Faculty & Staff:
Those involved with NILI come from a variety of backgrounds and specialize in a variety of areas including:
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NILI Staff:
Dr. Janne Underriner
Director
Janne Underriner is the director of the Northwest Indian Language Institute. She has been active with language preservation issues in the Northwest since 1996 when she began working with Elders in the Klamath Tribes' language project developing curriculum and teaching materials for their community and schools. She co-founded the Northwest Indian Language Institute (NILI) in 1997. Underriner assists the tribes in developing language programs, curriculum, assessment and teaching materials. She worked with the Tribes to develop the NW Indian Language Benchmarks in 2000. She is a grant writer of language and educational projects for the Tribes and for NILI. Underriner is a consultant to Oregon's Department of Education. Her languages of research are Klamath, Tolowa and Chinuk Wawa.
Judith Fernandes
Language teaching consultant
Judith Fernandes currently works for NILI as a language teaching consultant and instructor for the NILI Summer Institute. She is a retired public school language teacher with a specialization in immersion. She has worked with tribes in a variety of areas including designing assessment, curriculum building, immersion teaching, teacher training, writing benchmarks and lesson planning.
Lindsay Marean
Teacher trainer
Lindsay Marean taught Spanish for five years in Montana and Oregon. She then earned her MA in linguistics from the University of Oregon while working as a student teacher supervisor for the College of Education here. She moved California to work as a teacher trainer and curriculum developer with the Nüümü Yadoha language program there. Since returning to Oregon, she has continued working as a student teacher supervisor, as the editor of a weekly e-digest for language teachers, and as a practical linguist for the Tübatulabals of California. Her work with NILI includes instruction at the Summer Institute and participation in a curriculum development project for chinuk wawa learners. In her free time she studies her own ancestral language, Potawatomi.
Joana Jansen
Project coordinator
Joana Jansen completed her M.A. degree in Linguistics at the University of Oregon in June of 2004, and is currently working with Virginia Beavert on a doctoral degree at the University of Oregon that will focus on the grammar of Yakama Sahaptin. She also works with the Northwest Indian Language Institute (NILI) teaching Linguistics for Native Language Teachers, and coordinating NILI’s Summer Institute as well as on-site teacher trainings focused on program development, curriculum, and materials. In collaboration with community members, Heritage University and NILI staff, she organized the 2005 and 2006 Sahaptian Language Conferences.
Christopher Doty
Grants and technology coordinator
NILI Advisory Board:
Virginia Beavert
Yakama Nation Elder and Teacher
Tony A. Johnson
Cultural education coordinator, Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde
Tony Johnson is a Chinook Tribal member, a linguist and an artist who was born in his family’s traditional territory on Willapa Bay in Washington. His education includes attending the University of Washington and Central Washington University, where he earned a degree in Silversmithing and a minor in Anthropology.
Today, Tony directs the Language Program for the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde where he is involved in the revitalization of the Chinuk Wawa language. He acquired Chinuk Wawa as a second language from his own elders as well as the elders of the Grand Ronde community. Currently Grand Ronde is experiencing an exciting revitalization of this community language. Tony is committed to this end, is a teacher of students of all ages, and is actively involved in promoting the history and use of this important NW language.
Scott DeLancey
Professor of Lingustics, University of Oregon
Scott DeLancey's research activities center on the intersection of several areal and theoretical topics. Areally, his work is centered on the study of languages of South and East Asia, particularly the Tibeto-Burman family, and of western North America, particularly the Penutian stock. He has produced descriptive and analytical studies of aspects of the grammar of Tibetan, Newari, Sunwar, and other Tibeto-Burman languages, and of Klamath and Sahaptin in Oregon, and has also worked extensively on the historical reconstruction of Tibeto Burman and of Penutian, particularly of aspects of their morphology and syntax.
Brenda Frank
Director of Education, Klamath Tribes
Jeff Magoto
Director, Yamada Language Center
Carl Falsgraf
Director, Center for Applied Second Language Studies
Zalmai (Zeke) Zahir
Lushootseed teacher and scholar
Zalmai (Zeke) Zahir is a scholar and instructor of the Lushootseed language and culture. For over thirty years he has studied with elderly speakers, researching, transcribing and translating Lushootseed. He has authored and co-authored a number of Lushootseed language publications.