[Air-l] AoIR in Latin-America

[Nathaniel Poor]

I was thinking: "If we spin off the people who don't speak  
English.... who may not even be on the list in the first place...  
then we will have a more restricted view of the Internet..."

pero si, entiendo que es un problema con las idiomas del mundo... y  
ingles... y el internet...
(but yes I understand that it's a problem with languages of the  
world... and English... on the net...)
I also understand there is, currently, no easy answer to the issue of  
"we speak different languages but want to talk to each other"
actually I had my undergrads read... something... from the "ferment  
in the field" edition (1980s?) of the Journal of Comm, that had a  
dialog where Ev Rogers was one of the people, and he, I think it was  
him (apologies if I am wrong), had an interesting point about  
language where he said, for instance, English-language researchers do  
get a lot of material to read, but at the same time a lot of it is  
translated, so, the example he used was the Japanese, the Japanese  
can get most of the English material in translated form, but Japanese  
work is rarely translated into English
now I don't know if that was true then or even true now, but for me  
it was an interesting point about how language issues may not quite  
cut in expected ways

I feel that if we spin off non-English, then as you write there will  
never be any postings on the list in languages other than English!
(but not like I am fluent in anything but English, my Spanish is not  
very good, and honestly I find my near mono-lingualism a problem)
maybe it is chicken and egg...

but, now that I have a better understanding of how it might work I  
think it sounds like a solution worth trying
Sue is going to be a "go-between", and perhaps some others will also  
be on both lists and can cross-post *and* translate
that would be really cool....
so instead of creating different lists that are very separate, there  
can be communication! (my PhD is in Comm)

I am also glad the AIR conference is in different parts of the world,  
although that may only avoid American-centrism, but we are a young  
organization and these things take time (there is always ICA....)


On Mar 19, 2006, at 4:03 PM, geert lovink wrote:

> hi, i was a bit surprised about your remark on the aior as the list  
> and organization is so deeply anglo-centric. there are NEVER any  
> postings on that list in languages other than english. so what does  
> that 'regardless of language' means to you? there are hardly any  
> lists, sites, blog or journals that are poly-lingual. best, geert
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---------------------------------------------
Nathaniel Poor, Ph.D.
www.umich.edu/~natpoor
Visiting Assistant Professor
Communication Studies Dept.
Albion College
http://www.albion.edu/commstudies