The Phonlab project: Coimbra Phonetics Laboratory – heritage preservation and development

Abstract

PHONLAB is an R&D project on the history of experimental phonetics, funded by the Portuguese body, the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia – Foundation for Science and Technology. It brings together researchers from the Universities of Évora (Portugal), Coimbra (Portugal) and Stockholm (Sweden), and aims to recover for historiography and the collective memory the importance of the Experimental Phonetics Laboratory of the University of Coimbra (1936-1979) and its founder and director, Armando de Lacerda (1902-1984). In the funding year, 2022, the International Phonetic Association and the International Speech Communication Association Special Interest Group on “The History of Speech Communication Sciences” provided support for the holding of the 5th International Workshop on the History of Speech Communication Research, entitled ‘Lacerda 120’ in Portugal – the first of these scientific workshops to be dedicated to the memory of an individual phonetician. In addition, in 2023, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences dedicated a one-day symposium to Armando de Lacerda. PHONLAB focuses mainly on the material culture of objects from the past and has enabled the instruments of the Phonetics Laboratory, library resources and archives to be discovered as part of the heritage of the University of Coimbra Faculty of Arts and Science Museum by members of the project team and to be identified, preserved and assigned new value. The ultimate objective of this initiative, described in the paper, is to create a permanent exhibition at the University of Coimbra dedicated to Armando de Lacerda and the Coimbra Phonetics Laboratory.