16.814, Reflection: Moderator Anthony Aristar on 16 Years of LINGUIST

Thu Mar 17 15:58:22 UTC 2005

LINGUIST List: Vol-16-814. Thu Mar 17 2005. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 16.814, Reflection: Moderator Anthony Aristar on 16 Years of LINGUIST

Moderators: Anthony Aristar, Wayne State U <aristar at linguistlist.org>
            Helen Aristar-Dry, Eastern Michigan U <hdry at linguistlist.org>

Reviews (reviews at linguistlist.org)
        Sheila Collberg, U of Arizona
        Terry Langendoen, U of Arizona

Homepage: http://linguistlist.org/

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Editor for this issue: Neil Salmond <neil at linguistlist.org>
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1)
Date: 17-Mar-2005
From:  linguist < linguist at linguistlist.org >
Subject: Moderator Anthony Aristar on 16 Years of LINGUIST

2)
Date: 17-Mar-2005
From:  linguist < linguist at linguistlist.org >
Subject: How to donate...

3)
Date: 17-Mar-2005
From:  linguist < linguist at linguistlist.org >
Subject: Thank you to all of our contributors!

-------------------------Message 1 ----------------------------------
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 2005 10:55:08
From:  linguist < linguist at linguistlist.org >
Subject: Moderator Anthony Aristar on 16 Years of LINGUIST

Dear LINGUIST subscribers,

When I look back on the sixteen years that LINGUIST has been in operation, I've
sometimes  wondered if I would have started the list had I known how large an
operation it would become.

Not, of course, that I was not warned?  I remember that when I discussed the
idea with a colleague, he counseled me not to do it. Mailing lists were far too
much work, he said.  How could that be, I argued?  After all, it was just meant
to be a cosy little list of 20 or 30 colleagues talking linguistics.  There
surely couldn't be much work in that.

By the time LINGUIST started, however, the cosy list had grown to 60 or 70
subscribers.  And by the time the list was a year old, it had a membership of
1500.   Somehow I had produced something that people wanted much more than I
had predicted, and I was wondering how on earth Helen and I were going to keep
the thing afloat. In those days, both of us did all the work there was, of
posting and moderating and editing every message.  But at least it couldn't get
much bigger, I thought...

Of course LINGUIST did get much bigger, until today we have 20,850 subscribers
to the main LINGUIST list and its ancillary LINGLITE list, an Oracle database
containing tens of thousands of records, and a customized web-site that
contains thousands of pages.  We post up to 60-70 communications per day
through the list, every one of which has to be read and edited if necessary.
We keep a database of everything that linguists find interesting or useful:
jobs, conferences, calls, articles in the media, books, journals and papers,
and write virtually all the software and programs we need ourselves.

We review most linguistic books published, moderate discussions, store dissertation
abstracts, and categorize all of these resources according to their language
code and linguistic specialty. We try very hard to provide the very best
service we can to our discipline, and we do it all as a free service.

But of course we are doing so much more on LINGUIST now than we had earlier
planned to do. Without intending to, we've contrived to become the major source
of information for the discipline of linguistics, providing the discipline with
a single place where it can find almost anything it needs.  And we are training
and supporting a substantial group of graduate students, most of whom will
continue on to PhDs in linguistics.

Obviously, the days when Helen and I could do all of this ourselves are long
gone.  I doubt if we could do a 100th of it ourselves, in fact.  Our graduates
are enthusiastic towards LINGUIST, and many of them would, I think, work
without pay if it were feasible.  But graduate students must eat, and pay their
tuition, so if we are to employ them to do the work of the list, we must support
them.

So it's crucially important, if LINGUIST is to continue to provide you with the
services you've come to expect from us, that you donate to LINGUIST,
and give us the ability to keep going as we have.  And more is to come: we are
planning to add yet more of the services that you've asked for this year, if we
just have the staff to do it.

So won't you help us and give us a donation?  It will help us so much.  And it
will help you too.

Anthony Aristar

-------------------------Message 2 ----------------------------------
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 2005 10:55:11
From:  linguist < linguist at linguistlist.org >
Subject: How to donate...

This Year the LINGUIST List hope to raise $48,867. This money will go to help
keep the List running, by supporting all of our Student Editors for the coming year.

There are many ways to donate to LINGUIST!

You can donate right now using our secure credit card form.

Alternatively you can also pledge right now and pay later.

For all information on donating and pledging, including information on how to
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http://linguistlist.org/donate.html

The LINGUIST List is under the umbrella of Eastern Michigan University and as
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your financial advisor.

Many companies also offer a gift matching program, such that they will match any
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administrative procedure that doubles the value of your gift to LINGUIST,
without costing you an extra penny. Please take a moment to check if your
company operates such a program.

Thank you very much for your support of LINGUIST!

-------------------------Message 3 ----------------------------------
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 2005 10:55:13
From:  linguist < linguist at linguistlist.org >
Subject: Thank you to all of our contributors!

Angels ($1000 and over)
-----------------------

Mainstays ($100 to $1000)
-------------------------
Andrew Carnie
Baden Hughes
Beth Levin
D. Terence Langendoen
Ernest McCarus
Gerardo Lorenzino
John M.Lawler
Michael Silverstein
Surrey Morphology Group
Utilika Foundation
Plus one anonymous donor

Supporters ($100 to $1000)
--------------------------
Charlotte Brammer
Elena Valenzuela
Jane H Hill
Jeff Kaplan
Keith Slater
Patrick Honeybone
Pius ten Hacken
Stefano Bertolo
Susan Fischer

Donors (Up to $50)
------------------
Larry LaFond
Mayrene Bentley
Naomi Fox
PETER M ECKE
Rosemary Beam de Azcona
Sara Heitshu
Plus one anonymous donor

* * * * *

Supporting Publishers
---------------------

MAJOR SUPPORTERS

Cascadilla Press
 http://www.cascadilla.com/
Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd
 http://www.continuumbooks.com
Edinburgh University Press
 http://www.eup.ed.ac.uk/
Elsevier Ltd.
 http://www.elsevier.com/locate/linguistics
Equinox Publishing Ltd.
 http://www.equinoxpub.com/
Georgetown University Press
 http://www.press.georgetown.edu
Hodder Arnold
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John Benjamins
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Lawrence Erlbaum Associates
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Lincom GmbH
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MIT Press
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Mouton de Gruyter
 http://www.mouton-publishers.com
Oxford University Press
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Rodopi
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SUPPORTERS

Graduate Linguistic Students' Assoc., Umass
 http://glsa.hypermart.net/
International Pragmatics Assoc.
 http://ipra-www.uia.ac.be/ipra/
Kingston Press Ltd
 http://www.kingstonpress.com/
MIT Working Papers in Linguistics
 http://web.mit.edu/mitwpl/
Multilingual Matters
 http://www.multilingual-matters.com/
Pacific Linguistics
 http://pacling.anu.edu.au/
Palgrave Macmillan
 http://www.palgrave.com
SIL International
 http://www.ethnologue.com/bookstore.asp
St. Jerome Publishing Ltd.
 http://www.stjerome.co.uk
Utrecht Institute of Linguistics / LOT Netherlands Graduate School of Linguistic
 http://www-uilots.let.uu.nl/

* * * * *

Institutions
------------
Agder University College
City University of Hong Kong
Cymfony, Inc.
East Carolina University
McGill University
McNeil Technologies, Inc.
McNeil Technologies, Inc.
Meertens Institute
Nstein Technologies inc.
Portland State University
Saarland University, Saarbruecken, Germany
University of Cologne, Germany
University of Minnesota Duluth
University of Ulster
University of Windsor

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LINGUIST List: Vol-16-814	