SIGUL June 2025

sigul@list.elra.info

2 participants
3 discussions

Second call for papers: Special issue on Machine Translation for Low-Resource Languages@Language Resources and Evaluation Journal
by Atul K. Ojha 16 Jun '25

16 Jun '25

Apologies for cross-posting. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- *CALL FOR PAPERS: Language Resources and Evaluation Journal- Special Issue on Machine Translation for Low-Resource Languages* https://link.springer.com/collections/gbdgacbgbg *Guest Editors:* - Atul Kr. Ojha (Insight Research Ireland Centre for Data Analytics, DSI, University of Galway, Ireland) - Chao-Hong Liu (Industrial Technology Research Institute, Potamu Research Ltd.) - Ekaterina Vylomova (University of Melbourne, Australia) - Flammie Pirinen (UiT The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø) - Jonathan Washington (Swarthmore College, USA) - Nathaniel Oco (De La Salle University, Philippines) - Xiaobing Zhao (Minzu University of China) Machine translation (MT) technologies have been improved significantly in the last decade using neural MT (NMT) approaches. However, most of these methods rely on the availability of large parallel data for training the MT systems, resources which are not available for the majority of language pairs. Hence, current technologies often fall short in their ability to be applied to low-resource languages. Developing MT technologies using relatively small corpora still presents a major challenge for the MT community. In addition, many methods for developing MT systems still rely on several natural language processing (NLP) tools to pre-process texts in source languages and post-process MT outputs in target languages. The performance of these tools often has a great impact on the quality of the resulting translation. The availability of MT technologies and NLP tools can facilitate equal access to information for the speakers of a language and determine on which side of the digital divide they will end up. The lack of these technologies for many of the world's languages provides opportunities both for the field to grow and for making tools available for speakers of low-resource languages. In the past few years, several workshops and evaluations have been organized to promote research on low-resource languages. NIST has been conducting Low Resource Human Language Technology evaluations (LoReHLT) annually from 2016 to 2019. In LoReHLT evaluations, there is no training data in the evaluation language. Participants receive training data in related languages but need to bootstrap systems in the surprise evaluation language at the start of the evaluation. Methods for this include pivoting approaches and taking advantage of linguistic universals. The evaluations are supported by DARPA's Low Resource Languages for Emergent Incidents (LORELEI) program, which seeks to advance technologies that are less dependent on large data resources and that can be quickly pivoted to new languages within a very short amount of time so that information from any language can be extracted in a timely manner to provide situation awareness to emergent incidents. There are also the Workshop on Technologies for MT of Low-Resource Languages (LoResMT), Special Interest Group on Under-resourced Languages (SIGUL), Workshop on Resources and Technologies for Indigenous, Endangered and Lesser-resourced Languages in Eurasia (EURALI), the Workshop on Deep Learning Approaches for Low-Resource Natural Language Processing (DeepLo). AfricaNLP, TurkLang, Conference on Machine Translation (WMT), and International Conference on Spoken Language Translation (IWSLT) workshop, which provide a venue for sharing research and working on research and development in this field. This topical collection solicits original research papers on MT systems/methods and related NLP tools for low-resource languages in general. LoReHLT, LORELEI, LoResMT, SIGUL, EURALI, DeepLo, WMT, and IWSLT participants are very welcome to submit their work to the special issue. Summary papers on MT research for specific low-resource languages, as well as extended versions (>40% difference) of published papers from relevant conferences/workshops, are also welcome. Topics of the special issue include, but are not limited to: * Research and review papers on MT systems/methods for low-resource languages * Research and review papers on pre-processing and/or post-processing NLP tools for MT * Word tokenizers/de-tokenizers for low-resource languages * Word/morpheme segmenters for low-resource languages * Use of morphological analyzers and/or morpheme segmenters in MT * Multilingual/cross-lingual NLP tools for MT * Review of available corpora of low-resource languages for MT * Pivot MT for low-resource languages * Zero-shot MT for low-resource languages * Fast building of MT systems for low-resource languages * Re-usability of existing MT systems and/or NLP tools for low-resource languages * Machine translation for language preservation * Techniques that work across many languages and modalities * Techniques that are less dependent on large data resources * Use of language-universal resources * Bootstrap-trained resources for the short development cycle * Entity, relation- and event-extraction * Sentiment detection in MT * MT Summarisation * Processing diverse languages, genres (news, social media, etc.) and modalities (text, speech, video, etc.) * Speech Translation for low-resource languages * Multimodal MT for low-resource languages * MT models using LLMs for low-resource languages * Generative AI models for low-resource languages * Evaluation metrics and datasets for low-resource languages For further information on this initiative, please refer to https://link.springer.com/collections/gbdgacbgbg *IMPORTANT DATES* *August 26, 2025: Paper submission deadlineDecember 05, 2025: Revised papers dueMarch 2026: Publication* * SUBMISSION GUIDELINES* Authors should follow the "Instructions for Authors <https://link.springer.com/journal/10579/submission-guidelines> ( https://link.springer.com/journal/10579/submission-guidelines or Overleaf <https://link.springer.com/journal/10579/updates/17234296>)" on the LRE journal website <https://link.springer.com/journal/10579>. Thanks,

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Third call for papers Sixth Workshop on Resources for African Indigenous Language (RAIL)
by Menno Van Zaanen 12 Jun '25

12 Jun '25

Third call for papers Sixth Workshop on Resources for African Indigenous Language (RAIL) Co-located with DHASA 2025 https://sadilar.org/rail-2025/ RAIL Workshop date: 10 November 2025 DHASA Conference dates: 10-14 November 2025 Venue: CSIR International Convention Centre. The sixth RAIL workshop website: https://sadilar.org/rail-2025/ DHASA website: https://digitalhumanities.org.za/ The sixth Resources for African Indigenous Languages (RAIL) workshop will be co-located with the Digital Humanities Association of Southern Africa (DHASA) 2025 conference at the CSIR International Convention Centre in Pretoria, South Africa, on 10 November 2025. The RAIL workshop is an interdisciplinary platform for researchers working on African indigenous languages resources such as natural languages processing (NLP) tools, Human Language Technologies (HLT), data collections, and annotations. This workshop aims to foster a scientific community of practice that focuses on computational linguistic tools and data that are designed for or applied to the indigenous languages of Africa. Many African languages are under-resourced while only a few are considered to be somewhat better resourced. These languages often share interesting properties such as writing systems, making them different from most high-resourced languages. From a computational perspective, these languages lack enough corpora to undertake high level development of NLP and HLT tools, which in turn impedes the development of African languages in these areas. During previous workshops, it was noted that the problems and solutions presented were not only applicable to African languages but were also relevant to many other low-resource languages across the world. Because these languages share similar challenges, this workshop provides researchers with opportunities to work collaboratively on issues of language resource development and learn from each other. The RAIL workshop has several aims. First, the workshop brings together researchers who work on African indigenous languages, forming a community of practice for people working on indigenous languages. Second, the workshop aims to reveal currently unknown or unpublished existing resources (corpora, NLP tools, and applications), resulting in a better overview of the current state-of-the-art, and also allows for discussions on novel, desired resources for future research in this area. Third, it enhances sharing of knowledge on the development of low-resource languages. Finally, it enables discussions on how to improve the quality as well as availability of the resources. The workshop has “Language resources in the age of large language models” as its theme, but submissions on any topic related to properties of African indigenous languages (including related non- African languages) may be accepted. Suggested topics include (but are not limited to) the following: * Digital representations of linguistic structures * Descriptions of corpora or other data sets of African indigenous languages * Building resources for (under-resourced) African indigenous languages * Developing and using African indigenous languages in the digital age * Effectiveness of digital technologies for the development of African indigenous languages * Revealing unknown or unpublished existing resources for African indigenous languages * Developing desired resources for African indigenous languages * Improving quality, availability and accessibility of African indigenous language resources Submission requirements: We invite papers on original, unpublished work related to the topics of the workshop. Submissions, presenting completed work, may consist of up to eight (8) pages of content plus additional pages of references. The final camera-ready version of accepted long papers are allowed one additional page of content (up to 9 pages) so that reviewers’ feedback can be incorporated. Papers should be formatted according to the DHASA style sheet which is provided on the Journal of the Digital Humanities Association of Southern Africa website (https://upjournals.up.ac.za/index.php/dhasa/about). Reviewing is double-blind, so make sure to anonymise your submission (e.g., do not provide author names, affiliations, project names, etc.) Limit the amount of self citations (anonymised citations should not be used). The RAIL workshop follows the DHASA submission requirements. Please submit papers in PDF format (the submission link will be available soon). Accepted papers will be published in proceedings linked to the DHASA conference. Important dates: Submission deadline: 14 July 2025 Date of notification: 16 September 2025 Camera ready copy deadline: 24 October 2025 Workshop: 10 November 2025 DHASA conference: 10 November 2025-14 November 2025 Organising Committee Rooweither Mabuya, South African Centre for Digital Language Resources (SADiLaR), South Africa Muzi Matfunjwa, South African Centre for Digital Language Resources (SADiLaR), South Africa Mmasibidi Setaka, South African Centre for Digital Language Resources (SADiLaR), South Africa Menno van Zaanen, South African Centre for Digital Language Resources (SADiLaR), South Africa -- Prof Menno van Zaanen menno.vanzaanen(a)nwu.ac.za Professor in Digital Humanities South African Centre for Digital Language Resources https://www.sadilar.org ________________________________ NWU PRIVACY STATEMENT: http://www.nwu.ac.za/it/gov-man/disclaimer.html DISCLAIMER: This e-mail message and attachments thereto are intended solely for the recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorised review, use, disclosure, or distribution is prohibited. If you have received the e-mail by mistake, please contact the sender or reply e-mail and delete the e-mail and its attachments (where appropriate) from your system. ________________________________

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Third call for papers DHASA Conference 2025
by Menno Van Zaanen 12 Jun '25

12 Jun '25

Third call for papers DHASA Conference 2025 https://dh2025.digitalhumanities.org.za Theme: The role of humanities in digital humanities and artificial intelligence The Digital Humanities Association of Southern Africa (DHASA) is pleased to announce its fifth conference, focusing on the theme The role of humanities in digital humanities and artificial intelligence. In a region where the field of Digital Humanities is still relatively underdeveloped, this conference aims to address this gap and foster growth and collaboration in the field. The conference offers an opportunity for researchers interested in showcasing their work in the broad field of Digital Humanities to come together. By doing so, the conference provides a comprehensive overview of the current state-of- the-art in Digital Humanities, particularly within the Southern Africa region. As such, we welcome submissions related to Digital Humanities research conducted by individuals from Southern Africa or research focused on the geographical area of Southern Africa in the broad sense. Furthermore, the conference serves as a platform for information sharing and networking among researchers passionate about Digital Humanities. By bringing together experts working on Digital Humanities in Southern Africa or with a focus on Southern Africa, we aim to promote collaboration and facilitate further research in this dynamic field. In addition to the main conference, affiliated workshops and tutorials will be organised, providing researchers with valuable insights into novel technologies and tools. These supplementary events are designed for researchers interested in specific aspects of Digital Humanities or seeking practical information to enter or advance their knowledge in the field. The DHASA conference welcomes interdisciplinary contributions from researchers in various domains of Digital Humanities, including, but not limited to, language, literature, visual art, performance and theatre studies, media studies, music, history, sociology, psychology, language technologies, library studies, philosophy, methodologies, software and computation, AI, and more. Our goal is to cultivate an inclusive scientific community of practice within Digital Humanities. Suggested topics include the following: * The role of AI in digital humanities, the role of Digital Humanities in shaping AI, and the broader role of the humanities in both AI and DH projects; * Digital archives and the preservation of marginalised voices; * Intersectionality and the digital humanities: exploring the intersections of race, gender, sexuality, culture, and class in digital research and activism; * Activism and social change through digital media: how digital humanities tools and methodologies can be used to promote inclusion; * Engaging marginalised communities in the creation and use of digital tools, resources, and AI; * Exploring the role of digital humanities in decolonising knowledge and promoting indigenous perspectives; * The ethics of data collection and analysis in digital humanities and AI research; * The role of digital humanities and AI in promoting inclusive and equitable pedagogy; * Digital humanities and inclusion in the context of African and global perspectives and international collaborations; * Critical approaches to digital humanities and inclusion: examining the limitations and possibilities of digital tools and methodologies in promoting inclusion; and * Collaborative digital humanities projects with non-profit organisations, community groups, and cultural institutions; * Development of digital and AI tools for supporting digital humanities; * Novel utilisation of digital and AI tools for performing digital humanities research; * The role of digital humanities in the classroom: reimagining literacy and AI fluency * Digital humanities data and project management; * The role of librarians in the digital humanities project; * Any other digital humanities-related topic that serves the Southern African community. Submission Guidelines The DHASA conference 2025 asks for three types of submissions: * Long papers: Authors may submit long papers with a maximum of 8 content pages and unlimited pages for references and appendices. The final versions of accepted long papers will be granted an additional page (leading to a total of up to 9 content pages) to incorporate reviewers' comments. Long papers accepted for the conference will be presented in 30-minute time slots (which includes 10 minutes for questions). * Short papers: Authors may submit short papers with a maximum of 5 content pages and unlimited pages for references and appendices. The final versions of accepted short papers will be allowed an extra page (leading to a total of up to 6 content pages) to accommodate reviewers' comments. Short papers accepted for the conference will be presented in 15-minute time slots (which includes 5 minutes for questions). * Executive summaries: Authors can submit an executive summary for work in progress, limited to 1 page. Executive summaries accepted for the conference will be presented as posters during a dedicated poster presentation slot. All accepted long and short paper submissions that are presented at the conference will be published in the JDHASA journal, see https://upjournals.up.ac.za/index.php/dhasa. In addition, the executive summaries for the poster presentations will be published in a book of executive summaries before the conference. We particularly encourage student submissions where the first author is a student. All submissions should adhere to the ACL style guide: https://acl-org.github.io/ACLPUB/formatting.html Submissions should be submitted in PDF format. Submissions that do not adhere to the prescribed style guide will be rejected. Follow this link to go to the submission platform: https://dh2025.digitalhumanities.org.za/submission/ Authors are encouraged to upload their datasets to the SADiLaR repository: https://repo.sadilar.org/. In case of difficulties uploading the datasets, please reach out to Benito Trollip (benito.trollip(a)nwu.ac.za). Important dates Submission deadline: 14 July 2025 Date of notification: 16 September 2025 Camera-ready copy deadline: 24 October 2025 Conference: 10 November 2025 - 14 November 2025 Conference venue: CSIR ICC, Pretoria, South Africa Co-located events Several co-located events are currently being prepared, including workshops and tutorials. These will be updated on the conference website. Organising Committee Aby Louw, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research Andiswa Bukula, South African Centre for Digital Language Resources Avi Moodley, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research Franco Mak, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research Franziska Pannach, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen Ilana Wilken, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research Johannes Sibeko, Nelson Mandela University Juan Steyn, South African Centre for Digital Language Resources Laurette Marais, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research Marissa Griesel, South African Centre for Digital Language Resources Menno van Zaanen, South African Centre for Digital Language Resources Privolin Naidoo, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research Sthembiso Mkhwanazi, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research -- Prof Menno van Zaanen menno.vanzaanen(a)nwu.ac.za Professor in Digital Humanities South African Centre for Digital Language Resources https://www.sadilar.org ________________________________ NWU PRIVACY STATEMENT: http://www.nwu.ac.za/it/gov-man/disclaimer.html DISCLAIMER: This e-mail message and attachments thereto are intended solely for the recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorised review, use, disclosure, or distribution is prohibited. If you have received the e-mail by mistake, please contact the sender or reply e-mail and delete the e-mail and its attachments (where appropriate) from your system. ________________________________

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SIGUL June 2025