We have several PhD projects with the prospect of scholarships for students with backgrounds in computer science, machine learning, linguistics, anthropology, and other language-related fields. We have relationships with several Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory and Western Australia, to serve as potential field sites for PhD projects.

Transmitting ecological knowledge. A project to investigate ways of supporting local efforts to transmit ecological knowledge across generations, concerning bush medicine, healthy eating, and protecting significant places from environmental threats.

Efficient processing of oral languages. A project to investigate new methods in transcribing and analysing speech recordings, to provide useful functionality in Indigenous languages, such as text input, spell checking, and language learning.

Storytelling and language vitality. A project to investigate the connection between public storytelling and pride in linguistic identity, and the impact on language use and transmission.

Approximate name matching for Aboriginal languages. A project to explore algorithms for indexing and searching for hospital patient records which is robust to different pronunciations and spellings of Aboriginal names, clan names, and skin names.

Technology and wellbeing. A project to investigate the processes of designing, implementing and evaluating mobile technologies for use in remote communities, with applications to material culture, land management, food practices, health messaging, and so on.

Indigenous languages and STEM education. A project to investigate pathways from Indigenous knowledge practices to mathematical and algorithmic problem solving.

Machine-assisted composition. A project to investigate methods to support Aboriginal authors to use the standard orthography for their language, with the support of word recognition algorithms.

To discuss these and other project topics please email Steven Bird with information about your previous research experience; how your interests align with ours; and your curriculum vitae. For information about the application process please visit hdr.cdu.edu.au.