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With more than 60 languages spoken, Pakistan
represents a diverse yet cohesive linguistic and cultural
environment. Many languages are inter-related and many are
normally spoken across regional boundaries (e.g. Pashto,
Punjabi, Balochi, Sindhi, Urdu and Kashmiri.). Therefore, there
is a need to develop a common platform to bring together the
researchers working on these languages. There are some
organizations and regular conferences which are looking at
language and applied linguistic aspects.
However, researchers involved in language processing of these
languages also require a similar platform for exchange of ideas.
This would have many benefits. As Pakistan is a developing
country with limited financial resources, it is difficult to
raise support for researchers to frequently travel to
international conferences to present their research. Even if
funds are available for some, others in Pakistan cannot benefit
from these conferences. There is also a need for developing
language resources which can be used for benefiting people in
all these languages. Finally, there is a need to develop
collaborative projects to accelerate language processing
development and deployment in Pakistan for the benefit of the
whole country.
Therefore, there is a need to create a local platform to address
these issues for language processing. Creation of SNLP will
enable Natural Language Processing (NLP) community in Pakistan
to interact more frequently, accelerating the growth of this
very important field nationally. This society will also
develop strategic liaisons with other similar societies
internationally. |
