The Austronesian languages are a family of languages widely dispersed throughout the islands of Southeast Asia and the Pacific, with a few members spoken on continental Asia. Malagasy is a geographic outlier, which is spoken on Madagascar. Austronesian has ten primary subgroups, nine of them found in Taiwan (the Formosan languages) and one ancestral to all other members of the family (Malayo-Polynesian languages). Austronesian is one of the largest language families in the world, both in terms of number of languages (1244 according to Ethnologue) and in terms of the geographical extent of the homelands of its languages (from Madagascar to Easter Island). The name Austronesian comes from Latin auster “south wind” plus Greek nêsos “island”.

ICAL is held periodically every 2-3 years, and gathers scholars who work on all aspects of Austronesian languages, from diverse theoretical and methodological perspectives.

17ICAL will be held in June 2027 at Swarthmore College near Philadelphia, USA.

For any questions about ICAL in general, please email <icalsteering@googlegroups.com>

Past ICAL conferences

16ICAL (20-24 June, 2024) De La Salle University, Manila, Philippines

ICAL 15 (28 June-2 July, 2021), Palacký University Olomouc, Czech Republic

14-ICAL (17-20 July 2018), Antananarivo, Madagascar

13-ICAL (18-23 July 2015) Taipei, Taiwan

12-ICAL  (2-6 July 2012) Bali, Indonesia (photos here)

11-ICAL (22-26 June 2009) Aussois, France (book of abstracts here)

10-ICAL (17-20 January 2006) Puerto Princesa City, Palawan, Philippines

9-ICAL (8-11 January 2002) Canberra, Australia

8-ICAL (28-30 December 1997) Taipei, Taiwan

7-ICAL (22-27 August 1994) Leiden, Netherlands (proceedings here)

6-ICAL (20-24 May 1991) Honolulu, Hawaii, USA

5-ICAL (11-16 January 1988) Auckland, New Zealand

4-ICAL (13-18 August 1984) Suva, Fiji

3-ICAL (19-24 January 1981) Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia

2-ICAL (4-12 January 1978) Canberra, Australia

1-ICAL (2-7 January 1974) Honolulu, Hawaii, USA