Glottopedia, the free online encyclopedia of linguistics

[Peter Hook]

Dear All,

This proposal seems to turn its back on the universality and interdependency
of human knowledge. No discipline is an island. Linguistics (or at least
some linguists) prides itself on being a "window on the mind" and a bridge
to a dozen other fields (philosophy, logic, psychology, rhetoric,
communication, sociology, cryptology, anthropology, cultural studies,
semiotics, education, language learning...) Why can't the intellectual
investments requested be made to Wikipedia?  Or Wiktionary?  Or at least be
shared with Wikipedia and Wiktionary?

Sincerely,  Peter Hook


On 1/25/08, Martin Haspelmath <haspelmath at eva.mpg.de> wrote:
>
> Dear HistLingers,
>
> You may be interested in Glottopedia (http://www.glottopedia.org), the
> free reference site for linguists by linguists.
>
> Glottopedia differs from Wikipedia in that (i) its content is much more
> specialized (e.g. you'll be able to find articles on items such as
> "cryptanalysis", "syntacticization", "xenism", "rich agreement", "loan
> translation", "adfix"), and (ii) users must have an account to edit
> articles, and they must be linguists with an academic background.
>
> Moreover, Glottopedia focuses on *dictionary articles* rather than
> survey articles of the sort that are found in Wikipedia (and various
> specialized linguistics handbooks). But each dictionary article
> (protentially) provides more information than just a definition: It also
> gives examples, synonyms, other meanings of the term, the origin of the
> term, some key references, and a translation into other languages
> (Glottopedia is a multilingual enterprise; so far there are articles in
> English and German, but it is hoped that more languages will follow soon).
>
> Glottopedia also has articles on linguists, but unlike Wikipedia, which
> aims to restrict its articles to "notable people", Glottopedia
> potentially has articles on all linguists. (However, Glottopedia's
> articles on living linguists are restricted to links, in order to avoid
> problems of personality rights.)
>
> Eventually we also want to add articles about all languages and language
> families (with detailed references), and articles about things that we
> need for our everyday work (such as journals, conferences,
> institutions), but at the moment this is mainly an idea for the future.
>
> We feel that Glottopedia is a resource that the field of linguistics
> really needs, and we hope that you will all contribute to it. Some of us
> have taught courses in which the assignment to the students was writing
> dictionary articles on some technical terms. We think that especially
> advanced students, who do not have easy access to other forms of
> publications, will find that Glottopedia gives them a great chance to
> make a contribution to the field.
>
> Martin Haspelmath
>
> --
> 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
>
> Glottopedia - the free encyclopedia of linguistics
> (http://www.glottopedia.org)
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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> Histling-l at mailman.rice.edu
> https://mailman.rice.edu/mailman/listinfo/histling-l
>
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