LINGUIST List 26.1241

Wed Mar 04 2015

Jobs: Anthropological Linguistics; Language Documentation; Text/Corpus Linguistics; Typology: Post Doc, The Australian National University

Editor for this issue: Andrew Lamont <alamontlinguistlist.org>

Date: 02-Mar-2015
From: Ashmita Hada <cap.hranu.edu.au>
Subject: Anthropological Linguistics; Language Documentation; Text/Corpus Linguistics; Typology: Post Doc, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
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University or Organization: The Australian National University
Department: ANU College of Asia and the Pacific
Job Location: Canberra, Australia
Web Address: http://www.anu.edu.au/
Job Title: Postdoctoral Research Associate

Job Rank: Post Doc

Specialty Areas: Anthropological Linguistics; Language Documentation; Text/Corpus Linguistics; Typology


Description:

Postdoctoral Research Associate
Classification: Academic Level A
Salary package: $64,386 - $81,672 pa plus 17% superannuation
Fixed Term: 3 years

The ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language seeks a postdoctoral fellow at the ANU to undertake research on using a multilingual corpus development to investigate the typology of social cognition

The recently-funded ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language (CoEDL http://dynamicsoflanguage.edu.au), is launching an ambitious series of interlinked projects, focusing on language as a dynamic and variable system, and drawing on the full diversity of the world's languages, through four programs focusing on the design space of language (Shape), how it is learned (Learning) and processed (Processing), and how linguistic structures evolve at various timescales (Evolution). Two 'threads' (Archiving, and New Generation technologies) will enable the technological advances needed to drive forward the language sciences in the coming decades. The Centre is strongly interdisciplinary and features researchers from linguistics, psychology, anthropology, philosophy, bioinformatics, robotics and speech pathology. CoEDL is centred on four Australian Universities (Australian National University, University of Melbourne, University of Western Sydney and University of Queensland), with 14 further partner institutions around the world.

We are now recruiting a substantial number of three-year postdoctoral positions for the first phase of the Centre's activities. Each of these positions is free to international competition, will be based in the University most appropriate to their project, and will be selected by a subset of the Centre's personnel. These positions are primarily research-based, offering the possibility of substantial freedom of research within the broad ambit of the Centre and its programs. They come with appropriate research setup and ongoing research support costs (e.g. fieldwork support for field-based positions), plus some possibilities for limited teaching.

The role of this position is to develop and analyse a multi-lingual semi-parallel corpus, of around a dozen languages from around the world, focussing on similarities and differences in how languages encode categories underlying social cognition, from kinship to theory of mind to conversational management. Data on individual languages is being gathered by a team of researchers; this position will be tasked with coordinating the construction and analysis of a multilingual corpus and a set of typological and discourse categories that can be used for cross-corpus comparison. An initial description of the task used to elicit the data can be found at http://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/handle/10125/4504. Nicholas Evans will be leading the overall project. In addition to CoEDL researchers it will also involve collaboration with a number of Germany-based researchers under the ambit of Evans' Anneliese Maier Research Award, so that a knowledge of German language / academic culture would be an asset.

Each applicant should include a clear and plan (c. 2 pages) addressing what they see as the main challenges in using a semi-parallel corpus, as generated by the above research protocol, for investigating issues of how categories of social cognition are variably grammaticalised across languages.

For more information and to apply for the position, please visit the application link below.

Application Deadline: 23-Mar-2015

Web Address for Applications: http://jobs.anu.edu.au/cw/en/job/492555/postdoctoral-research-associate
Contact Information:
Ashmita Hada
Email: cap.hranu.edu.au

Page Updated: 04-Mar-2015