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A Story of Love and Debt: The Give and the Take of Linguistic Fieldwork

A Story of Love and Debt: The Give and the Take of Linguistic Fieldwork When a linguist goes into the field to work with a previously undescribed language, they aim at discovering what the language is like. What we linguists take away is knowledge—reflected in our publications, presentations and scholarly reputation. What we also get is the feeling of love for the languages and for the people, and the sense of indebtedness for what we learn and get given. The language communities expect us to produce dictionaries, story books and pedagogical materials. Academia and the communities place different expectations on linguists engaged in fieldwork research. I examine these, using the example of my own fieldwork with the Tariana, an Arawak-speaking group in the multilingual area of the Vaupés River Basin in north-west Amazonia (Brazil). The focus of the paper is a pedagogical workshop jointly run by myself with my Tariana-speaking adopted family. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology Taylor & Francis

A Story of Love and Debt: The Give and the Take of Linguistic Fieldwork

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A Story of Love and Debt: The Give and the Take of Linguistic Fieldwork

Abstract

When a linguist goes into the field to work with a previously undescribed language, they aim at discovering what the language is like. What we linguists take away is knowledge—reflected in our publications, presentations and scholarly reputation. What we also get is the feeling of love for the languages and for the people, and the sense of indebtedness for what we learn and get given. The language communities expect us to produce dictionaries, story books and pedagogical materials....
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Publisher
Taylor & Francis
Copyright
Copyright The Australian National University
ISSN
1740-9314
eISSN
1444-2213
DOI
10.1080/14442213.2013.769118
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

When a linguist goes into the field to work with a previously undescribed language, they aim at discovering what the language is like. What we linguists take away is knowledge—reflected in our publications, presentations and scholarly reputation. What we also get is the feeling of love for the languages and for the people, and the sense of indebtedness for what we learn and get given. The language communities expect us to produce dictionaries, story books and pedagogical materials. Academia and the communities place different expectations on linguists engaged in fieldwork research. I examine these, using the example of my own fieldwork with the Tariana, an Arawak-speaking group in the multilingual area of the Vaupés River Basin in north-west Amazonia (Brazil). The focus of the paper is a pedagogical workshop jointly run by myself with my Tariana-speaking adopted family.

Journal

The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology – Taylor & Francis

Published: Apr 1, 2013

Keywords: Multilingualism; Amazonian Languages; Fieldwork; Arawak Languages; Language and Identity

References

  • Taps: Checklist for Responsible Archiving of Digital Language Resources
  • Aruak-Sprachen Nordwestbrasiliens und der angrenzenden Gebiete
  • Multilingualism in the Northwest Amazon