Abbreviation CoLang Founder Carol Genetti | Formation 2008 Board of directors Advisory Circle | |
Formerly called InField: Institute on Field Linguistics and Language Documentation | ||
CoLang, the Institute on Collaborative Language Research, is a biannual training workshop in field linguistics and language documentation for linguistics students, professors, and members of indigenous language communities. CoLang has been described as part of a new "collaborative model" in "community-based methodologies" of language revitalization and documentation, where speakers of indigenous languages are valued as "equal partners" with linguists rather than as research subjects.
Contents
Activities
The institute happens in even-numbered summers (opposite the Linguistic Society of America Summer Institute) at various American universities, but it has drawn participants and instructors from around the world, including Australia, Canada, Kenya, Morocco, Nigeria, and the United Kingdom. The first part of the institute consists of two weeks of workshops on topics like community archiving, linguistics, audio and video recording, language teaching, and activism. The workshops are followed by a three or four week practicum where participants work intensively with speakers of a language to document it.
While each individual institute is organized by one or two local director(s), CoLang as a whole is governed by its Advisory Circle, which includes linguistics professors, community linguists, students, and representatives from partner organizations. The co-convenors of the Advisory Circle as of October 2015 are Ewa Czaykowska-Higgins and Susan Gehr. Each institute has been funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation's Documenting Endangered Languages program.
The first InField in 2008 resulted in ongoing collaboration between Kennedy Bosire and Carlos Nash for the completion of the Ekegusii encyclopedia and a dissertation on tone in Ekegusii. InField/CoLang has also resulted in ongoing community-based linguistics work in Kwak'wala and Kari’nja, among others.
History
CoLang was founded in 2008 as InField, the Institute on Field Linguistics and Language Documentation, by Carol Genetti. The institute was renamed to CoLang and adopted a charter and Advisory Circle in 2012. CoLang announced a long-term partnership with the Linguistic Society of America (LSA) in 2015.
InField 2008 California
InField 2008 was held at the University of California Santa Barbara. The director was Carol Genetti. The practicum languages were Ekegusii, Kwak'wala, and Mende.
InField 2010 Oregon
InField 2010 was held at the University of Oregon. The director was Spike Gildea. The practicum languages were Northern Paiute, Uyghur, and Wapishana.
CoLang 2012 Kansas
CoLang 2012 was held at the University of Kansas. The directors were Arienne Dwyer and Carlos Nash. The practicum languages were Amazigh, Cherokee, and Uda.
CoLang 2014 Texas
CoLang 2014 was held at the University of Texas Arlington. The director was Colleen Fitzgerald. The practicum languages were Alabama, Apoala Mixtec (course in Spanish), Innu, and Ngambai.
CoLang 2016 Alaska
CoLang 2016 was held at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. The directors were Alice Taff and Siri Tuttle. The practicum languages were Han, Miyako, and Unangam Tunuu
CoLang 2018 Florida
CoLang 2018 will be held at the University of Florida.