28.166, Internships: A 3-month PhD placement to develop access to the Evolving English VoiceBank/UK

Tue Jan 10 15:32:24 UTC 2017

LINGUIST List: Vol-28-166. Tue Jan 10 2017. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 28.166, Internships: A 3-month PhD placement to develop access to the Evolving English VoiceBank/UK

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Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2017 10:32:19
From: James Perkins [James.Perkins at bl.uk]
Subject: A 3-month PhD placement to develop access to the Evolving English VoiceBank/UK

University or Organization: British Library
Department: Research Development
Web Address: http://www.bl.uk/news/2016/november/british-library-phd-placements-call-for-applications

Type of Work: Archiving

Linguistic Field(s): Discipline of Linguistics
                     General Linguistics
                     Lexicography

Duration: 01-Jan-2001 to 01-Jan-2001
Voluntary
Internship Location: London, London, United Kingdom
Minimum Education Level: MA
Special Qualifications: This is offered through the British Library's PhD placement scheme - so applicants must be undertaking (or have recently completed) PhD research. 

As well as strong IT skills, including familiarity with MS Word and Excel, it is essential that the student has some familiarity with identifying and describing varieties of English. It is also desirable (but not essential) that the student has the ability to distinguish between English accents, knowledge of research methods in dialectology, and experience of using audio editing software.

This placement is suitable for a student with research interests in and/or advanced knowledge of linguistics or the English language. Although there is no requirement to transcribe the sound recordings (either orthographically or phonetically), it is essential that the student is able to evaluate the linguistic content and classify it according to established criteria – e.g. by cross-referencing a lexical item to a relevant dictionary or glossary or categorising an accent geographically/socially. A good grounding in dialectology, sociolinguistics and/or phonetics is essential and familiarity with British accents is desirable. 

Description:
This is an opportunity for a PhD student to undertake a 3-month placement at
the British Library. The placement student will be principally responsible for
cataloguing a subset of an important collection of digital audio files created
by the public: the Evolving English VoiceBank.

The Evolving English VoiceBank is a substantial audio archive of c. 15,000
voices created by visitors to the British Library’s Evolving English
exhibition in 2010/11. It is currently only partially catalogued, so this
placement presents an ideal opportunity to address this by accessioning a
substantial additional subset. Ultimately, this
will help the Library to enhance its Sound and Moving Image catalogue, provide
onsite access to the content in the Reading Rooms and, selectively, make new
content available to a worldwide audience via the British Library Sounds
website. 

The placement student will audit Evolving English VoiceBank audio files and
prepare cataloguing metadata for migration to the Sound and Moving Image
catalogue. A target of c.500-750 catalogue records is envisaged in three
months (or part-time equivalent) and the student will be expected to select
audio files and prepare accompanying metadata for upload to the Sounds
website. The student will be trained in using audio editing software (where
applicable) and in preparing cataloguing metadata records according to British
Library conventions for digital audio files.

In addition, the student will be encouraged to participate fully in the
department’s core activities – e.g. observing and potentially contributing to
workshops/conference presentations, posting blogs, selecting/preparing content
for online resources. The student may wish, for instance, to post blogs
relating to the content they select for upload to the Sounds website. This
part of the placement can be tailored to suit the
student’s own interests and expertise: possibilities include a description of
selected lexical submissions (the WordBank), a comparison of accents
contributed (the VoiceBank) or an analysis of participants’ reflections on
their own linguistic identity.

Application Deadline: 20-Feb-2017

Web Address for Applications:http://www.bl.uk/news/2016/november/british-library-phd-placements-call-for-applications
Contact Information:
	Dr James Perkins 
	Email: James.Perkins at bl.uk

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