Chris White & Yaron Matras

University of Manchester (United Kingdom)

RMS: Latest developments

The RMS (Romani Morpho-Syntax) Database was developed by Viktor Elšík and Yaron Matras at the University of Manchester during the years 1999–2004. It is a comprehensive electronic reference grammar, containing detailed information on well over 100 varieties of the language, and has already served as a source of data for several major publications, including Elšík & Matras (2006) on ‘Markedness and Language Change’ and Boretzky & Igla’s (2005) ‘Kommentierter Dialektatlas des Romani’. Over the past 3 years, RMS has been available online to a small circle of academic users, via a server located in Manchester.

In June 2005, a new three-year project was launched in Manchester to upgrade RMS into an extended web-based resource. The technical work involves re-programming of the database and web interface, and is accompanied by extensive editing of the transcriptions and sound material as well as by additional fieldwork. The presentation will outline the new resource’s development strategy, data processing methods, and introduce the new face of the database and accompanying website features.

Dieter W. Halwachs & Gerd Ambrosch

University of Graz (Austria)

ROMLEX: New Developments

ROMLEX is not a Romani dictionary in the usual sense. ROMLEX is a lexical database. It contains data that are representative of the variation in the lexicon of all Romani dialects, and offers almost complete coverage of the basic lexicon of the Romani language. In its forth phase ROMLEX is in a phase of consolidation and of expansion. Besides the ongoing inclusion of new varieties we concentrate on harmonisation of the exisiting material and the lexical documentation of the expansion of Romani into public domains. The presentation focuses on the strategies develloped for the documentation of this expansion process.

Dieter W. Halwachs & his team

University of Graz (Austria)

ROMTEXT: an electronic text resource

ROMTEXT is neither a database nor an archive in the usual sense. ROMTEXT is first of all a collection of Romani texts which were used respectively are used for the codification and/or description of Romani varieties spoken in Austria. It is a project in “statu nascendi” which on the one hand saves basic materials for the future in the best form possible and which on the other hand makes descriptions and codification processes transparent and traceable for the scientific community. The presentation mainly will deal with the strategies and standards used but also wants to open up for future cooperations.

Jan Červenka & Jiří Pos & Daniel Žák

Charles University, Prague (Czech Republic)

The Prague Romani database