An interesting defence of Russian science and research and
why we should pay attention to it.
Andrew Jameson
Email: [log in to unmask]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Janet Bartle" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, September 12, 2002 9:50 AM
Subject: Fwd: New journal on Computational Linguistics, in Russian and English


>
>--- Forwarded Message from Alexander Gelbukh<[log in to unmask]> ---
>
>Dear colleague,
>
>[This is to ask you whether you or your library would subscribe to this
>Journal.]
>
>Soon we will start publishing a new journal on Computational Linguistics.
>It will be published in Russia (in Russian and English, with summaries
>in the other language); see description below.
>
>To plan its printing and readership, we need to know whether you, or your
>University's library, would subscribe to this journal. Especially
>important are subscriptions outside ex-USSR, otherwise the project is just
>not financially viable.
>
>Please let us know [[log in to unmask]] if you plan to subscribe (how
>many copies can your library afford?), to count your help in. The price
>will be similar to that of existing journals, such as Computational
>Linguistics. We plan to issue monthly volumes of some 100 pages (A4 size).
>
>-----------------------------------------------------
>IS RUSSIAN SCIENCE STILL ALIVE?
>-----------------------------------------------------
>
>Yes. Recent annual conferences Dialogue (www.dialog-21.ru) have
>gathered hundreds of Russian linguists, computational linguists, and
>business representatives. About 150 best papers were selected for
>publication in a 1250-page Proceedings volume of Dialogue-2002.
>Dialogue conferences have more than 25 years of history.
>
>In 2001, Russian Association for Computational Linguistics and Intelligent
>Technologies (COLINT) was founded by several leading Russian research
>institutes, software companies, and university groups, to promote the
>full spectrum of activity in this domain, from fundamental research
>to commercial product development.
>
>The new journal will be oriented mostly to the vast community formed
>around Dialogue and COLINT and will exploit its huge potential for
>high quality novel publications.
>
>-----------------------------------------------------
>WHY READ RUSSIAN PUBLICATIONS?
>-----------------------------------------------------
>
>1. Russian science has earned excellent reputation in the past. Even
>    though Russia has lost its military and financial strength, its
>    scientists are the same and the quality of their research keeps
>    the same.
>
>2. Russian Computational Linguistics tradition, for historical reasons,
>    is different from the Western mainstream. It's good news and bad news.
>
>    Bad news because Western scientists sometimes have difficulties in
>    understanding Russian papers, and it takes some effort to map the
>    terminology and the basic assumptions to those traditional in the West.
>
>    Good news because this gives a new (or just non-traditional)
>    perspective, fresh (or just different) ideas, and thus enriches your
>    horizon. Combining these new (different) ideas with the mainstream
>    research directions would give you an advantage over your colleagues
>    who do not have access to this source, not to mention the advantage
>    for the science.
>
>3. Many of these publications will deal with Russian as the object of the
>    research. Taking into account the potentially huge Russian market and
>    integration of Russia into world culture and economics, many companies
>    and thus research institutes, conferences, publishers, etc. show
>    constantly growing interest in Russian-related lingware, such as
>    translation software, OCR, style checkers, text mining, etc. Russian
>    as object might become (if not already is) a promising research
>    direction for your group, too!
>
>4. If you live outside of ex-USSR, know that with few dollars or euros you
>    will help to save Russian science and to give access to scientific
>    literature to thousands of Russian scientists who just do not have
>    money to subscribe to existing computational linguistics journals.
>
>5. If Russian is your native or second language, just enjoy reading in
>    Russian! And hearing from your old friends and colleagues.
>
>-----------------------------------------------------
>WHAT IF I DON'T KNOW RUSSIAN?
>-----------------------------------------------------
>
>1. Each paper will be supplied with a sufficiently detailed English
>    summary.
>
>2. Ask your colleagues and students -- you will be surprised with that
>    some of them do read in Russian (if it is not their native language!).
>
>-----------------------------------------------------
>CONVINCED, WHAT TO DO?
>-----------------------------------------------------
>
>1. Ask your librarian if they would subscribe for such a journal, and
>    let us know [[log in to unmask]] how many copies they can afford.
>
>2. Pass this message on to your colleagues who might be interested, to
>    mailing lists, etc.
>
>3. Accept our most cordial thanks! We will contact you when the first
>    issue is ready.
>
>Thank you!
>Alexander (www.Gelbukh.com)
>=====================================
>Welcome to CICLing-2003 conf: www.CICLing.org
>Intelligent Text Processing and Computational Linguistics
>February 2003, Mexico
>=====================================
>Prof. Dr. Alexander Gelbukh (Alexandre Guelboukh Kahn),
>Research Professor, head of NLP Lab,
>Centro de Investigacion en Computacion (CIC),
>Instituto Politecnico Nacional (IPN), Mexico.
>[log in to unmask], [log in to unmask], www.Gelbukh.com
>=====================================

--------------------------------------------
Janet Bartle
Learning Technology Adviser
LTSN Subject Centre for Languages, Linguistics, and Area Studies
Language Institute
University of Hull, Hull, HU6 7RX
Tel: 01482 466175  Fax: 01482 466180  Email: [log in to unmask]
http://www.lang.ltsn.ac.uk