Fieldwork and Language Documentation

CLA updates

September 1, 2025

Here are some summer updates from the California Language Archive:

For the fall 2025 semester the CLA welcomes Tyler Lee-Wynant (GSR), Nyssa Combs and Sophia Hsu (undergraduate student assistants), and Priyanka Samant and Michaela Richter (BA Haverford 2025; volunteers)! In July, 23 boxes of archival materials related primarily to Pomoan languages (California), all from the estate of Sally McLendon (1933-2024; PhD 1966), reached the CLA from New York City (see photograph). Thanks to the cataloging work of Madison Fanucchi (BA 2025), we accessioned the Mauricio J. Mixco Papers and Sound Recordings (PhD 1971), a large physical collection of 41 boxes (17 linear feet, plus some tapes) containing 418 items. The collection is organized into 12 series spanning research on several languages (primarily Kiliwa, Mandan, and Shoshoni, but also Paipai, Mojave, and others studied as part of field methods courses) over many years and including more than 100 notebooks, file slips, sound recordings, loose notes, draft manuscripts, correspondence, conference materials, miscellaneous literature, and copies of the notebooks of other researchers. We accessioned the Gohar Barseghyan Collection of Armenian Films (Indo-European; Armenia), consisting of 43 MiniDV tape recordings of interviews, conversations, and cultural events among Bay Area Armenians. The acquisition of this collection was facilitated by Julianne Kapner; digital transfer and metadata creation were done by then-LRAP students Sophia Hsu and Jeremy Saputo. We accessioned the Roland B. Dixon Papers on California Languages, reorganizing some materials from our miscellaneous holdings and combining them with Dixon's five original notebooks on Chimariko (isolate; California) from work primarily with Polly Dyer, Sally Noble, and Friday in 1906. Also included is a digitized reel of microfilm including a few thousand loose pages of J.P. Harrington's notes on the language held by the National Anthropological Archives. We accessioned the Colección de materiales de la lengua matsigenka de Allen Johnson (BA 1963; Arawakan; Peru), which consists of three series of text transcriptions, loose notes and other manuscripts, and 38 digitized cassette tape recordings from 1972 forward. Scott AnderBois (Brown) and Wilson Silva (Arizona) accessioned Materials of the A'ingae Language Documentation Project (isolate; Ecuador, Colombia), consisting of audiovisual recordings of more than 65 sociolinguistic interviews and 125 texts, with transcription and translation of the texts in associated ELAN files. The project includes collaborators Leidy Quenamá Umenda, Shen Aguinda Ortiz, Martín Criollo Mendúa, Hugo Lucitante, Jorge Mendúa Quenamá, Thalya Mendúa, and Raúl Quieta Lucitante. We made several important sets of microfilmed notes available: 900+ pages of M.A.R. Barker's (1929-2012; PhD 1959) notes on Klamath (Klamath-Modoc; Oregon), seven notebooks made with speakers Aggie (Skellock) Butler, Robert David, Nora Hawk, Lizzie Kirk, Billet Lobert, Marian (David) Martin, Pansy Ohles, and Irene Skellock (bulk 1955-1957). 1,200+ pages of Wick Miller's (1932-1994; PhD 1962) notes on H'aakume Dzeeni (Keresan; New Mexico), 54 texts and 13 notebooks made between 1956 and 1959 with speakers George Garcia, Anne Hansen, Mary Histia, Andrew Lewis, Bell Lewis, Margaret Lim, Mary Valley, and Ruth Valley. 1,100+ pages of Karl Teeter's (1929-2007; PhD 1962) notes on Wiyot (Algic; California), as part of the Karl Teeter Papers on Wiyot and Other Languages, from his collaboration (1956-1958) with Della Prince, Birdie James, Nettie Rossig, and Cy Thomas. Other accessions: Julianne Kapner accessioned 21 items into Materials of the Armenian Language in the Bay Area (ALBA) Project (see 2024-13.036 thru 2024-13.056). Pliny Goddard's (1869-1928; PhD 1905) notebook on Chimariko from circa 1902 Cassette tape recordings of a 1982 interview by Sheldon Klein (1935-2005; PhD 1963) of anthropologist Maurice Zigmond (1904-1998) concerning Zigmond's early work with Kawaiisu (Uto-Aztecan; California) A 1989 cassette tape recording of Leonard Talmy (PhD 1972) reciting words in Atsugewi (Palaihnihan; California) made to assist language learners

2024-2025 FForum Presentations

September 18, 2024 - Round Robin

Discussion of recent/summer fieldwork activities

October 2, 2024 - Paper Discussion

A group discussion of "The promises and perils of positionality statements(link is external)" by...

Laryngeal features and segmental length: Cases studies in Yánesha’, Barese, Maranese, and Italian

Allegra Robertson
2025

This dissertation examines the relationship between laryngeal features and the segment in four languages, with a focus on phonetic traits, phonological representation, and the roles of length, weight, and stress. The case studies present laryngeal phenomena from disparate language contexts that are united in their subsegmental nature and typologically unexpected occurrence: laryngealized vowels in Yánesha’ (Arawakan), pre-aspirated geminate stops in Barese (Upper Southern Italo-Romance) and the local variety of Standard Italian (Central Italo-Romance), and post-aspirated geminate stops in...

Interactions between pronouns and clausal structure: Perspectives from Atchan

Rebecca Jarvis
2025

This dissertation examines the syntax and semantics of long-distance dependencies involving pronouns in Atchan, a Kwa language of Côte d’Ivoire. In addition to describing a range of morphosyntactic and semantic properties of Atchan, the dissertation takes as its focus two case studies of phenomena in Atchan where pronominal form and interpretation intimately relate to long-distance dependencies. One case study focuses on the syntax of resumption, while the other focuses on the semantics of prominence-sensitive, disjointness-marking pronouns.

The resumption case study focuses on a...

A Grammar of Nomlaki

Anna Björklund
2025

This thesis is a grammar of Nomlaki, a Wintuan language of northern California preserved exclusively through archival documents. Many early documenters did not consider Nomlaki sufficiently differentiated from its sister language Wintu to justify separate investigation. As a consequence, Nomlaki is the only Wintuan language without a grammatical description.


This grammar is a preliminary answer to this gap in the Californianist literature. This work is divided into eight chapters. The introduction includes an orientation of Nomlaki in its genetic context, a finding guide for its...

CLA updates

March 17, 2025

Here's the latest from the California Language Archive:

Thanks to the efforts of Shweta Akolkar and Wendy Costa, we've accessioned a second series to the Heather Hardy Collection of Tolkapaya Yavapai Language Materials, consisting of 23 cassette recordings of Molly Fasthorse (1910-2000). Yavapai is a Yuman language of Arizona. The recordings span collaborations at UCLA in the late 1970s and at the University of North Texas in 1981.

CLA updates

March 10, 2025

Here's the latest from the California Language Archive:

We've digitized Jaime de Angulo's manuscript The Clear Lake Dialect of the Pomo Language. In the last several weeks, we've hosted State Secretary of Tribal Affairs Christina Snider-Ashtari and colleagues, Native high schoolers from the Ukiah region, who were able to consult the notes and recordings especially of past Berkeley students and alums Abraham Halpern, Robert Oswalt (PhD 1961), and Eero Vihman on Northern Pomo (Pomoan; CA), and Tribal visits representing Washo (isolate; CA, NV), Northern Sierra and Plains Miwok (Miwokan; CA), and Tachi (Yokutsan; CA), these visits sponsored by the Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival (AICLS).

CLA updates

February 20, 2025

Here's the latest from the California Language Archive:

In the last couple of years, Bernat Bardagil (postdoc 2018-2020) has facilitated the acquisition of three legacy collections of materials related to Mỹky (isolate; Brazil). One of these collections has been accessioned. The two others, from the family of American missionary Robert Meader (1912-1997) and German anthropologist Gisela Pauli, are currently being cataloged. Digital copies of photographs and -- thanks to the quick work of Digital Revolution -- sound recordings are already making their way home. In the photographs below, Mỹky-speaking elders peruse some of Meader's photographs, dating from 1936 forward (top, February 2024), and listen to Pauli's recordings of the late Tapurá, from 1996 (bottom, February 2025).

CLA updates

January 26, 2025

Here's the latest from the California Language Archive:

Did you miss our end-of-year newsletter? Read it here! We have made available digital copies of 11 cassette tape recordings made by musicologist Susana Weich-Shahak in Peru in 1974 and 1975, consisting of stories, songs, and conversations in Arakmbut (Harakmbut), Ashaninka (Arawakan), Máíjĩ̵̀kì (Tukanoan), and Yagua (Peba-Yaguan), from the communities of Shintuya, Cutivireni, Sucusari, and Catalán, respectively (listen to an excerpt of Luis Ríos's (Bábì) story of Maineno in Máíjĩ̵̀kì here). The larger collection, the Colección de Materiales de Lenguas Peruanas de Susana Weich-Shahak, was previously accessioned, and additionally includes 8mm film and photographic slides, all of which are also now digitized. Zachary Wellstood, together with Nellie and R. David Zorc, has accessioned Documenting Aklanon Morphosyntax. The collection consists of materials spanning a field methods course at the University of Maryland in 2018 and 2019, with Maria Polinsky and Omer Preminger (recordings and notes in bundles 001-021), and telephone-based research afterward. The documentation focuses on grammatical topics.

Mam course offered at UC Berkeley

January 19, 2025

The Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies just launched a free (non-credit) Mam class for the spring semester. See here for more information.