Local Languages, Third Spaces, and other High-Resource Scenarios

Abstract

How can language technology address the diverse situations of the world's languages? In one view, languages exist on a resource continuum and the challenge is to scale existing solutions, bringing under-resourced languages into the high-resource world. In another view, presented here, the world's language ecology includes standardised languages, local languages, and contact languages. These are often subsumed under the label of 'under-resourced languages' even though they have distinct functions and prospects. I explore this position and propose some ecologically-aware language technology agendas.

Topics & Concepts