The annual North American meeting of New Ways of Analyzing Variation (NWAV) has a long and influential history of bringing together scholars researching language variation and change. Likewise, European conference series have provided opportunities for scholars working on this paradigm in Europe (e.g., ICLaVE). We believe that it is now time to develop a related conference series focused on the Asia-Pacific region. After all, the Asia- Pacific region includes some of the world's most sociolinguistically complex societies, many of which are being studied by local and international sociolinguists. We therefore invite you to join us in inaugurating a new regional conference, NWAV ASIA-PACIFIC, to serve as an "Asian branch" of NWAV.
The first meeting of NWAV ASIA-PACIFIC will be held at the University of Delhi, India, February 23-26, 2011. We are happy to announce that William Labov has kindly agreed to be the keynote speaker. The research that this conference endeavors to bring together will be firmly based on empirical data with an emphasis on quantitative analysis of variation and change. We welcome abstract submissions for 20-minute conference talks on a wide range of topics in language variation and change across the Asia-Pacific region, including speech communities, multilingualism, urbanization and migration, sociophonetics, individual variation and style-shifting in complex speech communities, language contact, variation in minority languages, dialect variation and change, dialect contact, variation in acquisition, language change across the lifespan, perceptual dialectology, and other related topics such as technological resources for sociolinguistic research.
Considering the diverse opportunities and research challenges in the ever-increasing, multilingual spaces of Asia, we believe that such a forum is not only highly relevant but urgently needed. We're taking this first step in the series with the hope that others will join us in helping to make this conference a regular event at other Asian- Pacific locations in the future. We hope to see you in India for this inaugural meeting of NWAV ASIA-PACIFIC!
* One-page abstracts should be submitted online by August 8, 2010 on the conference website: Notifications about acceptance will be sent in early September.
More information here.
The first meeting of NWAV ASIA-PACIFIC will be held at the University of Delhi, India, February 23-26, 2011. We are happy to announce that William Labov has kindly agreed to be the keynote speaker. The research that this conference endeavors to bring together will be firmly based on empirical data with an emphasis on quantitative analysis of variation and change. We welcome abstract submissions for 20-minute conference talks on a wide range of topics in language variation and change across the Asia-Pacific region, including speech communities, multilingualism, urbanization and migration, sociophonetics, individual variation and style-shifting in complex speech communities, language contact, variation in minority languages, dialect variation and change, dialect contact, variation in acquisition, language change across the lifespan, perceptual dialectology, and other related topics such as technological resources for sociolinguistic research.
Considering the diverse opportunities and research challenges in the ever-increasing, multilingual spaces of Asia, we believe that such a forum is not only highly relevant but urgently needed. We're taking this first step in the series with the hope that others will join us in helping to make this conference a regular event at other Asian- Pacific locations in the future. We hope to see you in India for this inaugural meeting of NWAV ASIA-PACIFIC!
* One-page abstracts should be submitted online by August 8, 2010 on the conference website: Notifications about acceptance will be sent in early September.
More information here.
