Professor and Head of the Department of Asian studies
Major Research Interests:
1) Korean historical linguistics (esp. Korean historical grammar, Middle Korean, pre-hangul sources on Korean, and the putative genetic relationship of Korean to Macro-Altaic, including Japanese);
2) Korean dialectology (esp. the dialect(s) preserved by the ethnic Korean minority in Russia and the former USSR, and ‘kyop’o Korean’ or diasporic varieties of Korean, in general);
3) History of Korean linguistics, including the history of Korean linguistic thought in Korea, Korean language and nationalism, Korean language ideologies, as well as the history of Korean linguistics and language pedagogy outside Korea;
4) Korean language pedagogy, including both post-secondary (university) and K-12 instruction. For the former, please visit www.korean.arts.ubc.ca, and for the latter, please visit http://www.ConcordiaLanguageVillages.org and go into the “Korean Language Village” pages; and
5) History of language, writing and literary culture in the Sinographic cultural sphere, with a specific focus on medieval Korea and the interplay of cosmopolitan and vernacular in other regions of the Sinographic cosmopolis.
Background:
Ph.D. (Harvard, 1991) Linguistics
M.A. (Harvard, 1986) Linguistics
B.A. (Yale, 1983) Linguistics (Japanese-Korean) and Political Science
