Assessing the intercultural in language learning. The implementation of Intercultural Language Learning (ICLL) is a priority in policy for the Commonwealth and States and is important in developing better understanding of people fro different cultures and countries. A key problem is the development of assessment models. This project is a first investigation of the process and theory of task-based assessment in ICLL and of the process of judgement in assessing languages and interculturality. The ....Assessing the intercultural in language learning. The implementation of Intercultural Language Learning (ICLL) is a priority in policy for the Commonwealth and States and is important in developing better understanding of people fro different cultures and countries. A key problem is the development of assessment models. This project is a first investigation of the process and theory of task-based assessment in ICLL and of the process of judgement in assessing languages and interculturality. The project will contribute to the quality of languages education nationally by enhancing languages teaching and learning and especially the contribution of languages learning to understanding, respecting and engaging with linguistic and cultural diversity, both in Australia and globally.Read moreRead less
The status and conceptualisation of cultural knowledge in language-in-education policy for second/foreign language education. This project aims to develop a coherent understanding of approaches to issues of culture and interculturality in languages-in-education planning and policy for the teaching of second/foreign languages in Australia, Europe, North America and Asia. This will involve both a study of the ways in which culturally focused curriculum and content are included in language-in-educa ....The status and conceptualisation of cultural knowledge in language-in-education policy for second/foreign language education. This project aims to develop a coherent understanding of approaches to issues of culture and interculturality in languages-in-education planning and policy for the teaching of second/foreign languages in Australia, Europe, North America and Asia. This will involve both a study of the ways in which culturally focused curriculum and content are included in language-in-education plans and policies, and a study of the ways in which the cultural component of language education is conceptualised in such plans and policies. These studies will provide a basis for examining the consistency of treatment of culture in language-in-education planning and policy.Read moreRead less
New words for new things: Formal and substantive aspects in the development of the Pitkern-Norf'k language. This project will help consolidate Australia's reputation as a leader in contact language research. It will strengthen Australia's social and economic fabric by involving a small remote community in research on their endangered language, thereby sustaining community cohesion and a sense of identity. The publications arising from the research will have direct applications to language reviva ....New words for new things: Formal and substantive aspects in the development of the Pitkern-Norf'k language. This project will help consolidate Australia's reputation as a leader in contact language research. It will strengthen Australia's social and economic fabric by involving a small remote community in research on their endangered language, thereby sustaining community cohesion and a sense of identity. The publications arising from the research will have direct applications to language revival, teaching, and cultural tourism as currently promoted by the Norfolk Island Assembly.Read moreRead less
Revival' in the Middle East: The Genesis of Israeli ('Modern Hebrew') - lessons for revival of no-longer spoken Australian languages. This project will enhance mutual understanding within multicultural Australia: (1) helping community leaders seeking to apply the lessons of Israeli to the revival of no-longer spoken Australian languages; (2) assisting local Jews to explore their roots and substantially improving Israeli and Hebrew teaching methodologies at universities and Jewish schools in Aust ....Revival' in the Middle East: The Genesis of Israeli ('Modern Hebrew') - lessons for revival of no-longer spoken Australian languages. This project will enhance mutual understanding within multicultural Australia: (1) helping community leaders seeking to apply the lessons of Israeli to the revival of no-longer spoken Australian languages; (2) assisting local Jews to explore their roots and substantially improving Israeli and Hebrew teaching methodologies at universities and Jewish schools in Australia. Globally, the project will enhance Australia's understanding of social, political and cultural conditions in the Middle East, by facilitating a clearer and more complex understanding of the languages and politics in the region. It will therefore make a valuable contribution to the war against terrorism, now the major threat to national security.Read moreRead less
Preserving and reviving language and culture of Norfolk Island. The project will help revive the endangered Norfolk Island language, thereby strengthening the sense of identity of the Norfolk Islanders. It will help achieve greater visibility of the language through an exhibition, interpretive signage and production of educational resources. The training provided will open up employment opportunities in education and cultural tourism in a remote community.
Linguistic analysis of Ngarrindjeri texts. The Ngarrindjeri language of the Lower Murray of South Australia was richly documented in the nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries. The largest body of texts (163 texts in Berndt and Berndt, 1993) is a treasure-trove of language and cultural knowledge from the 1940s, but has received little linguistic attention, because of difficulties in interpreting writing conventions and because of the inadequate translations provided. Through systematic linguisti ....Linguistic analysis of Ngarrindjeri texts. The Ngarrindjeri language of the Lower Murray of South Australia was richly documented in the nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries. The largest body of texts (163 texts in Berndt and Berndt, 1993) is a treasure-trove of language and cultural knowledge from the 1940s, but has received little linguistic attention, because of difficulties in interpreting writing conventions and because of the inadequate translations provided. Through systematic linguistic analysis and reconstructions, this project aims to shed light on how Ngarrindjeri changed over the 100 years since first documentation, how clan languages differed, and how Ngarrindjeri texts and sentences were structured. It is expected to provide important insight into the variation expected in language contact situations.Read moreRead less
The relationship between speech production and perception in Australian language speakers: implications for speech development and learning in Aboriginal children. Chronic ear infection blights the life of at least 50% of Aboriginal Australians. In a vicious cycle that extends from generation to generation, it leads to hearing loss, educational disadvantage, socio-economic disadvantage and environmental depredation, which once again leads to ear (and many other) infections. This is a unique atte ....The relationship between speech production and perception in Australian language speakers: implications for speech development and learning in Aboriginal children. Chronic ear infection blights the life of at least 50% of Aboriginal Australians. In a vicious cycle that extends from generation to generation, it leads to hearing loss, educational disadvantage, socio-economic disadvantage and environmental depredation, which once again leads to ear (and many other) infections. This is a unique attempt by researchers across academic disciplines to study the role of language in educational disadvantage and whether this disadvantage might be made worse for Aboriginal children by the early use of English at school. We ask whether, on purely acoustic or linguistic grounds, communicating in an Aboriginal language might offer improved educational and health outcomes for Aboriginal children in the early years.Read moreRead less
Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment And Facilities - Grant ID: LE100100211
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$650,000.00
Summary
The Big Australian Speech Corpus: An audio-visual speech corpus of Australian English. Contemporary speech science and technology are driven by the availability of large speech corpora. While audio databases exist for languages spoken in America, Europe and Japan, there is currently no large auditory-visual database of spoken language, and certainly not one for Australian English. Here we will establish the Big Australian Speech Corpus, which will support a speech science research and developmen ....The Big Australian Speech Corpus: An audio-visual speech corpus of Australian English. Contemporary speech science and technology are driven by the availability of large speech corpora. While audio databases exist for languages spoken in America, Europe and Japan, there is currently no large auditory-visual database of spoken language, and certainly not one for Australian English. Here we will establish the Big Australian Speech Corpus, which will support a speech science research and development using Australian English and facilitate the development of Australian speech technology applications from automatic speech recognition and text-to-speech synthesis used in taxi and other ordering services, to hearing prostheses and talking head aids for learning-impaired children, and a range of security and forensic applications.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE140101749
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$379,480.00
Summary
A computational network model of the mental lexicon. Understanding a word's meaning is a challenge when learning a language and a capacity that is seriously affected in various disorders such as Alzheimer's disease, however little is known about how meaning is organised in the mental lexicon and evolves from childhood into old age. This project aims to build a detailed computational model integrating information available through the senses and structure in the language environment to derive a l ....A computational network model of the mental lexicon. Understanding a word's meaning is a challenge when learning a language and a capacity that is seriously affected in various disorders such as Alzheimer's disease, however little is known about how meaning is organised in the mental lexicon and evolves from childhood into old age. This project aims to build a detailed computational model integrating information available through the senses and structure in the language environment to derive a lexicon that covers most words people know. By distinguishing qualitative different types of meaning relations, this project will allow the prediction of the kind of information and processes required to understand words and an understanding of how this lexicon grows in childhood and declines in old age.Read moreRead less
Phonological effects on the development of inflectional morphology. This project investigates the mechanisms underlying typically developing children's variable omission of inflectional morphemes (for example, plural, past tense). The results will have significant implications for the evaluation and design of interventions for language-delayed populations where serious problems of communication persist.