[ANU Pacific.Institute] PI submission regarding the teaching of Pacific languages

[John Burton]

All

I have been paying attention to this working group and have made cursory enquiries around here at DWU. I guess our position is that we are interested but cannot immediately identify a specific language program to tell you about at the moment. Stand by, however, for correction on this.

I will also note that we may be able to make some headway on the concept of a PNG National Dictionary of Tok Pisin Project. This is something I discussed with Frank Mihalic 1998-2000 and with other colleagues 2004-2005 after arriving at ANU. The whole thing came to a dead stop in 2005 when the then principal of Mihalic’s order, the SVD, failed to engage with it. The sticking point was that on his death the SVD had inherited the copyright of Mihalic’s IP and that was that. It was, however, very definitely Mihalic’s wish that work on his dictionary continue and that it be extended and updated. (P. Mühlhäusler had drafted a late 1970s update for a 3rd edition but Jacaranda wasn’t interested and went on reprinting the 2nd edition.) My conception was a continuing project to research the origins of TP as well as to accommodate neologisms and the changing nature of the language. (It had nothing to do with any of the questionable ’pocket dictionaries’ which some publishers produced in the 2000s.) Having seen a split among the 5000 speakers of Torres Strait Creole some years ago into three rival groups, each insisting on rival orthographies, I felt it important to only proceed with the project I had conceived under the cover of the Mihalic name to minimise, as far as possible, the risks of something similar happening in PNG. Hence I did not push the idea along after 2005.

Recent changes, though, have seen (a) the SVD move its institutional base from Hagen to the Divine Word University precinct (i.e. just off the main campus), (b) that DWU now has, or has brought back to the Madang campus, a critical mass of SVD staff engaged in mainstream research, and (c) that DWU’s Noser Library now has ‘the SVD archives’ (don’t know what this means yet as still uncatalogued AFAIK). My colleague, Fr Philip Gibbs, has also been making an approach within the SVD to see if there are remaining SVD concerns about proceeding with a Dictionary of Tok Pisin Project.

Just for your information and perhaps we will have more to say later.

Best regards
John Burton

Professor John Burton
DVP Research
Divine Word University
P O Box 483, Nabasa Road
Madang 511, Madang Province
Papua New Guinea

mailto:jburton at dwu.ac.pg
Mob: +675 7072 8622

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/John_Burton2
https://anu-au.academia.edu/JohnBurton
http://blogs.dwu.ac.pg/jburton/
https://researchers.anu.edu.au/researchers/burton-je


From: "Pacific.Institute" <pacific.institute-bounces at mailman.anu.edu.au<mailto:pacific.institute-bounces at mailman.anu.edu.au>> on behalf of Alan Rumsey <Alan.Rumsey at anu.edu.au<mailto:Alan.Rumsey at anu.edu.au>>
Date: Wednesday, 9 November 2016 at 1:05 pm
To: "pacific.institute at mailman.anu.edu.au<mailto:pacific.institute at mailman.anu.edu.au>" <pacific.institute at mailman.anu.edu.au<mailto:pacific.institute at mailman.anu.edu.au>>
Subject: [ANU Pacific.Institute] PI submission regarding the teaching of Pacific languages

Dear Colleagues,

As As you may have noticed, one of the agenda items for our upcoming AGM-cum-Board meeting on Friday is ‘Teaching Pacific languages: working group to report’. The submission drawn up by the working group has now been completed and approved by the PI Board.  It is available online at

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/66237921/PI%20submission%20re%20teaching%20Pacific%20Languages%207-11-16.docx

The Associate Dean of CAP who commissioned this report, Stephen Fruehling, will be present to discuss it with us. You would be welcome to participate in that discussion.

Best regards,
Alan

From: Alan Rumsey <alan.rumsey at anu.edu.au<mailto:alan.rumsey at anu.edu.au>>
Date: Wednesday, 9 November 2016 12:53 pm
To: "pacific.institute at mailman.anu.edu.au<mailto:pacific.institute at mailman.anu.edu.au>" <pacific.institute at mailman.anu.edu.au<mailto:pacific.institute at mailman.anu.edu.au>>
Subject: PI submission regarding the teaching of Pacific languages

Dear Colleagues,

As you may have noticed, one of the agenda items for our upcoming AGM-cum-Board meeting on Friday is ‘Teaching Pacific languages: working group to report’. The report of our working group has now completed and approved by the PI Board.  It is available online at

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/66237921/PI%20submission%20re%20teaching%20Pacific%20Languages%207-11-16.docx

The Associate Dean of CAP who commissioned this report, Stephen
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