Language on the Move

What happened when English-speaking missionaries came into contact with multilingual Indigenous Australians?
I had this fascinating conversation with @laurarad.bsky.social on the 1st @languageonthemove.bsky.social podcast of 2026 on @newbooksnetwork.bsky.social!

Found in Translation In this episode of Language on the Move Podcast, Tazin Abdullah talks to Dr. Laura Rademaker (Australian National University), the author of Found in Translation: Many Meanings on a North Australia…

Language teaching and translation: competitions over who can name, own, and control

In 1st Language-on-the-Move podcast @newbooksnetwork.bsky.social for 2026, @tazinabdullah.bsky.social speaks with Laura Rademaker about the Christian mission in North Australia
languageonthemove.com/found-in-tra...

A thoughtful thread update from my @languageonthemove.bsky.social colleague

Thank you, @schenior.bsky.social for these chronicles! 🙏

Digital mutual aid among migrants, in the shadow of ChatGPT For nearly four years now, I’ve been heavily involved in online (Telegram-based) communities for Ukrainian forced migrants in Austria. Such communities sprang up all across Europe after Russia’s fu…

More of my frustrated thoughts in this @languageonthemove.bsky.social post here: languageonthemove.com/digital-mutu...

18/22

🇺🇦🇦🇹

Four years of war, good god. So I continue my depressing tradition of going through THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY of the situation for Ukrainians in Austria.

You can compare directly with last year's thread.

🧵

1/22
bsky.app/profile/sche...

International Mother Language Day on a background illustration of arms holding up speech bubbles. 40% off with code IML40. Valid until 25/02/2026.

This International Mother Language Day we're offering a 40% discount on all our books for a limited time only!

Just use code IML40 at the checkout on our website to get 40% off your order 📚️

#IMLD2026 #IMLD #langchat

"To junior scholars, this volume opens paths into research by presenting the value and importance of a long-term, coherent research agenda."

Thanks to @jupurkarthofer.bsky.social & @languageinsociety.bsky.social for new review of "Life in a New Language" (@academic.oup.com)
doi.org/10.1017/S004...

People who do not eat chips could be ‘left behind’, says Frito-Lay’s CEO

The left tried for decades to pass green energy subsidies, passed them, the subsidies worked, and now literally the entire planet's electricity grid is going to convert to solar+battery. It just doesn't feel like "tech" because it mostly produces kinda boring blue collar jobs instead of billionaires

Andrea Pešková (@freieuniversitaet.bsky.social) on accents as "not errors but expressions of our identity, multilingual experience and authenticity."

"In other words — and this is the rock-solid principle on which the whole of the [Sirius Cybernetics] Corporation's Galaxywide success is founded — their fundamental design flaws are completely hidden by their superficial design flaws."

I have a foreign accent in Italian and it's part of my identity. What I do wish I could get rid of is the tendency to make slight grammatical errors - and not because I don't know they're errors, I hear them the second I say them. It's depressing to know I'll always do that in my everyday language

How I worked as a foreign accent coach Human voice – between sound and identity I have always been fascinated by the human voice. When you speak on the phone with a stranger, it can reveal so much about them. You can often tell whether …

For most second language speakers, their foreign accent is a source of anxiety. Some turn to accent modification training.

In the latest Language-on-the-Move post, Andrea Pešková provides a fascinating glimpse into the world of accent coaching.

languageonthemove.com/how-i-worked...

Cartoon. Person says to other person „We invented a robot that answers questions.“, adding, „we just have to feed it 10 baby giraffes a day“. The other person asks „But it answers the questions correctly?“ Person responds „Oh my goodness, no. No no no no no.“ By Aram J. French Appropriated due to missing alt text

An excellent @languageonthemove.bsky.social post by Jenia Yudytska about how ChatGPT can actually weaken Ukrainian migrant mutual aid efforts.

🇺🇦🇦🇹 Telegram a little differently than my usual:

About the Telegram groups themselves, the language and technology resources we all use, and our new unwelcome "member" - ChatGPT.

This is the most personal academic thing I've ever written. ♥️

Digital mutual aid among migrants, in the shadow of ChatGPT For nearly four years now, I’ve been heavily involved in online (Telegram-based) communities for Ukrainian forced migrants in Austria. Such communities sprang up all across Europe after Russia’s fu…

After our end-of-year publishing break, Language on the Move is back with an important post about how ChatGPT can actually weaken migrant mutual aid efforts, by @schenior.bsky.social

Another example where GenAI is useful in theory but damaging in reality

languageonthemove.com/digital-mutu...

Grants 2026 LingComm Grants – Small Grants for Communicating Linguistics to Wider Audiences We want to see more linguistics in the world!  The 2026 LingComm Grants are $300 (USD) to support lin…

Are you an early career researcher interested in communicating linguistics to broader audiences?

Consider applying for a @lingcomm.org grant!
Deadline April 30, via @lingthusiasm.com

lingcomm.org/grants/

Life in a new language Published in International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism (Ahead of Print, 2026)

"Language educators are reminded not to separate language proficiency from the contexts in which language is used and the communicative purposes it serves."

New review of "Life in a New Language" (@academic.oup.com)

www.tandfonline.com/eprint/A7VKQ...

About the PhD: Audits and evaluation of AI systems — and the broader context that AI systems operate in — have become central to conceptualising, quantifying, measuring and understanding the operations, failures, limitations, underlying assumptions, and downstream societal implications of AI systems. Existing AI audit and evaluation efforts are fractured, done in a siloed and ad-hoc manner, and with little deliberation and reflection around conceptual rigour and methodological validity. This PhD is for a candidate that is passionate about exploring what a conceptually cogent, methodologically sound, and well-founded AI evaluation and safety research might look like. This requires grappling with questions such as: What does it mean to represent “ground truth” in proxies, synthetic data, or computational simulation? How do we reliably measure abstract and complex phenomena? What are the epistemological or methodological implications of quantification and measurement approaches we choose to employ? Particularly, what underlying presuppositions, values, or perspectives do they entail? How do we ensure the lived experiences of impacted communities play a critical role in the development and justification of measurement metrics and proxies? Through exploration of these questions, the candidate is expected to engage with core concepts in the philosophy of science, history of science, Black feminist epistemologies, and similar schools of thought to develop an in-depth understanding of existing practices with the aim of applying it to advance shared standards and best practice in AI evaluation. The candidate is expected to integrate empirical (for example, through analysis or evaluation of existing benchmarks) or practical (for example, by executing evaluation of AI systems) components into the overall work.

are you displeased with today’s AI safety evaluation landscape and curious about what greater conceptual clarity, methodological soundness, and rigour in AI evaluation could look like? if so, consider coming to Dublin to pursue a PhD with me

apply here: aial.ie/hiring/phd-a...

pls repost

‘In the end, you feel blank’: India’s female workers watching hours of abusive content to train AI Women in rural communities describe trauma of moderating violent and pornographic content for global tech companies

When I talk about the ethics of using AI it’s this kind of thing that is on my mind.

Every lesson plan or admin task produced by an LLM is constructed on the back of real emotional harm and exploitation of labour in the global south. /1

www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

all the creators in the world will never fill the hole created by the degradation and loss of media institutions, despite all their problems

2026 New Books Network Listener Survey New Books Network is trying to learn more about our listeners to improve our content. We will only collect your personal contact information if you choose to provide it. Respondents will be entered in...

Support the @newbooksnetwork.bsky.social by filling in their listener survey:
docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

"In every discipline, women, as soon as they die, are usually erased."

Powerful tribute to Deborah Cameron by Teresa Moure
mircouam.com/en/archivos/...

Just finished the
@languageonthemove.bsky.social
podcast- Alexandra Grey speaks with Zozan Balci about Zozan’s new book, Erased Voices and Unspoken Heritage (2025). Having the same name with my late sister, Zozan portrays a wonderful discussion around names among several other issues. Great talk!

Language on the Move Podcast wins Talkley Award 2025 Final piece of good news for the year before we head into a publishing break over January: we’ve just heard that the Language-on-the-Move Podcast has won the 2025 Talkley Award 🙌🙌🏿🙌🏾🙌🏽🙌🏼🙌🏻 Th…

So proud of our @languageonthemove.bsky.social team and our podcast! Thank you to the @auslingsoc.bsky.social Australian Linguistic Society for this meaningful award! www.languageonthemove.com/language-on-...

As a teacher, I believe there is no such thing as a stupid question; as a researcher, I know there are plenty of stupid questions. What you ask and how you ask it makes or breaks the quality of your research.

YouTube video by Andrew Perfors Part 1: How do LLMs work?

I just created a series of seven deep-dive videos about AI, which I've posted to youtube and now here. 😊

Targeted to laypeople, they explore how LLMs work, what they can do, and what impacts they have on learning, well-being, disinformation, the workplace, the economy, and the environment.

So sad to hear about the passing of Deb Cameron!
One of the brightest, most incisive and most fun voices in sociolinguistics.
She will be sadly missed!
If you want to honor her by re-reading some of her work, this old post is still worth a read: www.languageonthemove.com/language-lie...