The Research Centre for Linguistic Typology is a research institute originally founded in 1998 in the Australian National University

Australian National University

The Australian National University is a teaching and research university located in the Australian capital, Canberra.As of 2009, the ANU employs 3,945 administrative staff who teach approximately 10,000 undergraduates, and 7,500 postgraduate students...

 by R. M. W. Dixon

R. M. W. Dixon

Robert Malcolm Ward Dixon is a Professor of Linguistics at The Cairns Institute, James Cook University, Queensland, and formerly Director of the Research Centre for Linguistic Typology at La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia.In 1996, Dixon and another linguist, Alexandra Aikhenvald,...

 which then moved to LaTrobe University, Melbourne

Melbourne

Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...

 in 2000. It is an internationally recognized centre of research on fieldwork linguistics, Language documentation

Language documentation

Language documentation is the process by which a language is documented from a documentary linguistics perspective. It aims to “to provide a comprehensive record of the linguistic practices characteristic of a given speech community”...

 and linguistic typology

Linguistic typology

Linguistic typology is a subfield of linguistics that studies and classifies languages according to their structural features. Its aim is to describe and explain the common properties and the structural diversity of the world's languages...

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R.M.W. Dixon and Alexandra Aikhenvald

Alexandra Aikhenvald

Alexandra Yurievna Aikhenvald is a linguist specialising in Linguistic typology and the Arawak language family of the Brazilian Amazonia.-Biography:...

 headed this institute up to 2008, when they accepted a position at James Cook University

James Cook University

James Cook University is a public university based in Townsville, Queensland, Australia. The university has two Australian campuses, located in Townsville and Cairns respectively, and an international campus in Singapore. JCU is the second oldest university in Queensland—proclaimed in 1970—and the...

 in Cairns. Since then, this institute is directed by Randy LaPolla

Randy LaPolla

Randy J. LaPolla is a professor of linguistics at LaTrobe University, specializing in the morphosyntax of Chinese, Qiang and Dulong/Rawang. He is well-known as the author of a grammar of Qiang and as the coauthor of Van Valin and LaPolla , a major work in Role and Reference Grammar...

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