Saxena / Borin Lesser-Known Languages of South Asia

Status and Policies, Case Studies and Applications of Information Technology
1. Auflage 2008
ISBN: 978-3-11-019778-5
Verlag: De Gruyter
Format: PDF
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 394 Seiten, Gewicht: 10 g

Reihe: ISSN

The increasing globalization and centralization in the world is threatening the existence of a large number of smaller languages. In South Asia some locally dominant languages (e.g., Hindi, Urdu, Nepali) are gaining ground beside English at the expense of the lesser-known languages. Despite a long history of stable multilingualism, language death is not uncommon in the South Asian context. We do not know how the language situation in South Asia will be affected by modern information and communication technologies: Will cultural and linguistic diversity be strengthened or weakened as they become increasingly prevalent in all walks of life? This volume brings together areas of research that so far do not interact to any significant extent: traditional South Asian descriptive linguistics and sociolinguistics, documentary linguistics, issues of intellectual and cultural property and fieldwork ethics, and language technology. Researchers working in the areas of documentary linguistics and language technology have become aware of each other in the last few years, and of how work in the other area could be potentially useful in furthering their own aims. Similarly, the insights of documentary linguistics are making their way into descriptive linguistics and sociolinguistics. However, the potential for synergy among these areas of research is almost limitless. This volume provides the reader, not so much with a do-it-yourself recipe for applying modern technology to the problem of language shift in South Asia today, but rather with some basic knowledge about the problems involved and some directions from which solutions could be forthcoming, a toolbox rather than a blueprint, for helping to shape the linguistic future of South Asia.

Zielgruppe

Sociolinguists interested in Language Contact and Language Shift;

Autoren/Hrsg.

Saxena, Anju

Borin, Lars

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Sprachwissenschaft Sprachwissenschaften
• Geisteswissenschaften Sprachwissenschaft Einzelne Sprachen & Sprachfamilien

Inhaltsverzeichnis

1;Frontmatter;1
2;Contents;7
3;Status of lesser-known languages in India;39
4;Minority language policies and politics in Nepal;69
5;Language policy, multilingualism and language vitality in Pakistan;81
6;Vanishing voices: A typological sketch of Great Andamanese;115
7;Lisu orthographies and email;133
8;Shina in contemporary Pakistan;145
9;The rise of ethnic consciousness and the politicization of language in west-central Nepal;169
10;Why Ladakhi must not be written – Being part of the Great Tradition: Another kind of global thinking;183
11;The impact of technology on language diversity and multilingualism;203
12;The impact of technological advances on Tamil language use and planning;211
13;Corpus-building for South Asian languages;219
14;Digitized resources for languages of Nepal;251
15;Multimedia: A community-oriented information and communication technology;265
16;Language survival kits;287
17;Grammatically based language technology for minority languages;301
18;Supporting lesser-known languages: The promise of language technology;325
19;Worrying about ethics and wondering about “informed consent”: Fieldwork from an Americanist perspective;347
20;Backmatter;379

Über Autor(innen)

Anju Saxena, Uppsala University, Sweden; Lars Borin, Göteborg University, Sweden.