Dr. Peter Gerrand
Adjunct Senior Research Fellow
Biography
My interest in Spanish language, literature and history was first kindled when I worked as a telecommunications research engineer in Madrid thirty years ago. I then resumed my career in telecommunications in Australia, first in industry and then as a professor of telecommunications at first RMIT University and then the University of Melbourne.
My interests in Spanish were reignited by undergraduate lectures I attended in 2003 at La TrobeUniversity on contemporary Spanish and Latin American literature. This led to a great opportunity to carry out doctoral research on minority languages on the Internet, with special focus on the Catalan, Basque and Galician language nationalism movements in regional Spain – comparing their tactics with those used to promote the major languages of Europe around the world.
Relevant Qualifications
- 2008 PhD (Spanish), La Trobe University
- 1992 DELE (advanced), Spanish Ministry of Education
Research Interests
- Regional language communities in Spain and their diasporas overseas; regional nationalism – especially Catalan, Galician and Basque.
- Initiatives to promote lesser used languages on the Internet; and their relationship with Internet governance and new technologies.
- Methodologies for estimating the use of different human languages on the Internet.
Other Honorary Positions Held
Vice-President of the CasalCatalà de Victoria, Managing Editor of the Telecommunications Journal of Australia (published by Monash ePress) and Honorary Research Associate in the School of Historical & European Studies, La Trobe University
Contact Details
E-mail: pgerrand@gmail.com
Relevant Publications
"Cultural diversity in cyberspace: the Catalan campaign to win the new .cat top level domain", First Monday,January 2006, Issue 11-1, at http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue11_1/gerrand/index.html
“Una breu història de la campanya catalana per aconseguir el domini d'Internet .cat, amb implicacions per a altres llengües minoritàries”, DigitHum (UniversitatOberta de Catalunya: Barcelona), Issue 8, May 2006, at http://www.uoc.edu/digithum/8/dt/cat/gerrand.html
"Accelerating broadband rollout – initiatives in regional Spain”, Telecommunications Journal of Australia, Vol. 56, Nos. 3 & 4, Spring/Summer 2006, pp. 84-92.
“Estimating linguistic diversity on the Internet: a taxonomy to avoid pitfalls and paradoxes”, J. Computer-Mediated Communication, Vol. 12 (4), July 2007, article 8, pp. 1298–1321, at http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/toc/jcmc/12/4
DOI: 10.1111/j.1083-6101.2007.00374.x
Minority languages on the internet. Promoting the regional languages of Spain. PhD thesis, School of Historical & European Studies, La Trobe University, Melbourne, December 2007 (available in Monash University’s Sir Louis Matheson library). Also published in 2009 by VDM Verlag, ISBN 978-3-639-19111-0.
The worldwide diaspora of Spain's regional communities: its reach, its history and its modern relevance. CERC Working Paper No. 3/2008. Melbourne: University of Melbourne. ISSN 1447-0071. December 2008. (64 pp.)
“The potential to win a .gal domain to support worldwide Galician culture – a view from the Antipodes”, in Defeating the Tyranny of Distance.Historical and Cultural Relations Between Australia and Galicia, Lorenzo Modia, M.J. and Boland, Roy C. (Eds).2009. ISBN 0-9775868-1-2. La Coruña: Antípodas. pp. 189-212.
“Promoting Supranational Identity via the Internet – the Modern Relevance of Spain’s Regional Diasporas”, in Media & Nationalism. The Basque, the Catalan, the Northern Ireland and the Scottish Cases, University of Vic, Vic (Catalonia), ISBN: 978-84-936186-4-3. June 2009, pp. 63
Book Reviews
“Princes of Print versus Warlords of the Web?” (review of Margaret Simons’ The Content Makers: Understanding the Media in Australia). TJA Vol. 57 Nos. 2 & 3, December 2007, pp. 40.1-40.2, DOI: 10.2104/tja07040. Available at http://www.tja.org.au/index.php/tja/issue/view/5
“Protecting good names in cyberspace.” (review of David Lindsay's International Domain Name Law: ICANN and the UDRP).TJA Vol. 58 No. 1, May 2008.DOI: 10.2104/tja08016, at http://www.tja.org.au/index.php/tja/issue/view/12
“The multicultural Internet: parallel worlds?” (Review of Gerard Goggin & Mark McLelland (Eds.),Internationalizing Internet Studies. Beyond Anglophone Paradigms. (Routledge, New York, 2009, 343 pp.)).TJA Vol. 60 No. 1, February 2010.DOI: 10.2104/tja10007, at http://www.tja.org.au/index.php/tja/issue/view/7