Interdisciplinary Approaches to Language Documentation edited by Susan D. Penfield Language Documentation & Conservation Special Publication No. 21 Interdisciplinary Approaches to Language Documentation edited by Susan D. Penfield Language Documentation & Conservation Special Publication No.21 PUBLISHED AS A SPECIAL PUBLICATION OF LANGUAGE DOCUMENTATION & CONSERVATION LANGUAGE DOCUMENTATION & CONSERVATION Department of Linguistics, UHM Moore Hall 569 1890 East-West Road Honolulu, Hawaiʻi 96822 USA http://nflrc.hawaii.edu/ldc University of Hawaiʻi Press 2480 Kolowalu Street Honolulu, Hawaiʻi 96822 USA © All texts and images are copyright to the respective authors, 2020 All chapters are licensed under Creative Commons Licenses Cover design by Laura Viola Maccarone of Rizbee Design Studio Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication data ISBN-13: 978-0-9856211-9-3 http:// http://nflrc.hawaii.edu/ldc/ http://hdl.handle.net/10125/24947 Contents Contributors iv 1. Introduction: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Language Documentation 1 Susan D. Penfield 2. Domain-Driven Documentation: The Case of Landscape 9 Niclas Burenhult 3. Child Language Documentation: A Pilot Project in Papua New Guinea 23 Birgit Hellwig 4. Interdisciplinary in Areal Documentation: 43 Experiences from Lower Fungom, Cameroon Jeff Good 5. Endangered Language Documentation: 72 The Challenges of Interdisciplinary Research in Ethnobiology Jonathan Amith iv Contributors JONATHAN D. AMITH has been an independent scholar since 2000 when he began work on San Agustín Oapan and Ameyaltepec Nahuatl (Balsas River valley, central Guerrero). He later proceeded to document Yoloxóchitl Mixtec (Pacific Coast of Guerrero) and Sierra Nororiental de Puebla Nahuati. More recently he has focused on lexicography and com- parative ethnobiology, extending his ethnobiological work to Totonac-speaking communi- ties in northern Puebla .Amith has published in linguistics, history, and anthropology. He has curated an exhibit of Indigenous protest art, edited an anthology of Nahuatl-language texts (book and 6-CD set), produced and codirected an award-winning Nahuatl-language documentary, and has an ongoing project of short documentaries in Mixtec. Amith has also collaborated with SRI International on automated speech recognition of Yoloxóchitl Mixtec. Presently he is developing metadata standards and a content management system, based on open-source Symbiota software, to facilitate comparative and community based ethnobiological research. NICLAS BURENHULT is Associate Professor and Senior Reader in Linguistics at Lund University, Sweden. His research concerns the relationship between language, culture and the environment, with a particular focus on landscape. He is a leading expert on the Aslian (Austroasiatic) languages of the Malay Peninsula and has directed major docu- mentation programs in that setting. He is a co-ordinator of the Repository and Workspace for Austroasiatic Intangible Heritage (RWAAI), a digital resource dedicated to endan- gered languages of Southeast Asia. He is the author of numerous works on the relation- ship between language and the environment, as well as on various aspects of the Aslian languages. JEFF GOOD is Professor of Linguistics at the University at Buffalo, State University of New York. His research interests include comparative Niger-Congo linguistics, language documentation, and morphosyntactic typology. He is presently engaged in team-based documentary work focused on the languages and multilingual ecology of the Lower Fungom region of Cameroon. This involves close collaboration with faculty and students at a number of Cameroonian universities and with specialists in anthropology, computer science, and geography. His research has also considered how digital tools and methods can best support the documentation of endangered languages. BIRGIT HELLWIG is based at the Department of Linguistics, University of Cologne, where she combines language documentation with psycholinguistics, focusing on the adapta- tion of longitudinal and experimental approaches to investigate language acquisition and socialization in diverse socio‐cultural settings. She is currently working with the Qaqet in Papua New Guinea, and she continues to be interested in the documentation and descrip- tion of the adult language, researching Goemai (a Chadic language of Nigeria), Katla (a Niger‐Congo language of Sudan) and Tabaq (a Nilo‐Saharan language of Sudan). SUSAN PENFIELD received a Ph.D. in Linguistic Anthropology from the University of Arizona in 1980 where she was later an instructor in the Second Language Acquisition and Teaching Ph.D. Program (SLAT) and for the American Indian Language Development v Institute (AILDI). From 2008-2011, Penfield directed the Documenting Endangered Languages Program at the National Science Foundation (NSF). She was awarded a Smithsonian Fellowship for Native American Programs in 2012. She is currently teaching for the University of Montana Linguistics Program and for the University of Arizona Certificate Program in TESL. Dr. Penfield specializes in language documentation, lan- guage reclamation, community-based language/linguistic training and interdisciplinary applications in all of these contexts. Language Documentation & Conservation Special Publication No. 21 (October 2020) Interdisciplinary Approaches to Language Documentation ed. by Susan D. Penfield, pp. 1-8 1 http://nflrc.hawaii.edu/ldc/ http://hdl.handle.net/10125/24940 Introduction: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Language Documentation Susan D. Penfield University of Arizona / University of Montana This special edition of the Language Documentation & Conservation Journal results from a speakers’ series held at the Third International Conference on Language Documentation and Conservation in 2013. The speakers’ series was designed to bring attention to the complexities and value of interdisciplinary research in language doc- umentation. Four speakers shared their ongoing research and have since revised their talks into the papers presented herein. Each paper offers a slightly different approach to designing and implementing interdisciplinary research in the context of language docu- mentation and each involves a different combination of disciplines. The authors present some aspect of what constitutes and defines interdisciplinary research, an approach that has been a frequent topic of academic rhetoric but remains on the fringes of mainstream research agendas. Before discussing the papers directly, some discussion of what con- stitutes ‘interdisciplinary research’ is in order. 1. What is interdisciplinary research? One workable definition says, Interdisciplinary research is any study or group of studies undertaken by schol- ars from two or more distinct scientific disciplines. The research is based upon a conceptual model that links or integrates theoretical frameworks from those disci- plines, uses study design and methodology that is not limited to any one field, and requires the use of perspectives and skills of the involved disciplines throughout multiple phases of the research process. (Aboelela et al. 2006: 341) This proposed definition was mainly designed to aid decision makers in funding agencies and researchers in identifying an interdisciplinary approach (Aboelela et al. 2006: 341). Another definition, used by the National Science Foundation, is as follows: Interdisciplinary research is a mode of research by teams or individuals that inte- grates information, data, techniques, tools, perspectives, concepts, and/or theories from two or more disciplines or bodies of specialized knowledge to advance funda- mental understanding or to solve problems whose solutions are beyond the scope of a single discipline or area of research practice.1 1 This definition originated in the 2004 Report of the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine titled Facilitating Interdisciplinary Research. See the NSF page at https://www.nsf.gov/od/oia/additional_resources/interdisciplinary_research/ definition.jsp CC Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives Licence 2 One problem entailed in defining the term ‘interdisciplinary’ is to distinguish it from similar terms such as ‘multidisciplinary’ or ‘cross-disciplinary’. In the general literature, the terms ‘interdisciplinary,’ ‘multidisciplinary, and ‘cross-disciplinary’ are often used interchangeably, although Amith draws distinctions between them noting that ‘cross-dis- ciplinary’ is the most neutral term. Amith also suggests that “the key word in the [NSF] definition is ‘integrates’, as it is precisely this integration that is taken to distinguish interdisciplinary from multidisci- plinary studies.” This notion of integration is, indeed, pervasive throughout the literature on interdisciplinary research. Note that Interdisciplinary research asks how these disciplinary understandings can be merged, expanded, and transcended. Interdisciplinary research will continue to require concepts and methods developed through disciplinary research, but it will integrate (emphasis added) that knowledge to create new connections between dis- ciplines and new explanations of complex phenomena. At its best, interdisciplinary research creates knowledge that no single discipline can create on its own. (Derrick 2011: 3) The most defining aspects of true interdisciplinary research are 1) that the vary- ing disciplines are joined early in the planning process and ‘integrated’ in terms of theoret- ical and practical