Jason Kandybowicz is an Associate Professor of Linguistics at The Graduate Center of The City University of New York. We talk about linguistic field methods, endangered and fictional African languages, and how Japanese and Yoda’s speech are similar.

For more information:

• Africa’s Endangered Languages: Documentary and Theoretical Approaches, edited by Jason Kandybowicz and Harold Torrence

• World’s Languages Dying Off Rapidly by John Noble Wilford

• Endangered Language Alliance website

• Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages website

• When Languages Die: The Extinction of the World’s Languages and the Erosion of Human Knowledge by K. David Harrison

• Linguistics and Pop Culture: Language, Culture, and Black Panther by Clare Harshey

• Shiritori: a simple game that’s great for practicing your Japanese vocab by Peter Backhaus

• Khayelitsha, an essay I wrote about my experience in Cape Town, South Africa