Non-Latin script web addresses approved

The internet regulator has approved plans to allow non-Latin-script web addresses, in a move that is set to transform the online world.

The board of Icann voted at its annual meeting in Seoul to allow domain names in Arabic, Chinese and other scripts.

More than half of the 1.6 billion people who use the internet speak languages with non-Latin scripts.

BBC website

Welsh language dyslexic help call

The level of support for dyslexic children in the Welsh language has come under fire from assembly members.

The enterprise and learning committee says there is a lack of consistency in screening of children in both English and Welsh medium education.

BBC website

Gaelic TV channel being reviewed

The impact of BBC Alba, the Gaelic television channel launched a year ago, is to be reviewed by the BBC Trust.

BBC news

World's largest thesaurus debuts

The world's largest thesaurus is being published after more than 40 years of work by the English Language department of Glasgow University.

BBC website

Review of Modern Foreign Languages provision in HE published (Worton Review)

Michael Worton's review of Modern Languages is now available from the HEFCE website.

http://www.hefce.ac.uk/pubs/hefce/2009/09_41/

Follow response on the LLAS twitter http://twitter.com/hea_llas (hash tag #Worton_review)

Firm seeks Glaswegian interpreter

A translation company is looking to recruit Glaswegian interpreters to help business clients who are baffled by the local dialect.

Today Translations placed an advert in The Herald newspaper on Tuesday seeking speakers of "Glaswegian English".

BBC website

Area studies to lose direct cash

The British Academy is to stop direct funding through its Learned Society Programme. In a letter to the directors of the six societies involved, which represent "area studies" in the UK, it says the programme will end in 2012. The African Studies Association, the research committee of the Association for South-East Asian Studies, the British Association for South Asian Studies, the British Society for Middle Eastern Studies, the Joint Initiative for the Study of Latin America and the Caribbean, and the Society for Libyan Studies receive a total of about £150,000 a year from the academy. A spokesman for the academy said the learned societies would still be able to compete for other sources of funding after 2012.

Times Higher Education

Universities rely on private school pupil to fill languages degrees

University courses important to the economy rely on independent schools for many of their students, says research.

These "strategically important and vulnerable" degree subjects include modern languages and engineering.

BBC website

Changes to Welsh language law bid

The final version of the assembly government's bid for more powers to make laws on the Welsh language will be published later, the BBC understands.

BBC website

Forensic linguists study hate mail

Recipients, which have ranged from mosques to the prime minister's office, have been bombarded with race hate and sexual insults.

But perhaps the most surprising thing about this case, which involves 57 letters and is being investigated by police, is the culprit could be a woman.

BBC website