront the enormity of the task of trying to record the wide
range of
socio-cultural knowledge encoded in an endangered language (e.g.
kinship
systems, indigenous medical knowledge, the structure of song and dance
styles,
etc.). Drawing on the expertise of others by undertaking collaborative
research
can be a way of meeting this challenge (for example, with
anthropologists,
ethnobiologists, ethnomusicologists, etc.). However collaborative
research also
brings its own challenges - of finding the experts, learning to work in
an
interdisciplinary mode, and the expense of a large scale documentation
project. Linguists
documenting endangered languages also need to understand local
conceptions of
knowledge which determine for each community who is a speaker
(knowledge) and
who has the right to speak (ownership). These issues may (de)limit the
linguist's access to speakers. Linguists are beginning to discuss the
issues of
finding and working with consultants, identifying so-called 'last
speakers' and
working with linguistic resources which may be less than perfect from a
linguistic perspective. Language
endangerment frequently occurs in an environment of conflict,
transition and
transformation. Fieldworkers may find themselves confronted by a wide
variety
of challenges, such as becoming involved in advocacy and community
development,
and needing to reassess a more conventional relationship between
linguist and
consultant and community in order to work within an 'empowering'
framework. We
also may realise that we need specialised training to teach us how to
do the
applied work that communities may ask us to do. Cameron,
Deborah, Elizabeth Frazer, Penelope Harvey, Ben Rampton and Kay
Richardson.
1993. Ethics, Advocacy and empowerment: issues of method in researching
language. Language and Communication 13: 81-94. Craig, Colette.
1993. Fieldwork on endangered languages: a forward look at ethical
issues. In
Andre Cochetiere, Jean-Claude Boulanger, and Conrad Ouellon, eds,
Proceedings
of the XVth International Congress of Linguists, Vol. 1: 33-42. Quebec:
Presses
de l'Universite de Laval. Dauenhauer,
Nora Marks and Richard Dauenhauer. 1998. Technical, emotional, and
ideological
issues in reversing language shift: examples from Southeast Asia. In
Lenore A.
Grenoble and Lindsay J. Whaley, eds, Endangered languages: language
loss and
community response: 57-98. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Evans,
Nicholas. 2001. The last speaker is dead ? long live the last speaker!
In Paul
Newman and Martha Ratliff (eds.). Linguistic fieldwork: 250-281.
Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press. Gerdts,
Donna B. 1998. Beyond expertise: the role of the linguist in language
revitalization programs. In Nicholas Ostler, ed, Endangered languages:
what
role for the specialist?: 13-22. Proceedings of the second FEL
Conference, U.
of Edinburgh, 25-27 September 1998. Grinevald,
Colette. 1998. Language endangerment in South America: a programmatic
approach.
In Lenore A. Grenoble and Lindsday J. Whaley, eds, Endangered
languages:
language loss and community response: 124-159. Cambridge: Cambridge
University
Press. Himmelmann, N.P. 1998. Documentary and descriptive linguistics.
Linguistics(36). 161-195. You can
record stories and transcribe them (write down the words from the
recording and
include a translation into a lingua franca or majority language, such
as
English, Indonesia, Tok Pisin, Kriol). You can start working on a
dictionary,
collecting words for as many different things as you can. It is
important to
start right now! Speakers of an endangered language are in an ideal
position to
record a variety of speech events. Training and advice from linguists
is
strongly advised so that the recordings can be the best possible
quality. Right now
(mid-2006) there are a number of types of recorders that you can use to
produce
good quality audio. You must have a good microphone and cable, and it
is worth
spending a little more on them than on the actual recording machine. Do not
use internal microphones as they will pick up machine noise. For
producing
archival quality resources do not use minidisks. They compress the
sound as
soon as they record and this means you have instantly lost some of the
signal.
For working with endangered languages it is not a good idea to make
less than
optimal recordings. Analog
tapes can still be fine, especially if you use chrome tape which
doesn't
stretch as much as polyester tape does. You will then need to digitise
the tape
to create archival files. Similarly,
hard disk recorders look like becoming the best form of recording media. Look at
these websites for more detail: Now (mid-2006) it is best to create an archival version of your media file and then to use software like Transcriber or Elan
to transcribe and to link your media and transcript. This means that your work of transcribing will also result in a file in which chunks of the transcript can be clicked on and heard. The
best software at the moment for
dictionary work with endangered languages is Shoebox. http://www.sil.org/computing/shoebox/index.html, or the more recent revision of Shoebox called
Toolbox which can handle Unicode. A step-by-step guide to starting with Shoebox (by Jason Lee and Pascale Jacq) can be found here as an rtf or pdf document. Another useful guide is the "Introduction to Shoebox and Toolbox with notes on Econv, Transcriber and Elan" by Andrew Margetts (June 2005) is available here as a pdf document and provides an outline of Shoebox and how it fits with transcription software. Accompanying the pdf file is a zip file of 1 Mb with a set of sample files, including Shoebox settings files as discussed in the pdf document. It is
crucial that we prepare our data in a way that it can be accessed by
others in
the future. Think of those old wordlists, for example, which may be the
only
record that we have for some languages, and that we can consult because
they
are being looked after in an archive. We must ensure that the records
that we
make are in a form that is understandable by others, that they are
stored on
media that will endure, and that they are discoverable by those wanting
to find
them. The archive for material related to Australian indigenous
languages is
AIATSIS (http://www.aiatsis.gov.au)
and a recently established archive for languages outside of Australia
is
Paradisec (http://paradisec.org.au). An important
starting point is being very clear about your goals: what do you hope
to
achieve in the program? For example, is the goal to set up language
nests for
children, to provide a context for speakers to maintain language use in
a
particular domain, to educate the community about minority languages,
etc?
There are many different types of language programs and this will help
clarify
the type that best suits the needs you have identified. Fishman,
Joshua A. (ed.). 2001. Can threatened languages be saved? Reversing
language
shift, revisited: A 21st century perspective. Clevedon: Multilingual
Matters. This
website can help put you in touch with linguists who have some
experience with
the languages of your region. You can also contact linguists through
the
linguistic departments and other organisations listed on this page. There is
a growing number of organisations providing professional training for
language
maintenance practitioners. In Australia, Pundulmurra College in Western
Australia and Batchelor College in the Northern Territory (http:www.batchelor.edu.au/)
train
indigenous linguists, language workers and teachers. Monash University (http://www.arts.monash.edu.au/ling)
has a course which offers professional development for a wide
range of
practitioners who are working with endangered languages. We advise
that training and advice and/or professional assistance from linguists
will
help with the best possible language documentation and can assist in
the
success of your project. We also suggest that you shouldn't be put off
if you
can't immediately find help or if you want to get started by yourself.
The
question "How can I work on my language?" on this page gives you some
starting points, and there are some more tips given below.
Return
to FAQ list If your ancestral language is no longer spoken you may want to locate what records you can and then use these in a language reintroduction program. A well-known example in Australia is that of Kaurna in Adelaide, see the book Warrabarna Kaurna! Reclaiming an Australian Language by Rob Amery. Another recent book on these issues is Saving Languages by Lenore Grenoble and Lindsay Whaley. A very useful set of webpages on language revitalization and similar language programs in the USA is the 'Teaching indigenous languages' site.
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