"Dr" Shiva Motaghi-Tabari, is the winner of the 2017 Michael Clyne Prize for her thesis about “Bidirectional Language Learning in Migrant Families”. The Michael Clyne Prize is awarded annually by the Australian Linguistics Society for the best postgraduate research thesis in immigrant bilingualism and language contact. Prof Michael Clyne is our superhero in sociolinguistics, pragmatics, multilingualism, second language learning, contact linguistics and intercultural communication. Congrats, Shiva!! Let's go to a pub!
Another friend, Alexandra Grey is one of two joint winners of the 2017 Australian PhD Prize for Innovations in Linguistics. Alex's thesis discusses how language rights affect minority languages in China. Congrats, Alex!! Let's have champagne! Btw, Alex was in charge of social media of "Bridging Language Barriers Symposium" hosted by Prof Ingrid Piller and Language on the Move team. Almost without lunch, she worked hard to do twitting for a live coverage. Alex collected questions directly from broad audience, interpreted the point of questions and the symposium answered. Beauty of friendship! I saw other LotM team members supporting Alex behind a scene. LotM members, you did a fantastic job!
I wrote in Chinese, "I love sociolinguistcs" at the top of Alex's thesis, below.
Me, too, hope to do something in a visual art, like LotM team does.
It's wonderful to see the legacy of Prof Michael Clyne is alive, strong and nurturing new talents who will lead linguistics and academics. When Michael passed away, he generously funded Michael Clyne Award. I feel the importance of good mentors and pioneers. His lovely personality and enthusiasm of research and want for social justice are alive in my heart. His most famous defined concept is "monolingual mind set" which fails to either recognise or capitalise on the existing linguistic assets/potential in increasingly
multilingual societies such as Australia. I was lucky enough to enjoy Michael's lecturers...and sketched him. Aw, it made my direction to a visual artist?!
Now, let's have a productive week!
Friends, Happy Painting!!
Prof Michael Clyne
