Stefanie Pillai (University of Malaya)
Many local languages struggle to survive amidst competition from national and official languages, and within multilingual contexts. This is the case, for example in Malaysia, where almost 70% of languages of 130 or so languages are considered to be “in trouble” (http://www.ethnologue.com/country/MY). Linguists’ interest in such languages does not tend to go beyond the study of these languages, and translating the studies into academic papers. Researchers seldom think about what language communities get from these studies, especially in the case of minority and endangered languages. In any case, these studies are largely inaccessible to the communities. To what extent, though, do researchers have an ethical and social obligation to give back to language communities, especially when such efforts may help keep the language alive? This workshop aims to encourage participants to reflect on this question, and to discuss ways of engaging language community members in their research. This workshop will also look at way researchers can contribute towards revitalisation efforts of minority and endangered languages.
References
Austin, P. K., & Sallabank, J. (Eds). (2015). the Cambridge Handbook of Endangered Languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Pillai, S., Soh, W.-Y., Kajita, A. S. (2014). Family language policy and heritage language maintenance of Malacca Portuguese Creole Language. Language & Communication, 37, 75-85.