Welcome to Jane's Honours project 2005 website.
This website will provide you with the latest news and results on my
project.
My project concerns phylogentic modelling of
artificial and European languages. Evolution of languages
happens gradually around us everyday. As modernisation of the
society takes place, new words and new grammatical structures are
created or adapted from other languages into different languages.
The aim of my project is to be able to model this evolution and
describe the relationships between different languages.
I believe that languages, if not well studied and used, could
easily face extinction. Many linguists predict that at least half
of the world's 6,000 or so languages will be extinct by the year
2050 and most of these endangered languages consist of languages
used by the minority communities. According to data collected by
the Australian Bureau of Statistics, there exist more than 60
indigenous languages that are spoken by Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander Australians. However, only 12% of all
Indigenous Australians and less than 1% of the total Australian
population are able to speak at least one of these Indigenous
Languages.
Hence, my project is dedicated to provide a means
of preserving endangered languages by studying them, and
documenting my findings.
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