Leipzig Workshop: Towards a Comprehensive Language Catalogue

[Martin Haspelmath]

Towards a Comprehensive Language Catalogue:
One-day workshop at the MPI for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, 28 
June 2007
(organized by Martin Haspelmath, see 
http://email.eva.mpg.de/~haspelmt/cat.html)

At this informal workshop, we want to discuss ways in which linguists can
collaborate towards the ambitious goal of creating a Comprehensive Language
Catalogue. At the moment, all available language catalogues (such as Ruhlen
1987, Moseley & Asher 1994, Gordon 2005) are limited in the amount and 
quality
of information on the world's languages that they provide. At this 
workshop, we
will discuss the specifics of the field's desiderata and possible ways 
of moving
closer to achieving them.

9.00-9.15 Martin Haspelmath (MPI-EVA): Welcome and introduction

9.15-10.00 Christian Lehmann (U Erfurt): Language names (glossonymy)

10.00-10.30 Michael Cysouw (MPI-EVA) & Jeff Good (U at Buffalo): The 
units of
language cataloguing: Languoids and doculects

10.30-11.00 Tapani Salminen (U Helsinki): From language checklists to a 
language
catalogue

11.30-13.00 Anthony Aristar (Linguist List), Östen Dahl & Ljuba 
Veselinova (U
Stockholm): Geographical information, LL-map and GIS (geographical 
information
systems)

14.00-14.30 Kazuko Obata (AIATSIS Canberra): AUSTLANG

14.30-15.00 Guillaume Segerer (CNRS-LLACAN Paris) & Erhard Voeltz (U
Frankfurt/M): Databases of African languages (see LLACAN database)

15.00-15.30 Anthony Aristar: Genealogical information and Multitree

15.30-15.45 Balthasar Bickel (U Leipzig): Desiderata for a database of
genealogical information

17.00-18.00 Harald Hammarström (Chalmers U, Gothenburg) & Michael Cysouw:
Bibliographical information

18.00-19.00 How to make further progress

Further participants:

Peter Austin (SOAS London)
Joan L.G. Baart (SIL International)
William Croft (University of New Mexico)
Swintha Danielsen (University of Nijmegen)
Jean-Marie Hombert (University of Lyon 2)
Laurent Romary (Max Planck Digital Library)

Anyone else who is interested is welcome to attend. This is not a closed 
workshop, but a maximally open one. The speakers are not invited 
speakers, as there is basically no funding for the workshop. If you want 
to attend, it would be nice to contact Martin Haspelmath before, but you 
can also drop in spontaneously.

-- 
Martin Haspelmath (haspelmath at eva.mpg.de)
Max-Planck-Institut fuer evolutionaere Anthropologie, Deutscher Platz 6	
D-04103 Leipzig      
Tel. (MPI) +49-341-3550 307, (priv.) +49-341-980 1616