Projekt

Vanua Lava is an island of only 334 sq.km with a population of approximately 2,000 inhabitants in the Republic of Vanuatu, and yet this small island was, until recently, home to four actively spoken languages. Two of these languages are now on the verge of extinction, the other two languages are target of this documentation project which started in 2006. The two languages of this study are spoken within an hour's walk of each other and yet they are considerably different. Vera'a is the more endangered with approximately 200 - 300 speakers, residing mainly in the one village of the same name. Vurës is a considerably larger language with around 1,000 speakers. That is why Vera'a is not only endangered due to contact with English, French and the pidgin Bislama, but also to some extent by Vurës itself. In the extension phase of the project the team will focus on the transcription, translation, further annotation and archiving of recorded data material to complete the corpus in the electronic archive at the Max-Planck-Insitute in Nijmegen.

• Prof. Dr. Ulrike Mosel

  Universität Kiel
  Philosophische Fakultät, ISFAS
  Insitut für Skandinavistik
  Kiel
  

• Dr. Catriona Malau

  University of Newcastle
  Faculty of Education and Arts
  School of Humanities and Social Science
  Department of Linguistics
  Callaghan NSW
  Australien