The Kanak Language Academy (KLA), or in French; Académie des langues kanak (ALK) is a local, public educational establishment in

New Caledonia New Caledonia ( ; ) is a group of islands in the southwest Pacific Ocean, southwest of Vanuatu and east of Australia. Located from Metropolitan France, it forms a Overseas France#Sui generis collectivity, ''sui generis'' collectivity of t ...

. Founded in 2007, with roots reaching to the Nouméa Accord of 1998, the legislative assembly endorsed the setting up of the French territory's first indigenous Kanak languages institute. Its mission is "to establish rules of usage and to help promote and develop all Kanak languages and dialects". The KLA is expected to standardise, protect, and develop the about forty

Kanak languages The thirty New Caledonian languages also known as Kanak languages form a branch of the Southern Oceanic languages. Their speakers are known as Kanaks. One language is extinct, one is critically endangered, four are severely endangered, five are ...

and dialects, as well as standardize the written form for Kanak languages. The majority of

New Caledonian languages The thirty New Caledonian languages also known as Kanak languages form a branch of the Southern Oceanic languages. Their speakers are known as Kanaks. One language is extinct, one is critically endangered, four are severely endangered, five are ...

do not have a written form. Those that do, have a rudimentary one. As it was extremely difficult to standardize the spelling of kanak languages, a program was developed by the KLA and the

University of New Caledonia The University of New Caledonia UNC (''Université de la Nouvelle-Calédonie'') is a French university which is part of the Academy of New Caledonia located in Nouméa and Koné. The university goes back to 1987 when the ''Université Française ...

that would propose a common writing standard. All the collected data is analyzed by

linguist Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...

s that develop a form of writing which is accepted by the speakers. KLA publishes dictionaries, folk tales, and glossaries. In 2009, it had three radio broadcasts daily from Monday to Friday. In 2008, it organized a festival, Space Orality. There are eight project leaders, each working in one of the areas of the country who are supported by academicians. They are selected from New Caledonia's main cultural and traditional clans and confederations. Déwé Gorodey was appointed chair of the academy in 2007. Its current director is Weniko Ihage.

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* {{Authority control Languages of New Caledonia Education in New Caledonia Educational organizations based in New Caledonia Educational institutions established in 2007 Language regulators 2007 establishments in New Caledonia