panel on âThe teachable vs. the learnable: Linguistics in endangered language pedagogyâ co-âauthored with Jordan Lachler, as well as in my presentation.
+ The Cognitive Commitment
and
Endangered Language
Pedagogy
Sally Rice University of Alberta 13th International Cognitive Linguistics Conference ✜ Northumbria University ✜ Newcastle, UK ✜ 24 July 2015 ✜ Some aspects of this presentation were previously presented at the 2015 International Conference on Language Documentation and Conservation (ICLDC-‐4) special panel on “The teachable vs. the learnable: Linguistics in endangered language pedagogy” co-‐authored with Jordan Lachler, as well as in my presentation “Challenges to the ‘social-‐interaction’ engine in endangered language communities: Notes from the Canadian field” at the Interactional Foundations of Language Workshop at the 2011 LSA Institute.
+ CILLDI
http://www.cilldi.ualberta.ca
!
the Canadian Indigenous Languages and Literacy Development Institute is a 3-‐week summer school held at the University of Alberta for speakers, learners, and advocates of First Peoples’ languages
!
CILLDI is now in its 16th year (first classes held in 2001)
!
designed for Aboriginal teachers, speakers, Elders, & community activists who are working in the area of endangered Indigenous languages
!
offers undergraduate and graduate courses in linguistics, language documentation, language education, and teacher training through the Faculties of Arts, Education, and Native Studies
!
the Community Linguist Certificate, begun in 2007, is a 6-‐course, 18-‐credit program delivered through CILLDI, leading to a provincially recognized certificate
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+
The Challenge
Community language programs are not producing new generations of conversationally-‐proficient speakers.
There are many reasons for this, but poor language curriculum design is one of the main culprits -‐-‐ and one of the few we have some control over.
The available curricula for most (Canadian) Indigenous languages: !
Focus on topics with minimal conversational value or cultural relevance -‐-‐ numbers, colors, animals, body parts;
!
Burden students with decontextualized language activities -‐-‐ memorizing verb paradigms, translation exercises.
+
What’s Missing?
The teachers and curriculum developers – who are often the same person in smaller language communities – all have linguistic and cultural competence.
But what most of them are missing is metalinguistic competence.
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Metalinguistic Competence
!
Ability to introspect (individually and collectively) about the lexical, grammatical, and functional patterns of one’s own language.
!
Understanding the ways in which those patterns can be meaningfully and systematically manipulated in context.
!
Externalizing those insights through the use of basic descriptive linguistic analytical techniques and terminology.
+
Metalinguistic Competence
Most Indigenous language practitioners lack these specific skills.
This is not due to an inability to introspect about their own languages, but rather due to a lack of appropriate training to capitalize on the insights they they do have.
This is the goal of the Community Linguist Certificate and the training we offer at CILLDI informed by cognitive/functional/typological principles.
+ 2007
a golden opportunity to practice
applied cognitive linguistics
+ CILLDI TRAINING AND
THE COMMUNITY LINGUIST CERTIFICATE
Short-term goals
!
aimed at speakers
!
provide practical skills, hands-‐on data analysis, and a level of comfort working with technology
!
give linguistic and sociolinguistic exposure
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help students create a community-‐ready portfolio through strategic elicitation
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provide networking opportunities with language activists from other communities
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act as a spring-‐board for future study and collaboration
+ CILLDI TRAINING AND
THE COMMUNITY LINGUIST CERTIFICATE
long-term goals
!
develop a cadre of community-‐based and linguistically trained Indigenous language workers and activists in Canada
!
encourage some speakers to consider further training in linguistics
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provide models of community-‐university collaboration for speakers and graduate students
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give undergraduate and graduate students an opportunity to tutor, TA, or teach CLC courses and build relationships with various communities
Where to" begin?
+
It’s not what languages have, but what speakers do.
Core Principles as a Cognitive Linguist
grammar is meaning meaning is contextualized usage (not structure) prevails
+
(inter)subjectivity pervades grammar embodiment of conceptual categories collocational entrenchment trumps everything
Core Principles as a Cognitive, Corpus Linguist
grammar is meaning meaning is contextualized usage (not structure) prevails (inter)subjectivity pervades grammar embodiment of conceptual categories collocational entrenchment trumps everything
+
constructions are mostly lexeme-‐specific
collocational & collostructional patterns are genre-‐ and mode-‐specific spoken language is more interesting than written language
Core Principles as a Cognitive, Corpus, Field Linguist
grammar is meaning meaning is contextualized usage (not structure) prevails (inter)subjectivity pervades grammar embodiment of conceptual categories collocational entrenchment trumps everything constructions are mostly lexeme-‐specific collocational & collostructional patterns are genre-‐ and mode-‐specific
+
spoken language is more interesting than written language
we are in language-‐documentation mode (with most of Canada’s Indigenous languages) we need to record as many speakers, in as many interactional contexts, talking about as many subjects, as possible (and in multi-‐media)
F/M +
[ F/M ] = Cx +
A linguistic expression (form/meaning pairing) is a construction.... ....of varying size, category, analyzability, semantic transparency, and applicability in particular usage contexts.
+
‘put the green pencil on the red square’
+ you-singular-individual handle-sticklike-object thing-that-one-marks-with that-looks-like-a-leaf onto-the-top-of thing-that-is-cut-twice that-looks-like-blood
Cx = C
x
where x = C+ONTENT CONTEXT CONSTRUAL CONVENTION CULTURE CONVERSATION
+
literacy > oralcy >
sociality
literacy is leaden (it can kill narrative and even syntax) orthographic debates can stop revitalization efforts in their tracks mere transcription is insufficient language use studied in its proper social context is always more accessible to learners (and linguists) making interactive discourse the proper starting point of documentation and second language teaching is an achievable goal
+
literacy
< oralcy
