At the Permanent Council Meeting held in Hong Kong, the reviewing process of the papers
submitted to ICPhS was discussed. PC members voted in favour of a single blind procedure
for the reviewing of papers submitted to forthcoming Congresses.

Ten travel scholarships for the amount of 300 Euros are made available by the Gösta Bruce Memorial Fund, to support student members to present their research at ICPhS2011. Click here for details.

This content has been removed, since ICPhS2011 is now over.

We regret to announce the death of the President of the International Phonetic Association, Professor Gösta Bruce. He was elected president in 2007.

A message received from Lund University informs us that he died on Tuesday 15th June 2010 following a short illness.

We extend our condolences to his family, colleagues, and many friends around the world.

(To make a contribution towards a memorial fund administered by the IPA, click here.)

In April 2005, the IPA Council received a formal request to vote on the adoption of a standard IPA symbol for the labiodental flap. The request was made by Dr Kenneth S. Olson, Associate International Linguistics Coordinator, SIL International, and was supported by Professor Peter Ladefoged, a member of the IPA Council.

In his letter of request, Dr Olson provided justification for the need for a standard IPA symbol for the labiodental flap. He stated that 'research has shown that the labiodental flap is quite widespread in Africa. It is attested in at least seventy languages and is fully incorporated into the phonological system of at least twenty languages. A standard IPA symbol would be a tremendous benefit for facilitating research on the sound'.

The IPA Council voted in favour of the adoption of a symbol for the sound. Following discussion and a further vote of Council, the symbol adopted was the 'right-hook v', ⱱ, which combines a 'v' and a fish-hook 'ɾ', suggesting a voiced labiodental sound and a tap/flap articulation.

The labiodental flap will be included in the next edition of the IPA chart; it will also be incorporated in Unicode and included in the SIL fonts.