Digital solution to age-old dilemma (fwd link)

[Aidan Wilson]

In addition to this article, on the same page in this morning's herald was 
a piece about Philip Parker, whom we'd all remember as the guy who's been
producing heavily substandard dictionaries, thesauruses and crossword 
puzzle books without attribution or any information about the language at 
all. But I'm not sure it gets the point across right. It also quotes both 
Peter Austin and myself.

Puzzled publisher at a loss for words
http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/puzzled-publisher-at-a-loss-for-words/2008/12/18/1229189813966.html

>THE indigenous language fraternity may be small. It may be close to 
>extinct. But this week at least it was the mouse that roared, after 
>Aboriginal
>language experts stopped a prolific 21st-century publishing phenomenon in 
>its tracks.
>
>With more than 100,000 titles listed at the online bookstore amazon.com, 
>Philip Parker is, theoretically speaking, the most published author in 
>history.
>
>A marketing professor at the INSEAD business school in France, he uses 
>patented computer algorithms to copy information online and compile it 
>into
>"studies" on niche subjects such as the econometric outlook for bath mats 
>in India or web servers in the United States.
>
>The process has seen him labelled a "book spammer" by his critics and a 
>luminary by admirers. But it was Professor Parker's hobby that offended 
>the
>delicate sensibilities of Aboriginal language experts.

-Aidan

--
Aidan Wilson

The University of Sydney
+612 9036 9558
+61428 458 969
aidan.wilson at usyd.edu.au

On Thu, 18 Dec 2008, phil cash cash wrote:

> I think it would be swell if we could all participate in a project like this!   
> 
> Easy Question: what it would take to mobilize language content for mobile devices?
> 
> It seems it just a matter of time (& effort) before mobile devices will be able to access & transmit native language content (here in North America) via
> teacher-to-learner, learner-to-learner.  It is interesting, maybe facinating(?), that media rich devices like the iPhone or iPod Touch (and many others)
> can effectively handle film-based media, audio and interactivity.  But when you look at the software roster, nothing but games and other trivial
> interactive content.  What we need is an IPA-capable note pad for language content note taking...also, we need transferablity (or interpolability) from
> established software to mobile devices (much like the Kirrkir example) to access organized native language data.  We need mobile-device enabled films and
> other visual media-rich language content.  Good-bye military hand-helds.   
> 
> Of course (upon reflection) all of this is based on the thesis of a digital transformation of language/culture and the creation of a network society. 
> Call it a hyper-reality floating beyond face-to-face language if you will.  The question often asked is "will we (native language speech communities)
> come to accept our media-saturated lives" as a common everyday experience?   Sounds like a design-ethnography project...
> 
> *Can you hear me now (said in the native language)?*
> 
> My favorite media clip and one floating around the internet (recv'd from folks in OZ) was a link to a short commercial showing an aboriginal elder, upon
> hearing a bull-roarer out in the outback, stands up on a rock and starts to swing his own bull roarer in answer.  The bull roarer breaks and flys off to
> hit an elderly lady drinking at a water hole.  The end point is the question, something like "There's got to be a better way." 
> 
> Just a few thoughts today...
> 
> Phil Cash Cash
> UofA
> 
> Quoting phil cash cash <cashcash at email.arizona.edu>:
> 
> > Digital solution to age-old dilemma
> >
> > December 19, 2008
> > Australia
> >
> > IN THE most remote parts of Australia, one computer can be shared between 100
> > people, with only a handful knowing how to turn it on.
> >
> > But even there, says a University of Sydney linguist, Aidan Wilson, there are
> > "thousands of mobile phones".
> >
> > That's why Mr Wilson and his colleagues at the university's Pacific
> > And Regional
> > Archive for Digital Sources in Endangered Cultures hope their
> > indigenous mobile
> > phone dictionary will be a hit.
> >
> > It is based on Kirrkirr, an interactive dictionary developed at the
> > university
> > that shows not only the meanings but also how words are connected to others.
> >
> > Access full article below:
> > http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/digital-solution-to-ageold-dilemma/2008/12/18/1229189804505.html
> 
> 
>