[Athapbasckan-L] Survey on language work

[Arlene Bowman]

Thank you.  Arlene Bowman

On Mon, Mar 2, 2026, 7:51 PM Claire Bowern <clairebowern at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi all,
> Kristine Hildebrandt and I (with other colleagues) are trying to track
> recent changes (or not) to language work around the world. This survey is
> for anyone who engages in, supports, is supported by, or collaborates with
> communities on topics of language documentation, maintenance, and
> revitalization. These surveys can be shared broadly, with any stakeholders,
> anywhere in the world. We are also able to generate survey questions in
> other languages as needed, and accept responses both in written or audio
> formats. We are grateful to our NSF DLI Community of Science collaborators
> for their support. Thank you! More details are below.
>
> The short version (under 5 minutes to complete):
> https://cryptpad.fr/form/...
> <https://cryptpad.fr/form/#/2/form/view/bXfPtM2-9XI9wwi3ZuYd8tOrAmPa9GKKclMfLiZKiJk/>
> The longer version (maybe up to 20 minutes to complete, but we'd get
> really useful details to help build our viability schema):
> https://cryptpad.fr/form/...
> <https://cryptpad.fr/form/#/2/form/view/7IpVLIHucfDK1d2yo84cL29mx09o85ICq9IpZFzZ4fc/>
>
> **Introduction**
> The overall aim of these short and long surveys is to figure out how
> things are changing in the language documentation world: both immediately
> and in the longer term. In the last year, there have been rapid changes in
> many aspects of the US federal funding and legal landscape that relate to
> language work, and such funding has been a big (though by no means
> exclusive) source of funding for language work.
> These surveys are about the “structures” and institutions that make it
> possible (or at least easier) for communities and linguists to make and
> keep records about language: in short, to do language documentation. We
> take a very broad view of "language documentation" and include any work
> related to language description (for any reason), language reclamation and
> revitalization, archival work, pedagogical development, oral histories, and
> other related work. That is, any work that includes a component of work
> that centers on language as its goal. We have abbreviated this as "LDMR"
> for _Language Documentation, Maintenance, and Revitalization._
> More generally, we are aiming to build a "resource viability" schema or
> index to create a rubric by which the viability or threat-level to existing
> language documentation resources (for example, digital archives and other
> relevant technology, institutes, and so on) can be measured according to
> their ability to withstand, survive, continue operations and so on during
> current and future political and economic changes. We hope to identify the
> points that have had the biggest impact, and to use this information for
> where to focus opportunities to supplement, rebuild, and further grow.
> We take as inspiration for this index discussions in Seifert et al. (2018)
> and also McDonnell et al. eds. (2015), both papers which discuss resources
> and documentation Our scope, however, is much broader. Note that this work
> has some things in common (but not many) with Gavin et al’s (2025) Language
> Freedom Index, which focuses on language rights and freedom of language use
> in social, educational, and legal contexts.
> For this project, we are crowdsourcing experiences. That is, we want to
> know how individuals and communities are affected by these changes, as well
> as what changes have happened. The short survey is for very brief snapshot
> types of information. But you can also complete the longer survey if you'd
> like, to give us more nuanced information about the spaces and places where
> this kind of work is supported or threatened, based on your experiences.
> Questions about the surveys can be directed to Kristine Hildebrandt (
> khildeb at siue.edu) or Claire Bowern (claire.bowern at yale.edu)
>
>
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