Following ALT tradition, the ALT VI meeting in Padang will begin with a workshop on local languages, which, in the present case, will be taken to mean the languages of Sumatra.

In addition, a couple of talks will be concerned with typologically interesting non-Austronesian languages adjacent to Sumatra, in peninsular Malaysia and the Andaman Islands.

The workshop will take place on the afternoon of Thursday 21 July and the morning of Friday 22 July. Thursday afternoon will consist of general introductory overview talks, while Friday morning will feature more specific talks on particular linguistic topics.

The programme for the workshop is largely by invitation; however, a few slots remain open for submitted abstracts.

Invited speakers who have confirmed their participation in the workshop:
Anvita Abbi, Karl Anderbeck, Lea Brown, Niclas Burenhult, Peter Cole, Gabriella Hermon, Uli Kozok, Uri Tadmor.

Persons wishing to present a paper at the workshop are invited to submit an abstract to David Gil, to reach him before 1 January 2005. Submissions should be electronic, preferably in pdf format, and of approximately one page in length.

Papers at the workshop should be concerned with one or more of the languages of Sumatra. (For the purposes of the workshop, Sumatra is understood to include also offshore islands such as Nias, Mentawai and Enggano to the west, and the Riau archipelago to the east.) Papers should be of general interest for linguists who are not specialists in the region, and should be presented in English.

Participants presenting a paper at the Workshop on the Languages of Sumatra may also submit a (different) paper for presentation at the general ALT VI meeting.

Inquiries
David Gil
gil@eva.mpg.de
+49-341-3550321
+62-21-5741842