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March 25, 2020

Sande, Jenks, and Inkelas published in NLLT

Congrats to Hannah Sande (PhD 2017), Peter Jenks, and Sharon Inkelas, whose article "Cophonologies by Ph(r)ase" has just appeared online in Natural Language & Linguistic Theory. Read it here!

March 23, 2020

Survey updates

Zach O'Hagan sends the following updates from the Survey of California and Other Indian Languages:

  • Christine Sheil (PhD 2016) archived a new collection of sound recordings of 18 elicitation sessions on Scottish Gaelic (Indo-European; Scotland), stemming from her dissertation fieldwork there in 2013 and 2014.
  • Wilson de Lima Silva (Arizona) archived a new collection on Ticuna (isolate; Brazil, Colombia, Peru), based on fieldwork in the Cidade de Deus neighborhood of Manaus, Brazil during his MA research at the University of Utah in 2004. There are sound recordings of elicitation, reading, and texts, as well as derivative materials like MA coursework and previously published booklets.
  • We archived a new collection of sound recordings and written materials related to Chungli Ao (Ao; India), which derive from the 2008-2009 graduate field methods course (Linguistics 240) co-taught by Alice Gaby and Lev Michael, with language consultant Moa Imchen. The students in the course were Alex Bratkievich, Daniel Bruhn (PhD 2014), Ramón Escamilla (PhD 2012), Lindsey Newbold, Hannah Pritchett, Marilola Pérez (PhD 2015), and Russell Rhodes. Prof. Gaby is now at Monash University in Melbourne. We're grateful to undergraduate student Ellis Miller, who's working as an LRAP apprentice in the Survey this semester, for making the content descriptions for the items in this collection.
  • Steve Parker (Dallas International University & SIL International) archived a new collection of field notes and sound recordings of Panobo/Huariapano (Panoan; Peru). Dating from 1991, these are the only known sound recordings of Panobo in existence, the language being thought to have no more first-language speakers. The consultant was Arquímedes Sinuiri Nunta.

March 19, 2020

Shen presents at CUNY Conference on Sentence Processing

Alice Shen presented a talk at the CUNY Conference on Sentence Processing, which was entirely online this year. The title of her talk was "Asymmetric processing costs in the auditory comprehension of Mandarin and English bilingual sentences." You can read more about it here.

Rybka and Michael paper in Journal of Historical Linguistics

A paper by recent Berkeley Linguistics post-doc Konrad Rybka and Lev Michael, entitled A privative derivational source for standard negation in Lokono (Arawakan), has appeared in the pages of the Journal of Historical Linguistics. Congrats!

March 13, 2020

Linguistics events this week (March 13-20, 2020)

In and around the linguistics department in the next week:

March 6, 2020

Linguistics events this week (March 6-13, 2020)

In and around the linguistics department in the next week:

Breath of Life 2020 issues call for linguistic partners

Leanne Hinton writes:

Big Give is coming next week!
Big Give is an online fundraising tradition that began in 2014, giving alumni, parents, students, faculty, staff, and friends the chance to come together on one day to show support for the Linguistics Department specifically, and the Berkeley campus generally.  Big Give begins at 9pm on Wednesday, March 11, and runs through 9pm on Thursday, March 12.  Watch for our emails around that time---you might even be able to help us win extra money in the hourly contests!
Welcome Katherine Hilton

Belatedly, welcome Katherine Hilton!

Dr. Katherine Hilton has joined the linguistics department this semester as a temporary lecturer teaching Ling 100 “Introduction to Linguistic Science”.  Dr. Hilton earned her PhD in 2018 from Stanford, and now lives in Berkeley.  Her dissertation was entitled “What does an interruption sound like?” (committee: Rob Podesva, Penny Eckert, and Meghan Sumner), so she might be paying close attention if she hears you interrupt someone.  She has an impressive teaching history at Stanford both as a TA (Phonetics, AAVE, and Language and Society), and as an instructor of record (Intro to Linguistics, Language and Society, and Discourse Structure).

You’ll see her holding busy office hours in Dwinelle 1224.

 Welcome Katherine! 

Ko receives FEL grant

Congrats to Edwin Ko, who has just been awarded a Foundation for Endangered Languages grant for his project entitled Development of Northern Pomo language revitalization camps!

February 29, 2020

Bardagil organizes Manoki language school

Postdoc Bernat Bardagil writes to share that he has just organized the 2nd Watjuho Ja'a School, an intensive language school for the Manoki language, a variety of the isolate language Mỹky. It took place at the village of Cravari, in western Mato Grosso, Brazil.

Manoki language school

February 28, 2020

Linguistics events this week (Feb 28-March 6, 2020)

In and around the linguistics department in the next week:

  • Linguistics Department Colloquium - Friday Feb 28 -  Dwinelle 3335 - 3-5pm
    Stephanie Shih (USC): Lexical classes in probabilistic phonology
  • Phorum - Monday March 2 - 1303 Dwinelle  - 12-1pm
    Matthew Leonard (UCSF): Dynamic Brain Networks for the Perception and Organization of Speech
  • Fieldwork Forum - Wednesday March 4 - 1303 Dwinelle - 4-5.30pm
    Line Mikkelsen (Berkeley): Publishing based on fieldwork
  • Practice talk - Wednesday March 4 - 1229 Dwinelle - 11-12:30p
    Ruth Rouvier (Berkeley): "My language saved my life": Identity, Wellbeing, and Language Reclamation
  • Practice talk - Wednesday March 4 - 1303 Dwinelle - 2-3:30p
     Julia Nee (Berkeley): Language revitalization is about more than language: the role of community building in revitalizing Teotitlán del Valle Zapotec

February 25, 2020

Survey updates

Zach O'Hagan sends the following updates from the Survey of California and Other Indian Languages:

  • Maziar Toosarvandani (PhD 2010) archived a new collection on Northern Paiute (Uto-Aztecan; CA, OR, ID, NV), based on 10 years of research with elders Grace Dick, Leona Cluette Dick, Morris Jack, Inez Jim, Elaine Lundy, Edith McCann, Harold Miller, and Jimmy Nez, and in collaboration with Molly Babel (PhD 2009) and Michael Houser (PhD 2010). The collection consists of 281 recordings of lexical and grammatical elicitation (as he writes, with a focus on "nominalization, clausal embedding, clause chaining, and aspect"), and texts. The project grew out of Andrew Garrett's 2005-2006 field methods course on the language.
  • Conor Daly (PhD Slavic 1991) archived a new collection on Ninilchik Russian, a variety spoken on the Kenai Peninsula and surrounding region of southern Alaska. Based on fieldwork in July and August 1985, the collection consists of conversations, interviews, and linguistic work with 25 people.
  • The five notebooks comprising Marvin Kramer's (PhD 2002) field notes from summers 1968 and 1969 on Kutenai (isolate; British Columbia, ID, MT) are now available (Kramer.002.001-Kramer.002.005). The consultants were Ambrose Gravelle, Catherine Gravelle, and Frank Whitehead. (Thanks to Alex Elias for assisting us in scanning these!)
Dawson to Western Washington

Congratulations to Virginia Dawson, who has just accepted a tenure-track position in semantics at Western Washington University! Ginny will be joining Western's newest department.

February 21, 2020

Linguistics events this week (Feb 21-28, 2020)

In and around the linguistics department in the next week:

  • Linguistics Department Colloquium - Friday Feb 21 -  Dwinelle 88 - 3-5pm
    Charles O'Hara (USC): Inter-Generational Learning Affects Phonotactic Typology
  • Linguistics Department Colloquium - Monday Feb 24 -  Dwinelle 370 - 3-5pm
    Gasper Begus (University of Washington): (Deep) Learning in Phonology
  • Language Revitalization Working Group - Wednesday Feb 26 - 1303 Dwinelle  - 2pm-3pm
    Discussion of language revitalization in non English-matrix contexts
  • Fieldwork Forum - Wednesday Feb 26 - 1303 Dwinelle - 4-5.30pm
    Myriam Lapierre (Berkeley): Challenges of literacy education and orthography development in the Amazonian Indigenous context: a case study from Panãra.

February 20, 2020

Nee paper to appear in L2 Journal

Congrats to Julia Nee, whose paper Creating Books for Use in Language Revitalization Classrooms: Considerations and Outcomes will be coming out in the Spring 2020 edition of L2 Journal! You can access the paper here.

Gahl joins board of the Aphasia Center of California

Congrats to Susanne Gahl, who has been voted into the Board of Directors of the Aphasia Center of California!  The Aphasia Center is a resource and community for people with aphasia, built on the principles of the Life Participation Approach to Aphasia (https://leader.pubs.asha.org/doi/10.1044/leader.FTR.05032000.4 ).

February 14, 2020

Survey updates
First-year graduate student Alex Elias has assisted in the last few weeks in scanning two Berkeley linguists' field notes on five different languages:
  • George Foster's 13 notebooks on the culture and language of the Yuki people of northern California, dating from 1937 (Oswalt.007.001 through Oswalt.007.013). Foster (1913-2006) received his PhD under A.L. Kroeber in 1946, and was later Professor of Anthropology, until 1979. His wife, Mary LeCron Foster (1914-2001), received a PhD from this department in 1965, and the campus's anthropology library is named after them. The notebooks were originally given to Robert Oswalt (PhD 1961). Consultants were Charlie Doorman, Cecilia Logan, George Moore, Ralph Moore, Eben Tilletson, and Old Toby.
  • George Foster's 3 notebooks on Huchnom (Yukian; CA) culture, also dating from 1937 (Oswalt.007.014 through Oswalt.007.016). The consultant was Lula Johnson.
  • George Grekoff's 3 notebooks on the Clayoquot dialect of Nuu-chah-nulth, a Wakashan language of British Columbia, dating from 1966 and 1967 (Grekoff.002.001 through Grekoff.002.003). Grekoff (1923-1999) was a student of Mary Haas in this department. He did not complete the PhD, but later taught at the University of Washington. Consultants were Hyacinth David, Winifred David, and Odelia Hunter.
  • George Grekoff's 5 notebooks on Skagit, a Lushootseed variety (Salishan; WA), dating from 1964 to 1967 (Grekoff.002.004 through Grekoff.002.008). The consultant was Louise George.
  • George Grekoff's notebook on Southeastern Pomo (Pomoan; CA), dating from 1957 (Grekoff.002.009). The consultants were Effie and John Kelsey.
Linguistics events this week (Feb 14-21, 2020)

In and around the linguistics department in the next week:

February 11, 2020

Mystery Language, Splash @Berkeley!

Raksit Lau, Wendy López Márquez, Alice Shen and Edwin Ko will present a short course at Splash on Sunday, March 8th.

Splash brings over 400 high school students to Berkeley's campus for "a day of unlimited learning". 

Mystery Language! Introduction to Linguistic Analysis