[from Sally Dixon]
I was privileged to attend the WA Language Centres conference in Perth last week. Delegates from 5 regional language centres and several language programs spent three days swapping stories at the wonderful Kaditj internet café and conference facility, and probably could have talked for at least another week.
We were warmly welcomed by Noongar elders Dorothy Winmar and Gloria Nora Dann, and Justina Smith who shared her beautiful blend of contemporary and traditional Noongar dance. The progress of the Noongar language program has been breathtaking. Since presenting their very first book at the last conference only two years ago, the team (in partnership with Batchelor Press) has developed a great pile of resources with several different Noongar clans. There are also twelve short language lessons in development for NITV so stay tuned in for those. We also got to hear how language has been incorporated into the Djidi Djidi Aboriginal School in Bunbury. Moorditj!
What to do with research outputs: an excellent example – Jeremy Hammond
[from Jeremy Hammond] As linguists and anthropologists working on small and often endangered languages, we should consider distributing the materials that we accumulate over time. Obviously institutions such as PARADISEC provide a repository for the data, and this is an important role for the safeguarding of raw materials for long-term forward compatibility. But we also … Read more