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CSLI Calendar, 10 September 1997, vol. 13:1
C S L I C A L E N D A R O F P U B L I C E V E N T S
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10 September 1997 Stanford Vol. 13, No. 1
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A weekly publication of the
Center for the Study of Language and Information (CSLI)
Stanford University, Ventura Hall, Stanford, CA 94305-4115
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ACTIVITIES DURING 10 -- 19 SEPTEMBER 1997
THURSDAY 11 SEPTEMBER
4:00pm Xerox PARC Forum
George Pake Auditorium, Xerox PARC
Lingo Jingo: Does the US need an official language?
Geoff Nunberg
Abstract below
FRIDAY 19 SEPTEMBER
10:00am CSLI Open House
-3:00pm Cordura Hall
Description below
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XEROX PARC FORUM
on Thursday, 11 September 1997, 4:00pm - 5:00pm
George Pake Auditorium, Xerox
[http://www.parc.xerox.com/ops/projects/forum]
Lingo Jingo: Does America Need an Official Language?
Geoff Nunberg
Xerox PARC
Over the past 15 years, the "English-only" movement has become a
central issue in American political life. Eighteen states have adopted
official language measures and legislation is pending in thirteen
more; in 1996 the House of Representatives approved a law that bars
the federal government from providing services in languages other than
English, which will probably be voted on in the Senate in the current
term. Some polls show over 80 percent of Americans favoring making
English the official language.
Proponents of these measures argue that they are necessary to counter
the "drift toward official multilingualism." They claim that there are
more than 30 million Americans who do not speak English and warn that
government bilingual programs encourage people to believe that they
can function without learning English, a situation that could lead to
the sorts of civil divisions that have torn apart nations like Canada,
Belgium, and Sri Lanka. In this talk, however, I'll argue that these
claims are wildly overstated and implausible. Official English
measures are both unnecessary and themselves divisive -- a bad cure
for an imaginary disease -- which is why the movement has been
overwhelmingly opposed not just by ethnic and civil-rights
organizations, but by the American linguistics community.
Biography: Geoffrey Nunberg is a Principal Scientist at the Xerox Palo
Alto Research Center and a consulting professor of linguistics at
Stanford University. He is also the usage editor of the American
Heritage Dictionary and a regular commentator on the NPR program
"Fresh Air." He has been actively involved in questions of language
policy since 1986.
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CSLI OPEN HOUSE
on Friday, 19 September 1997, 10:00am to 3:00pm
Cordura Hall
[http://www-csli.stanford.edu/csli/]
Come and see exciting demos from the Archimedes Project, the Applied
Speech Technology Lab, EPGY, and much more.
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CSLI VISITORS
The following are some of the current visitors at CSLI
Maria Cerezo
Universidad De Navarra
Dept of Philosophy
Pamplona, Spain
Sept 97-Feb.98
Areas of interest: Logic and Philosophy
Renee Elio
University of Alberta
Dept of Computer Science
Sept 97-May 98
Areas of interest: applications of machine learning for
intelligent advisory systems
Hiroshi Fujimoto
Medical and Welfare Equipment Technology Development
Coordinate Office
Agency of Industrial Science and Technology, MITI
Tokyo Japan
Sept 97
Working with Neil Scott and the Archimedes Project
Gen Kikui
IAP researcher, working with Stanley Peters
July 97-July 98
NTT Information & Communication Systems Labs
Researcher, Intelligent Information Processing Labs.
Did research and development of a cross-lingual information
navigation system on the WWW. Concerned mainly with language
identification of WWW documents and with translation of queries and
search results.
Godehard Link
University of Munich
Institut fur Philosophie
Logik und Wissenschaftstheorie (IPLW)
Munich, Germany
Sept - Oct 97
Ed Mares
Victoria University of Wellington
Dept of Philosophy
Wellington, New Zealand
Sept 9-30, 1997
Areas of interest: Logic, Philosophy of Language
Jeff Pelletier
University of Alberta
Dept of Philosophy
Dept of Computing Science
Sept 97-May 98
Yasuhiro Takayama
IAP researcher, working with Stanley Peters
Sept 97-Sept 98
Mitsubishi Electric Corporation
Information Technology R&D Center
Kazuhiro Takahashi
Chukyo University
School of Computer and Cognitive Sciences
Sept 97-Apr 98
Areas of interest: psychology-oriented cognitive science, visual
reasonings or effects of diagrams
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END MATERIAL
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