[lg policy] New Australian program pledges millions towards endangered aboriginal languages

[Harold Schiffman]

New Australian program pledges millions towards endangered aboriginal languages

August 14th, 02009 by Laura Welcher

In a new announcement by the Australian government, the equivalent of
$7.8 million US dollars will go towards programs that work to save
endangered aboriginal languages. Australia is one of the
linguistically rich regions of the world, in recent history having
upwards of 275 distinct languages.  These languages also contain some
fascinating linguistic features, such “mother-in-law” avoidance
speech, unique noun class systems (witness the Dyirbal noun class for
“women, fire, and dangerous things”), and words of surprising internal
complexity (take for instance the Mayali word
Abanyawoihwarrgahmarneganjginjeng. ‘I cooked the wrong meat for them
again’.)

Of these 275 languages, 111 are now extinct, and an additional 100
languages are considered to be critically endangered, with only a few
elderly speakers remaining.  To address this precipitous decline, the
new program proposes to start with “translation services, tests for
children and a feasibility study for a national centre for Aboriginal
languages.” Programs like this may seem like too little too late, but
declaring these languages “national treasures” can actually go a long
way in creating a better climate for their continued use.  A similar
policy change came when the United States passed the Native American
Languages Act of 1990, reversing decades of destructive government
language policies, and setting up a grant program that continues to
fund community-based language research to this day.

There is also support for aboriginal language documentation through a
number of other grant programs, both large and small, that exist to
support language documentation around the world.  These include the
Endangered Language Fund (ELF), the Foundation for Endangered
Languages (FEL), the US Federal Documenting Endangered Languages
program and a few private programs such as The Hans Rausing Endangered
Languages Program and the Volkswagon Stiftung funded DoBes project.
Each of these programs has been underway for several years, and
combined, have a rich portfolio of successful projects to their
credit.

http://blog.longnow.org/2009/08/14/new-australian-program-pledges-millions-towards-endangered-aboriginal-languages/

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