Summer 2019 Faculty-Directed research with Linguistics Professor Mike Flynn at the Lake Traverse Reservation
For this project, Professor Flynn, Anna Grove, Sarah Steinke, and I traveled to the Lake Traverse Reservation for linguistic field research. This research was a continuation of the Dakota Project, a long-term partnership between the Carleton Linguistics department and the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate Dakotah Language Institute (SWODLI).
The purpose of the project was to collect data from native speakers in order to answer several outstanding questions about the language’s phonemic inventory. Specifically, we were looking for features such as word-initial aspiration and glottal stop in vowel initial words.
We were able to conduct a linguistic interview with Mr. Clifford Canku, one of around 40 remaining native speakers of the language. My experience in undergraduate research helped me to develop skill sets valuable for independent and collaborative projects. It allowed me to further explore my interests in linguistic research and prepared me for graduate school.
— Alex Zhai ’20, Cognitive Science