Endangered languages

CIPL has a long-term commitment to work on language endangerment.

Its XVth Congress in Québec in 1992 was devoted to this theme. A series of keynote papers was commissioned from leading experts in each area of the world, and the resulting Congress volume, Robins & Uhlenbeck (1991), was the first worldwide survey of the field. Two of the keynote speakers at the Prague XVIIth Congress (2003) presented talks on issues in language endangerment, and a large number of panel presentations are given on related topics at every Congress.

The former CIPL President, the late Prof Stephen Wurm, was a leading figure in raising worldwide interest among linguists in the issue of language endangerment, and compiled a number of important works including the overview chapter 1 of Robins & Uhlenbeck (1991), the UNESCO atlas of endangered languages, Wurm (1996) 1st edition and Wurm (2001) 2nd edition, and many other major publications. Through his fundraising skills, in the 1990s CIPL was able to make a large number of small grants for work on endangered languages, and to support an international symposium on endangered languages in Tokyo in 1995, Matsumura (1998). This triggered a large number of other activities, such as the Endangered Language of the Pacific Rim project based in Japan, the colloquium Language Endangerment, Research and Documentation at Bad Godesberg in 2000, Brenzinger (2007), and a collaborative project on language endangerment and language maintenance based in Australia, Bradley ∓ Bradley (2002).

CIPL also awards individual prizes for work on endangered languages. At its XVIIth Congress in Prague in 2003 a prize was awarded to a promising young scholar, and at its XVIIIth Congress in Seoul in 2008, a prize was awarded to a leading senior scholar working for the maintenance of endangered languages. Similar prizes will be awarded at each future CIPL Congress.

CIPL supports summer workshops and summer schools on language endangerment. We sponsored a summer school on language documentation at Leiden University in 2007. At the School of Oriental and African Studies 22 June-3 July 2009, we sponsored a workshop on language endangerment and co-sponsored a summer school on language documentation. CIPL intends to continue to sponsor similar summer schools and workshops in the future.

Publications