Expertise

Research Interests:

  • Korean language and linguistics
  • Comparative study of East Asian languages
  • Discourse-pragmatic and cognitive approaches to grammar
  • Synchronic variation and language change: Grammaticalization, lexicalization
  • Korean language and linguistics; comparative study of East Asian languages; discourse-pragmatic and cognitive approach to grammar

I am interested in discourse-pragmatics, linguistic typology and language universals. I seek functional explanations on why languages are structured in the ways they are through the ways human beings communicate with each other.

Recently, grammaticalization and synchronic variation are my main research areas.

 



 
Past Affiliations

UC President Postdoctoral Fellow, Office of the President, University of California, Los Angeles (past)

Visiting Assistant Professor, Linguistics, University of California, Los Angeles (past)

Visiting Lecturer, Linguistics

Associate Professor, East Asian Studies Center, Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies, Indiana University Bloomington

Communities
Language Studies, Language Studies, Asian Studies, Chinese, Chinese, Japanese, Japanese
Degrees
PhD, University of California, Los Angeles, Linguistics, 1991
MA, University of California, Los Angeles, Linguistics, 1984
Keywords
arts and humanities korean language or literature linguistics or philology
Languages
Chickasaw, Choctaw, French, Japanese, Korean, Lakota, O'Odham, Spanish
Honors

Trustees Teaching Award (TTA), Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures (Indiana University Bloomington), 2003-2004

Indiana University TERA Teaching Excellence Recognition Award (Teaching Award), Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures (Indiana University Bloomington), 1998-1999

UC Presidential Postdoctoral Fellowship (Linguistics), UC President Office, 1992-1993

International Cultural Society of Korea Pre-doctoral Fellowship, Int'l Cultural Society of Korea (now absorbed into Korea Foundation), 1989-1989

Magma Cum Laude, University of California at Los Angeles, 1981

Honors in Linguistics (Linguistics), Dept. of Linguistics (University of California at Los Angeles), 1981

Associations
American Association of Teachers of Korean
American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages
International Circle of Korean Linguistics
International Cognitive Linguistics Association
International Pragmatics Association
Linguistic Society of America
Linguistic Society of Korea
The Discourse and Cognitive Linguistics Society of Korea