Director: Language Planning and Development

Job description

• The Office of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Teaching & Learning) seeks to appoint a dynamic and energetic Professor or Associate Professor to provide strategic leadership and guidance at an institutional level on all matters related to language policy, planning and development in the University.
• The successful candidate must have strong interpersonal skills and the ability to work effectively with a wide range of constituencies and diverse communities, both inside and outside the University.
• The Director will be expected to strategically lead and manage the University’s Language Planning and Development Office in implementing and advancing UKZN's language policy, promoting multilingualism, developing African Languages as an academic language, providing language support services including translation and editing, conducting language research including computational linguistics, and ensuring that language transformation contributes to academic excellence, accessibility, and social justice across the institution.
• To lead the development of strategy in relation to language policy and development. The role includes promoting academic collaborations related to language development. 

• Associate Professor
• Doctoral Degree in Languages/Linguistics or related area
• Evidence of specialisation in IsiZulu and English
• Evidence of experience in Bilingual/Multilingual education, especially in higher education
• Evidence of recent and relevant knowledge of Language Policy and Planning and/or Language terminology development and translation preferably related to isiZulu
• Track record of publications commensurate with the level of appointment in language related research, preferably including isiZulu

ADVANTAGES:

• NRF rating or research recognition in linguistics or language studies
• Additional South African languages (highly advantageous)
• Knowledge of computational linguistics and language technologies
• Experience with corpus building and linguistic databases
• Membership in professional language associations
• Experience with language advocacy and policy development

The closing date for receipt of applications is 17 November 2026