LUCL Newsletter - October 2009

The October LUCL newsletter will give you a brief overview of current affairs. If you would like to include some issue in the next newsletter, please let the LUCL office know.

Management Team

Gea will be away from 19 to 23 October. The Office will have restricted opening hours during this week - for details see website.


Councils and Committees

Advisory Council
The Advisory Council met on Thursday, 17 September. LUCL finances were discussed and it was agreed that the Advisory Council will send a letter to the Faculty Board. The main issues are: the percentage that will be passed on to the Institutes as an incentive for PhD defences and NWO/EU projects, and the earmarking of a possible deficit or surplus of the budget 2009. The next meeting is scheduled for 13 November, during which the Faculty Board will have its bi-annual meeting with the Adviesraad.

Institute Council
The Institute Council met on Thursday, 24 September 2009. Gabriel Hoezen gave a presentation on the ATC (Academisch Talencentrum), and the role it can play within LUCL. After that Maarten Mous gave a presentation on LUCL, followed by a lively discussion on how LUCL could improve its PhD programme and on the BA and MA programmes in general.   The next meeting of the Insitute Council will be on Friday 18 December: Christmas drinks!

PhD Defences

28 October: Assimakis Tseronis, 'Qualifying Standpoints' (please note: 11.15am)
Promotores: Ton van Haaften en prof.dr. Van Eemeren (UvA)

3 November: Marius Doornenbal, 'A grammar of Bantawa: Grammar, paradigm tables, glossary and texts of a Rai language of Eastern Nepal'
Promotor: Geert Booij / Co-promotor: Crit Cremers

24 November: Tolemariam Fufa, 'A Typology of Verbal Derivation in Ethiopian Afro-Asiatic Languages'
Promotor: Maarten Mous 

10 December: Kristina Riedel, 'The syntax of object marking in Sambaa: A comparative Bantu perspective'
Promotores: Lisa Cheng and Thilo Schadeberg  

17 December: Zaira Khalilova, 'A grammar of Khwarshi'
Promotores: Frits Kortlandt and Bernard Comrie (Max Planck, Leipzig)

Personnel

We would like to welcome:

Jessie Nixon - started on 1 October as PhD student on the ERC-project of Yiya Chen. Jessie's office is temporarily in room 1166-205b.
Roberta Tedeschi - started on 1 October as Docent at the Italian department. She has worked here at the beginning of the year as well, so she's not entirely new to our Institute.
Gijsbert Rutten  - started on 1 October as a Postdoc researcher on the NWO project of Marijke van der Wal: 'Letters as Loot', Gijsbert is also familiar with LUCL, as he was a postdoc here in 2007-2008.
Tyler Peterson - starting on 15 October as a Postdoc researcher on the NWO Nature of Evidentiality project of Willem Adelaar and Johan Rooryck. Tyler's office will be 1166-205a.

The following PhD students have found a new position:

Hilke Reckman - will start her Rubicon project 'Learning language in a virtual scenario: A grounded approach in teaching natural language to computers'. She will do her research at MIT media lab, with the research group 'Cognitive Machines' of Deb Roy.
Annemie Verbist becomes 'Docimoloog' at the Opleidingsinstituut Federale Overheid in Brussels.

We wish all of you a lot of success in your new position!

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'Buitenpromovendi'
The following external PhD students have been admitted to the Institute by the LUCL selection committee:
LydiaHoeft - promotor: Maarten Mous, supervisor: Azeb Amha Research subject: Discourse features of Koorete, Ethiopia
Nasir Syed - promotor: Marc van Oostendorp Research subject: Phonology on the Saraiki Language of Central Pakistan Nasir will come to Leiden to do his research at our Institute.
Eyasu Tamene - promotor: Maarten Mous, supervisor: Victoria Nyst Research subject: Ethiopian Sign Language

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Guests
Dr. Ula Remmer will be here from October to December, as a guest of Sasha Lubotsky. Ula is from University of Zürich.
Gabriela Brozba will be a visiting PhD student from 19 October to June next year, to work under the supervision of Colin Ewen (subject of her research: Phonology of Englishes)

R&O Update

Once more we would like to remind you that ROG meetings with all staff should be held once a year. LUCL endorses this viewpoint and would really encourage that all staff has had a ROG meeting by the end of the year. ROG reports should be sent to Maarten Mous for signature.

Requests for appointments

Requests for appointments (including student assistants) should be sent to Gea Hakker at least one month before the starting date of the appointment. This is the minimum period for collecting all the documents and preparing the contract. If not, the date of appointment will be postponed.

Multifunctionals

Within a couple of weeks it will be possible to print, copy and make scans on the multifunctionals (copy machines). All members of staff will get a personal card. More information about the procedure will follow by email.

Grants

Deadlines NWO grants
Please note the following LUCL deadlines for grant proposals:
19 October: first draft proposal VENI to LUCL
9 November: first draft proposal VIDI to LUCL

Huygens grants
A meeting on the Huygens Talent Programme will take place on 5 November in Utrecht. For more information, see website, or contact Cindy Schotte, scholarship coordinator at the International Office (c.schotte@sea.leidenuniv.nl)

Lectures and Conferences

9 October: Elisabeth de Boer on 'What the split of the split of the Tôkyô type tone system into a number of sub-types can tell us about the tone system of proto-Japanese'.
14 October: Workshop 'Letters as Loot'
30 October: first LUCL Colloquium: lectures by Marian Klamer and Marion Elenbaas
3 November: prof. B. Bickel 'Linguistic universals and hidden diversity'
18 December: prof. B. Comrie on the typology of numerals  

For more info on time and lcoation see also 'this month at LUCL'. 

LUCL Office
Last Modified: 02-09-2010