@inproceedings{gessler-etal-2026-missing,
title = "The Missing Middle: Language Documentation Needs Better Infrastructure, Not Better Models",
author = {Gessler, Luke and
Anastasopoulos, Antonios and
Auderset, Sandra and
Bodt, Timotheus and
Chelliah, Shobhana and
Christian, Sebastien and
Fily, Maxime and
Herrera, Santiago and
Huber, Eva and
Loaiciga, Sharid and
Meelen, Marieke and
{\"O}stling, Robert and
Palmer, Alexis and
Visser, Eline},
editor = "Agyapong, Godfred and
Moeller, Sarah and
Arppe, Antti and
Marashian, Ali and
Rosenblum, Daisy",
booktitle = "Proceedings of the Ninth Workshop on the Use of Computational Methods in the Study of Endangered Languages ({C}omput{EL}-9)",
month = jul,
year = "2026",
address = "San Diego, California, USA",
publisher = "Association for Computational Linguistics",
url = "https://aclanthology.org/2026.computel-1.15/",
pages = "136--147",
ISBN = "979-8-89176-422-4",
abstract = "Despite decades of progress in human language technology (HLT) and growing research interest in endangered languages, practical uptake of HLT in documentary linguistics workflows remains rare. In this opinion piece, we report on a structured dialogue among approximately twenty academics convened to diagnose why this gap persists. Across all topics, we identify a recurring structural problem, which we call the missing middle: despite the existence of many potentially useful HLTs, the connective infrastructure necessary to make them genuinely accessible to linguists and language communities does not exist. We report the details of our discussion and make four specific recommendations for how those active in language documentation and HLT research might orient their future work."
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%0 Conference Proceedings
%T The Missing Middle: Language Documentation Needs Better Infrastructure, Not Better Models
%A Gessler, Luke
%A Anastasopoulos, Antonios
%A Auderset, Sandra
%A Bodt, Timotheus
%A Chelliah, Shobhana
%A Christian, Sebastien
%A Fily, Maxime
%A Herrera, Santiago
%A Huber, Eva
%A Loaiciga, Sharid
%A Meelen, Marieke
%A Östling, Robert
%A Palmer, Alexis
%A Visser, Eline
%Y Agyapong, Godfred
%Y Moeller, Sarah
%Y Arppe, Antti
%Y Marashian, Ali
%Y Rosenblum, Daisy
%S Proceedings of the Ninth Workshop on the Use of Computational Methods in the Study of Endangered Languages (ComputEL-9)
%D 2026
%8 July
%I Association for Computational Linguistics
%C San Diego, California, USA
%@ 979-8-89176-422-4
%F gessler-etal-2026-missing
%X Despite decades of progress in human language technology (HLT) and growing research interest in endangered languages, practical uptake of HLT in documentary linguistics workflows remains rare. In this opinion piece, we report on a structured dialogue among approximately twenty academics convened to diagnose why this gap persists. Across all topics, we identify a recurring structural problem, which we call the missing middle: despite the existence of many potentially useful HLTs, the connective infrastructure necessary to make them genuinely accessible to linguists and language communities does not exist. We report the details of our discussion and make four specific recommendations for how those active in language documentation and HLT research might orient their future work.
%U https://aclanthology.org/2026.computel-1.15/
%P 136-147
Markdown (Informal)
[The Missing Middle: Language Documentation Needs Better Infrastructure, Not Better Models](https://aclanthology.org/2026.computel-1.15/) (Gessler et al., ComputEL 2026)
ACL
- Luke Gessler, Antonios Anastasopoulos, Sandra Auderset, Timotheus Bodt, Shobhana Chelliah, Sebastien Christian, Maxime Fily, Santiago Herrera, Eva Huber, Sharid Loaiciga, Marieke Meelen, Robert Östling, Alexis Palmer, and Eline Visser. 2026. The Missing Middle: Language Documentation Needs Better Infrastructure, Not Better Models. In Proceedings of the Ninth Workshop on the Use of Computational Methods in the Study of Endangered Languages (ComputEL-9), pages 136–147, San Diego, California, USA. Association for Computational Linguistics.