Creative Multilingualism’s Summer Showcase: Language Diversity in the Digital Age
Enjoy linguistically enriched snacks and drinks with contributions from our research and creative partners on topics including teaching pronunciation with AI, interactions between linguistic diversity and biodiversity, and a Prismatic Jane Eyre. With a Yoruba/English musical finale by Grammy Award Winner Lekan Babalola (Percussion) and Kate Luxmoore (Clarinet).
“Pop-up Talks”: Multilingualism in the Age of AI
Participants to be confirmed.
A series of provocations, presentations, and performances from undergraduates, postgraduates, researchers, creative artists on the topic of Multilingualism in the Age of AI.
Teaching languages with AI and related technology: Pronunciation and digital literacy
Travis Ralph-Donaldson (Niter Ltd.), Suzanne Graham (University of Reading), James Turner Pengchong Zhang (University of Reading); Heike Kruesemann (University of Southampton)
This presentation will introduce key digital tools being used in the DELTEA ESRC-funded research project: Digital Empowerment in Language Teaching. It will include insights into an app developed by Niter Ltd. and being used in the primary school-based project, showing how the app might address challenges for the teaching of languages in relating to variable teacher language proficiency and limited curriculum time. The presentation will also outline how digital stories and accompany activities are being trailed in schools alongside the app. After the presentation audience participants will be able to try out the app themselves.
Darwin and the Fuegians, Ethno-ornithology and Human Rights
Andrew Gosler (Professor of Ethno-ornithology, University of Oxford)
Charles Darwin suggested the diversification of languages was comparable to the diversification of species. Recent research on biological and linguistic diversity supports this assertion. Yet we are discovering also that the process of diversification (evolution) is not, as he believed, driven principally by competition and conflict. Darwin was strongly influenced by his own cultural assumptions and his poor opinion of the indigenous people of Tierra del Fuego, whom he first encountered in December 1832. Studies of their language, and its extinction, tell a different story, one that helps to understand evolution, and the value of biocultural diversity itself.
Prismatic Jane Eyre meets AI
Matthew Reynolds (University of Oxford) and Wen-Chin Ouyang (SOAS)
Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre is not just an English novel: it has been translated more than 600 times into at least 68 languages. Beginning with a brief account from Matthew of this phenomenon, and of the creativity of multilingualism which it reveals, he and Wen-Chin will explore whether there is any scope for that sort of creativity in AI translation and lead some experiments, in which everyone can join in, to find out.
Friday 24 May 2024 from 4pm at the Cheng Kar Shun Digital Hub, Jesus College, Oxford
Book free tickets via our Eventbrite page here
