34.1296, Tales from Tanzania: Part 5

Fri Apr 21 17:05:05 UTC 2023

LINGUIST List: Vol-34-1296. Fri Apr 21 2023. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 34.1296, Tales from Tanzania: Part 5

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Team: Helen Aristar-Dry, Steven Franks, Everett Green, Joshua Sims, Daniel Swanson, Matthew Fort, Maria Lucero Guillen Puon, Zackary Leech, Lynzie Coburn
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Editor for this issue: Maria Lucero Guillen Puon <luceroguillen at linguistlist.org>
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Date: 21-Apr-2023
From: Maria Lucero Guillen Puon [luceroguillen at linguistlist.org]
Subject: Family and fieldwork

Tales from Tanzania: Part 5
Family and fieldwork
Jeremy Coburn, PhD candidate, Indiana University

What is it like to conduct linguistic fieldwork in a remote location
with a family? While it certainly is not an easy task, it was
immensely rewarding to share the experiences with my wife and
children, none of whom had previously been to Tanzania. For me, it was
as much a part of the goals I had set for the trip than the research
itself. Fortunately, the Fulbright-Hays DDRA fellowship was an
experience specifically tailored to such an endeavor.

As I mentioned last week in Part 4, our homebase in Karatu was an hour
motorcycle drive from my *nearest* research site. The farthest site,
at which I spent most of my time, was a three-hour one-way trip into
the bush. Most weeks, my family would remain in Karatu while I would
go and conduct research on the weekdays, camped in my little two-man
tent, before returning on the weekend. On several occasions, however,
either just my 6-year-old son or the entire family would come and stay
with me in the Hadza camp. We would ride out on motorcycles for the
three-hour trip through very rough terrain. Together, we would share
all the experiences entailed in spending time with the Hadza. My son
would often go out hunting little birds with the other boys while I
sat with Hadza speakers collecting data or making recordings. The
Hadza children and he loved spending time together, despite a language
barrier between them.

Being a linguistic fieldworker is challenging; doing that work while
also taking care of a family is even more so. However, I would argue
that *not* having them there for those 10 months would have been even
more difficult. As academics, it is easy to expect us to
compartmentalize our lives and it is often (implicitly) expected that
we will sacrifice everything for the furthering of our discipline and
career. But my research could have been a total bust and I still would
have felt that this experience was worth every challenge we faced…
because I am not just a field linguist. I am also a family man.

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LINGUIST List: Vol-34-1296
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