About Me
I have a masters in Ethnobotany and a PhD in Field Linguistics with a focus in Ethnobiology. My masters research examined the relationship of language decline and ethnobotanical knowledge in a multilingual village in rural Cameroon. I was focusing on just one language, quickly realizing that I had on blinders and needed to look at all languages in a person's repertoire to fully understand ethnobotanical knowledge. I wanted to know more about multilingualism, social factors, and to gain a broader perspective from just plant knowledge to biological and ecological knowledge. PhD research brought me back to Cameroon to undertake a more comprehensive research project.
​
I like the challenges of being a field linguist—
To have to be all the things that come with documenting linguistic and ethnobiological knowledge, from knowing how to elicit grammar and phonology, to being good at photography, audio and video recording, and something I really actually enjoy, data management. And then there's the analysis part and adding a personal touch with my artistic skills.​
My name is Heather. Family and friends call me Hebs or Hebsie. I like to read dictionaries and cookbooks, love the outdoors, and am a mom of two sweet kids.
​
​I consider myself a linguistic ethnobiologist. I am fascinated by the interconnections of language and traditional ecological knowledge, particularly with multilingualism and endangered languages.
​
Some of my interdisciplinary interests:
​​​
-
multilingualism
-
ethnobiology
-
linguistic anthropology
-
cognitive anthropology & linguistics
-
psycholinguistics
-
language documentation
-
endangered languages
-
sociolinguistics
-
lexical variation
-
linguistic diversity
-
biodiversity and conservation
-
language revitalization & vitality
Although this site seems to be all about me, none of the research and raw data would have been possible without collaboration with people in Mbenguedjé and Nyanjida, who kindly let me basically invade their lives, follow them around, and ask all sorts of questions.
​
My research was funded by the Endangered Languages Documentation Program (ELDP).