We are delighted to announce the release of the language-learning website Intermediate Urdu at http://urdu.wustl.edu/
Hosted by Washington University in St. Louis and developed with a grant from the South Asia Language Resource Center at the University of Chicago, Intermediate Urdu comprises sixteen interactive reading passages with corresponding audio and English summaries, dynamic online quizzes, and thirteen video interviews of Urdu scholars. All content is directed towards students at the intermediate level and preparing them for advanced level proficiency.
The site is the first to fully utilize Nastaliq as a web-based font so that Nastaliq is natively displayed in the site without requiring the user to download an appropriate font.
For the site's font functionality to work properly across all operating systems, users are required to use the most recent version of the Firefox browser (4.-).
We are eager for your feedback, so please contact Dr. Mohammad Warsi at warsimj@gmail.com or Samuel Wright at wright.samuel@gmail.com with any comments.
We are delighted to announce that 'Nepali: A Beginner's Primer, with Conversational Dialogues and Grammar' is now online: http://lrc.cornell.edu/nepali/
Hosted by Cornell University's Language Resource Centre, and developed with a grant from the South Asia Language Resource Center at the University of Chicago, the course comprises 16 lessons with dialogues, associated audio and video content, an interactive bilingual glossary (with audio pronunciation clips) and additional supplementary materials.
The core content of this beginner's course draws on the instructional material devised by Shambhu and Banu Oja at Cornell University, used for teaching over the last 25 years.
No registration is required to use the site. The materials are all offered for free online.
Best Wishes,
Kathryn March, Shambhu Oja and Mark Turin
A. Sean Pue and Vishwajeet Singh at Michigan State University have created a multifaceted web site (http://hindiurdu.net) for the blended teaching of Hindi-Urdu. This site will provide on-line elements for both students and teachers that address significant gaps in current Hindi-Urdu materials.
This includes over twenty proficiency-oriented videos aimed at various language levels that were filmed at and around Michigan State University in summer 2010. These have captions, as well as tags for level, using ACTFL, ILR, and the more common "basic, intermediate, advanced" scale. There is also an online devanagari writing guide, which redraw handwriting samples and allow students to trace and write using their mouse, stylus, or finger on a tablet device. Efforts have been to make these resources function on older computers as well as latest mobile devices, so they will also work on the iPad and iPhone by using HTML5, the newly emerging web standard. This website was supported by a pedagogical materials grant from the South Asia Language Resource Center for which Dr. Pue was the principal investigator along with Vishwajeet Singh (now at the University of Oregon).
Elizabeth will be assuming Antoinette's role in the department, of whom many of you knew well. Please feel free to contact Elizabeth at any time with your questions or concerns just as you did with Antoinette. In addition to her duties at the center, Elizabeth is a full-time student in the MA arts journalism program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Elizabeth can be reached at 773-834-3399 or at ecronin@uchicago.edu
SALRC has recently updated its Recommended Pedagogy Programs webpage. View the latest information at the page here. Check back for continual updates and e-mail salrc @uchicago.edu with any programs you suggest be added to the list.
Be sure to visit the SALRC Blog. This web resource is a medium for releasing announcements and information relevant to teaching and research on South Asian languages. The blog contains current postings in the following categories and is updated daily: Calls for Papers,Conferences, Job Listings, Language Study Programs, and Travel Grants. The blog also contains an RSS feed which can be subscribed to as a supplement to our existing listservs.
Our Awards page containing information on grants for materials development given out by SALRC in the last four years is now a database searchable by language.
As a resource for language teaching faculty, students, and SALRC-affiliated software developers, the SALRC is assembling a collection of fonts that we believe are best suited for displaying South Asian languages on the computer screen. This site provides practical information about these fonts, including text samples, how and where to get them, and how to install and use them on your computer.