Phew. It's been a busy three months but at the end of this week, first semester classes end (she says with a grin on her face :). That doesn't mean I haven't enjoyed the classes. In fact, I've loved them. One course is an honours class. This is different from honors at US universities. Here, the basic undergrad degree is 3 years. Students with a high enough GPA can enrol in a 4th (honours) year which gives them a separate degree. It's kind of like the first year of an MA (the 2nd year involving writing an MA thesis). Anyway, I have two very smart, motivated students in my year-long honours class and it's a joy to spend a couple hours a week discussing sound patterns with them.
My other class is made up of 14 third-year linguistics majors. Part of the class has involved the students carrying out an experiment in which a native speaker of another language (Maori, Japanese or Korean) produced made-up foreign words. The students designed the experiments, recorded the subjects, analyzed the acoustic data and presented the preliminary results at a gathering at Jon's and my home last night. It was so great seeing these students who were so intimidated a couple of months ago at the thought of doing their own experiments, giving powerpoint presentations with pretty graphs illustrating their results. After the presentations, we had tacos, drinks and good conversation (pictures to come). What a wonderful end to my first semester.
Over the past couple of weeks, I've also been hosting two good friends, Andy Wedel and Adam Ussishkin, who are visiting the New Zealand Institute for Language, Brain and Behaviour (plug, plug, plug :), giving presentations, talking with folks, and working with me. Andy and I collaborate on research investigating the impact of uncertainty on language production and processing, and Adam and I work on the sound system of Maltese. It's amazing how much more productive a research collaboration can be when you're sitting across the table in the same room!
It's also been so much fun having them here. Aside from us being able to show them some of the places that we like, they've also served as a very good reconnaissance team for me and Jon. Andy and Adam drove out to the west coast last weekend (North Americans: it took them *3* tiny hours to cross the country :), and came back with great stories and tips on what to see and where to go. Jon and I are going for a couple of days after the semester ends. (I.am.very.very.excited.:) (pictures of this definitely to come as well).
A week after that, I leave for the northern hemisphere (sounds weird to say that since I really don't feel like I'm that far away -- denial perhaps or just good internet and phone connections). Would love to see as many of you northern hemispherers as I can! My itinerary is below.
June 13-15, Columbus (OH)
June 15-22, Thornbury (Canada)
June 22-28, Paris (France)
June 29-30, Rochester (NY)
June 31-July 8, Columbus
Love and cheers,
Beth
No comments:
Post a Comment