This page summarizes the history of graduate instruction in linguistic field methods at Berkeley, with information about academic year, language(s), consultant(s), and instructor(s), when known. Links in the Language column are to archival collections in the California Language Archive (CLA). The information has been reconstructed from archival course catalogs, which occasionally do not reflect the ultimate instructor of record, and in consultation with Linguistics faculty, graduate students, alumni, and records in the CLA. We will...
When? Spring 2026: Every other Wednesday, 3:10PM-4:00PM (alternating with LRWG)
Where? Hybrid Format (in-person in Dwinelle 1303 and via Zoom; email organizers for passcode)
What? We are a working group dedicated to the critical examination of methodologies in language documentation, description, and revitalization, as well as to...
The Language Revitalization Working Group offers a space for folks involved with (or interested in) language revitalization to gather, share, present, discuss, and improve their language revitalization efforts. LRWG is open to all - grad and undergrad students, faculty, staff, and community members; you don't need to be affiliated with UC Berkeley to attend.
In Spring 2026, we will meet every other Wednesday at 3(:10)pm (PST) in a hybrid format: if you're on campus you can join us in-person in Dwinelle 1303, and if you're not, you can join via...
The Group in American Indian Languages (GAIL) meets periodically in order to bring together individuals interested in Indigenous languages of the Americas for dinner and a presentation. News about events can be found below, and a list of other past talks can be found here.
If you would like to receive periodic emails updating you about our activities, join the Friends of the Survey email list by writing to scoil-ling@berkeley.edu.
Caquinte (Arawakan), Chamikuro (Arawakan), Omagua (Tupí-Guaraní), Taushiro (isolate), and Omurano (isolate); language documentation, description, history and contact in Amazonia; historical linguistics; morphosyntax; semantics; information structure
Andrew Garrett, Madeleine Strait, Rhosean Asmah, and Julia Peck attended the January workshop of the Yurok Language Program in Klamath on the Yurok Reservation, where Andrew led a session on numerals and the Yurok lunar calendar system. Andrew was recognized with a gift and gratitude for his longtime engagement and prioritization of community requests and needs! They also visited Rek'woy, the place where the Klamath River, now undammed thanks in part to Yurok and Karuk activism, flows freely into the Pacific Ocean (pictured).
'Echkwoh Rek'woy 'o tenem'. There are a lot of sea lions at Rek'woy.
This week we host the fourth visit supported by the new CLA Community Research Grant: Kawaiisu community members and collaborating linguists (left to right) Merlene Everson, Laura Grant, Sophia Kendrick, and Brandi Kendrick. They are consulting on the cataloging of the forthcoming Maurice L. Zigmond Collection of Uto-Aztecan Language Materials acquired in April of last year. The CLA has previously collaborated with Grant, Everson, and others to archive the born-digital collection Kawaiisu Conversations and Landscapes Project, which features the voices of Everson's mother, the late Betty Girado Hernandez, her aunt, and uncle.
Here's the latest from the California Language Archive:
Julianne Kapner has accessioned a new collection of recordings and transcripts of word lists and oral histories from the ongoing Armenian Language in the Bay Area (ALBA) Project. Josefina Bittar (UCSC) has accessioned the Corpus del Español y Guaraní Paraguayos de Asunción, 14 sociolinguistic interviews in Paraguayan Guaraní (Tupí-Guaraní; Paraguay) and Spanish from 2015. Emanuele Fabiano, Joshua Homan, Manuel and Samuel Nuribe Arahuata, and Zachary O'Hagan have accessioned a new collection of audio and video recordings of interviews predominantly in Urarina (isolate; Peru) about the history of the Urituyacu River, especially the history of Omurano people, based on collaborative research from 2022.
