My research concentrates on collecting, annotating and interpreting data from two North American languages, Wichita (Caddoan, spoken in Oklahoma by one person now) and Lakota (Siouan, spoken widely in the northern plains of the US and in Canada). I have video and audio records of speakers using these languages which I write down, translate, and analyze for three purposes, first to provide records for the community of speakers if they wish to develop programs to save or teach their languages, second, to deposit in archives (or provide in writing, for example a dictionary) with similar data from many languages so linguists and others can access them, and third, to provide input for studies of phenomena of interest to linguistic theory. In addition, although I do not research this area, I consider myself an expert on the details of English grammar and phonology which are needed by teachers of English as a second language.
keywords
siouan and caddoan (native american) languages, syntax of polysynthetic languages, phonology of selected languages, english structure as needed by teachers of english as a second language
