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Leading experts gather for AIATSIS language seminars
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Professor Emerita Leanne Hinton - one of the world’s leading experts on language revitalisation – will be part of a free seminar – and panel discussion – on Indigenous language protection and promotion in Canberra on Monday, March 26. |
22 March 2012
The Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) will host a major seminar on Indigenous language protection and promotion – featuring Professor Emerita Leanne Hinton - one of the world’s leading experts on language revitalisation – in Canberra next week.
The free seminar – and panel discussion – under the theme Language Revitalisation from Documentation: Heroes and Programs will be held on Monday, March 26 featuring Professor Hinton as well as several of Australia’s leading language experts.
Professor Hinton and her Indigenous colleagues in the USA have demonstrated how languages pushed to the brink of extinction can have life breathed back into them and they can be heard every day in their communities.
Leanne Hinton is a Visiting Fellow at the Australian National Dictionary Centre and Professor Emerita at UC Berkeley. She has written dictionaries and grammars of Native American languages and is a leading expert in working with Indigenous communities for language revitalisation programs around the world.
AIATSIS’s Acting Principal, Dr Luke Taylor, said that the seminar and panel discussions are part of activities developed by the AIATSIS Centre for Australian Languages in tandem with the community based language organisations.
“This is a major initiative,” Dr Taylor said. “Given the disastrous loss of world Indigenous languages every initiative that helps revitalise languages or saves endangered languages in Australia – and overseas - is crucial.”
Leading Australian language experts joining Professor Hinton as members of the discussion panel, include:
- Professor Ghil’ad Zuckermann, Professor of Linguistics and Endangered Languages, University of Adelaide
- Dr Michael Walsh, University of Sydney
- Mr Geoff Anderson, Parkes Wiradjuri Language Group
- Dr Christina Eira and Ms Vicki Couzens, Victorian Aboriginal Corporation for Languages
- Dr Margaret Florey, Director, Resource Network for Linguistic Diversity, Melbourne.
The seminar will run from 12 noon until 4pm and features a film screening about Jessie Little Doe Baird, one of the individuals that Professor Hinton will highlight in her talk. The film also includes footage of linguist Ken Hale - professor of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology known for his lifelong dedication to the study and preservation of endangered languages,
“The good news is that Indigenous communities around the world have started to reclaim their languages in their own way. AIATSIS is a part of widespread efforts to achieve this goal,” Dr Taylor said.
The Centre for Australian Languages is also co-sponsoring – with the Australian National University’s Australian National Dictionary Centre – a public lecture at the ANU by Professor Hinton on March 28 at the John School of Medical Research, beginning at 6 pm.
Dr Taylor said that Professor Hinton will discuss the Master-Apprentice Language Learning Program which she developed in California and which has been used successfully in dozens of Indigenous communities in North America.
“The program is a boot-strap language learning method where Elders who know the language and young adults who want to learn their language work together on a daily basis.”
Professor Hinton will also discuss how this innovative program may assist Australian Aboriginal peoples in their quest to save their languages as well as reporting on recent “Training the Trainers” workshops held in central and northern Australia.