LSA Bulletin
March 2005
The Ken Hale Chair
Dear Colleagues:
A major thrust within contemporary linguistics, and indeed in North American linguistics since even before the founding of our Society, has been the study and preservation of endangered languages, an area where linguistics can make a real difference in the broader world. As part of this effort, the Linguistic Society of America undertook an initiative in 2003 to endow a new chair at the summer Linguistic Institute for the teaching of field methods. This chair is to be named in memory of Ken Hale, whose passion for the study and preservation of endangered languages is legendary. The chair will be inaugurated at the 2005 Institute at MIT and Harvard, where it will be held jointly by Mary Laughren, Jane Simpson, and David Nash.
The announcement of the chair has already resulted in related synergistic activities. Complementing the chair is a new fellowship, funded by the Committee on Endangered Languages and Their Preservation, to support a highly ranked student at the Institute enrolled in the six-week field methods course to be taught by the holders of the Hale Chair. In addition, a workshop is planned for the weekend of 9-11 July at the Institute, focusing on 'Language Documentation: Theory, Practice, and Values'. Its themes include the requirements of field linguistic training, the concerns and involvement of the heritage language communities, and issues in documentation and archiving.
An endowed Institute chair requires substantial funding. In this particular case, the demands are still greater, because it is necessary to fund not only the professorial salary and expenses but also a stipend and expenses for the speaker of the language under study, who would be serving as consultant. Our estimate is that $200,000 can endow this chair in perpetuity, alongside the existing endowed Collitz and Sapir chairs at the Institute.
Since the chair was announced in January 2004, the LSA has received contributions totalling $67,000, which include $20,000 from MIT, $10,000 from the Salus Mundi Foundation, and $37,000 from individual members of the LSA, 19 of whom have donated $1000 or more. We have also been fortunate to have been awarded a matching grant from the NEH, which for the period through 2008 will add an extra 25% to contributions from nongovernmental donors, up to $40,000. The LSA has also been able to budget $30,000 towards this endowment. Thus we have about $63,000 left to reach our goal, which we hope to reach by the end of this year, in time for the 2007 Institute at Stanford.
We would like to ask you to consider making a substantial tax-deductible contribution toward this campaign. We are hoping for contributions on the order of $1000, but lesser amounts will not be frowned upon. We're sure there are myriad causes to which you regularly donate, but this is a special opportunity to help establish the recording and preservation of endangered languages as a top priority of the LSA, and to do so in the name of Ken Hale. Please consider as large a gift as you can make, and then add 10 percent. A form has been included in this issue of the Bulletin, which may be sent to the LSA Secretariat.
By all means feel free to call or email us if you have questions or ideas. On behalf of the Executive Committee of the LSA, we thank you profusely for whatever help you can offer us in making this happen.
With warmest regards,
Mark Aronoff, President
Joan Bybee, Past President
Ray Jackendoff, 2003 President