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LANGUAGE J���N�. 2004 10 RCHIVES A V��S�� 1, 2007 ��. 3 NEWSLETTER I� T��� N�����: Editorial Archiving Video – A Linguist’s View (A Reply to David Nathan) 2 Patrick McConvell Video – A Technologist’s View (A Reply to David Nathan) 3 Peter Wi�enburg Technical Section Review: Audio Recorders Zoom H4 and Korg MR-1 5 Paul Trilsbeek, Gerd Klaas Review: Audio Recorder iRiver H320 8 Bernard Howard News in Brief The CLARIN Research Infrastructure Initiative 9 Peter Wi�enburg . Mail: [email protected]. ISSN: 1573-4315. Announcements Anniversary Conference at SOAS 10 Expressions of Interest: So�ware Development at SOAS 10 HRELP Language Documentation Funding Available 10 h�p://www.mpi.nl/LAN/ Language Archives Newsle�er. Web: Newsle�er. Language Archives Uneson. Uneson. Layout: Marcus Marcus Editors: David Nathan, Paul Trilsbeek, Language Archives Newsle�er No. 10, Sep 2007 Editorial Archiving This issue captures a zeitgeist in the relationship Video – A Linguist’s View between language documentation and technology. Five (A Reply to David Nathan) articles deal with two related topics in very different ways. Three equipment reviews illustrate the amazing rate at which improved audio recorders are becoming Patrick McConvell available to linguists, and imply that the way in which Australian Institute of Aboriginal linguists use these devices is relatively unproblematic. and Torres Strait Islander Studies On the other hand, two articles provoked by Nathan’s article in the last issue argue that the documenter’s video camera is a methodology rather than just a In my 2003 paper Multilingual, multiperson, multimedia: device. Regardless of whether we fully understand Linking audio-visual to text material in language how the various forms of putative information in video documentation ([1], Section 4), I argued that using and recordings are to be represented, theorised, validated archiving video is the best way of doing language or utilised, more and more field linguists will be documentation. Digital video recording is easy and using them due to technological advances that make cheap; it includes good audio; and there are a number handling of video much easier, and due to programs of good annotation tools. More and more people are such as DoBeS that actively promote the use of video for using video all the time. The paper noted these points language documentation. in favour of video: The debate about the role of video is positive because it can never be a bad thing to ask practitioners to explain what they are doing and why; whether the debate 1. it identifies speakers in multiperson broadens into examining how language endangerment conversation; becomes a rationale for all manner of technological 2. it captures the environment and objects in it; applications remains to be seen. 3. it renders paralinguistic expressions; 4. it records sign language; David Nathan, Paul Trilsbeek, Marcus Uneson 5. it shows signs that alter propositional meaning; 6. it shows gesture elucidating force; 7. it is preferred by the community as a record; 8. it costs less and less to store as technology improves. Nathan concedes that the usefulness of video for point 4 (sign language), along with music and dance, is not disputed. He claims that points 2 (display of relationship to environment and objects) and 3 (paralinguistics) can be of value, but of limited value because not everything of relevance can be ‘in frame’. This is of course true, just as not every relevant sound is picked up by an audio recorder. O�en though, the relevant objects are brought into frame, such as when people demonstrate a technique or paint a picture while Suggestions and contributions welcomed at: they talk, or when a place is visited so that a person can [email protected] comment on the visual field right there. The notion that using a video camera will ‘tempt’ fieldworkers not to record deeper social relationships seems to undervalue Next deadline for copy: their capabilities and training. Nov 1, 2007 Point 1 (identifying speakers) is not mentioned by Nathan but it is an extremely important practical factor. Video is almost essential for recording multi-person conversation. When listening to audio recordings of 2 Language Archives Newsle�er No. 10, Sep 2007 such conversations, with their overlaps, disfluencies seem to be adequate for the average documentation and background noise, it is o�en extremely hard (even video, and I cannot see how these formats conflict with for the original participants) to work out who was preservation goals. speaking, or who was being addressed. This problem Nathan’s suggestion about video training is of largely evaporates with use of video. course welcome. Such training should be aimed at The history of linguistic fieldwork is dominated by true documentation video, not making short films or monologue – story narration and one-to-one structured documentaries except as by-products. It should also interview and elicitation. This is perhaps why we include basic editing to remove unusable footage, and imagine that distinguishing several voices is not a training in providing metadata, which will reduce the problem. Yet even in these genres a multiperson aspect burden on archive technical staff, whose labour may be applies – narration as co-narration; or elicitation from the major cost threatening to blow out the budgets of a group of people (o�en valuable when people offer video-rich archives. different answers or argue!). These genres offer only the I would conclude that Nathan’s fears about problems tip of the iceberg when it comes to the ways of talking with use of video for fieldwork are largely unfounded. It in a community. Conversation is the more common would be a great shame if we retreated from the benefits form, and it o�en varies considerably from the speech of current and evolving video technology. Rather than styles used in story telling and interview. Conversation a vision of archives stuffed with “barely watchable” provides the basic data for many researchers such as video, I prefer to entertain an optimistic view of a conversation analysts, linguistic anthropologists and resource in the future which will have a rich record child language acquisition researchers. Some of these including visual information, to which researchers and have long embraced the use of video (e.g. see the makers of educational and community material can CHILDES database [2]). return again and again for new ‘takes’ on the data. Nathan is quite right in saying that films and videos are made in all kinds of ways for different Links purposes. Perhaps the dominant one is ‘telling a [1]: h�p://hdl.handle.net/2123/1429 story’ in a documentary or ethnographic film, which is quite different from the kind of record we need for [2]: h�p://talkbank.org/data/ documentation. I had the privilege of doing a short [3]: h�p://www.linguistics.unimelb.edu.au/research/projects/ course in video with two great ethnographic film- ACLA/ makers, David and Judith McDougall, who introduced me to the debate between Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson 70 years ago, where Mead took the position that film could be used to ‘record events’, and Bateson that all filming was subjective, selective and partial. The truth is somewhere in between, and the key is for would-be language documenters to understand that a fuller record Video – A Technologist’s View is possible, from which they can subjectively select and (A Reply to David Nathan) edit elements for various purposes. This is what we have been doing in the ACLA project ([3]); in collaboration with community members, fieldwork footage is edited Peter Wi�enburg together with framing material to make DVDs of project MPI for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen news to be circulated in the communities. I cannot understand Nathan’s comments about video equipment being intrusive. Basic cameras are now In LAN 9, David Nathan wrote a very interesting article very small, quite similar in size to the smallest audio- about the use of video for language documentation recorders, and not threatening to people in most places purposes. This article is meant as a response coloured by in the world, who are usually familiar with similar a slightly technologically biased view and by the view technology. Bulky equipment which may be used by the DoBeS programme chose a�er intensive discussions professionals (but which is becoming increasingly less during its pilot phase in 2000 and 2001. While there are bulky) is rarely necessary for language documentation many thoughts in Nathan’s article that I certainly share, fieldwork. there are also some arguments – in particular in his The other set of reasons advanced by Nathan for summarising paragraph – that I do not agree with. reconsidering use of video has to do with the economics of digital archives. I am no expert here, but in terms of storage there seem to be many people who believe that Documentation methodology storage costs will continue to decrease as technologies Nathan argues that “video can only complement improve. The spectre of wanting to or having to use documentation’s methodology”. This is true, but why high quality media standards in archives is not really stress this? This is true for all primary sources that applicable in the majority of cases, as MPEG2 or MPEG4 are added to enrich a documentation, if you take the 3 Language Archives Newsle�er No. 10, Sep 2007 traditional linguists’ view. According to this view verbal channels. In many cultures the situation a description of the structure of a language is the may be completely different, e.g. gestures may ultimate goal in describing a language. The basis for have an important role in disambiguating the the underlying analysis work is the primary material.