Lenore A. Grenoble

Dr. Lenore A. Grenoble specializes in the study of language contact and shift in Indigenous settings, with particular attention to the Arctic. Her work is empirically driven, and her current interests focus on language usage in multilingual settings, with particular attention to Arctic Indigenous language communities. She is presently involved in several collaborative projects that investigate the linguistic, social and cognitive causes and outcomes of contact and shift, coupled with questions about the impact of urbanization and climate change, on Arctic Indigenous language vitality. Alongside these projects, she is involved in research into language revitalization and how to create long-term sustainable language practices. Her current field and documentation work is centered in the Russian Far North and Arctic, and in Greenland. Grenoble is a member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and a recipient of the Guggenheim Fellowship and a fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS). In 2018 she held the Fulbright Arctic Distinguished Chair, Norway. She has received grants from the NSF Program in Linguistics and the Program in Documenting Endangered Languages.

Books/Edited Volumes: 

• Reconstructing Non-Standard Languages: A Socially-Anchored Approach, by Lenore A. Grenoble & Jessica Kantarovich. 2022. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Press. https://doi.org/10.1075/impact.52
• Language Contact in the Territory of the Former Soviet Union, ed. by Diana Forker & Lenore a. Grenoble. 2021. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10. 1075/impact.50
• Linguistic Minorities in Europe. Lenore A. Grenoble, Pia Lane & Unn Røyneland, eds. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. 2019- https://www.degruyter.com/lme
• Encyclopedia of Slavic Languages & Linguistics. Marc L. Greenberg, Editor-in-chief; & Lenore A. Grenoble, General editor Associate editors: Stephen Dickey, Masako Fidler, Marek Łazi«ski, Nadezjda Zorikhina Nilsson, Anita Peti-Stanti¢, & Björn Wiemer. Leiden: Brill. Online: 2020 -https://referenceworks.brillonline.com/browse/encyclopedia-of-slavic-languages-and-linguistics-online
• Saving Languages. Lenore A. Grenoble & Lindsay Whaley. 2006. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
• Language Policy in the Former Soviet Union. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Press, 2003.
• Language Documentation: Practices and Values. Lenore A. Grenoble & N. Louanna Furbee, (eds.) Amsterdam: John Benjamins Press, 2010. [paperback edition: 2012]
• Endangered Languages: Current Issues and Future Prospects. Lenore A. Grenoble & Lindsay Whaley, (eds.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.

Selected Articles:

• Phillips, Jacob, Lenore A. Grenoble, & Peggy Mason. The unembodied metaphor: Comprehension and production of tactile metaphors. Frontiers in Communication 8: 1144018. https://doi.org/10.3389/fcomm.2023.1144018
• Grenoble, Lenore A., Elena V. Nesterova, & Antonina A. Vinokurova. 2023. Language vitality and sustainability: Minority Indigenous languages in the Sakha Republic. In Vladimir D. Davydov, Jenanne Ferguson, & John Ziker, eds., The Siberian World, 31-46. New York: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429354663-3
• Grenoble, Lenore A. & Boris Osipov. 2023. The dynamics of bilingualism in language shift ecologies. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 13(1): 1-39. http://doi.org/10.1075/lab.22035.gre
• Grenoble, Lenore A. & Boris Osipov. 2023. Understanding language shift. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 13(1). http://doi.org/10.1075/lab.22100.gre
• Malysheva, Ninel, Lenore A. Grenoble, Igor Danilov, Marina Osorova, & Aitalina Rakhleeva. Plants in the Sakha culture: names, knowledge and habitat. Journal of Ethnobiology 42(2): 461-476. Supplemental material pp. 1-6. https://doi.org/10.2993/0278-0771-42.4.461
• Grenoble, Lenore A. Contact and shift: Colonization and Urbanization in the Arctic. 2022. In Salikoko S. Mufwene & Anna María Escobar, eds., The Cambridge Handbook of Language Contact, 473-501. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009105965.024
• McMahan, Hilary, Lenore A. Grenoble, & Alliaq Kleist Petrussen. 2022. A socially anchored approach to spatial language in Kalaallisut. Linguistics Vanguard 8 (s1): 39-51. https://doi.org/10.1515/lingvan-2020-0013
• Boltokova, Daria, Lenore A. Grenoble, Jessica Kantarovich, & Maria Pupynina. 2022. Knowing and remembering: assessing proficiency in endangered language communities. Language Documentation & Conservation 16: 137-159. https://hdl.handle.net/10125/74676
• Forker, Diana & Lenore A. Grenoble. 2021. Some structural similarities in the outcomes of language contact with Russian. In Diana Forker & Lenore A. Grenoble, eds., Language contact in the territory of the former Soviet Union, 259-287. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/impact.50.int
• Grenoble, Lenore A. 2021. Why revitalize? In Justyna Olko & Julia Sallabank, eds., Revitalising endangered languages: A practical guide, 9-32. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108641142.002
• Grenoble, Lenore A. 2021. Language shift. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Linguistics. Published online 25 March 2021. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199384655.013.34
• Grenoble, Lenore A. & Lindsay J. Whaley. 2020. Toward a new conceptualization of language revitalization. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development. https://doi.org/10.1080/01434632.2020.1827645
• Grenoble, Lenore A. 2020. Urbanization, language vitality and well-being in Russian Eurasia. In Matthew Romaniello, Jane Hacking & Jeff Hardy, eds., Russia in Asia: Interactions, Imaginations, and Realities, 183-202. Oxford: Routledge
• Grenoble, Lenore A. 2020. Contact and the development of the Slavic languages. In Raymond Hickey, ed., Handbook of Language Contact. 2nd Edition. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

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Multilingualism: Theory and Praxis (LING 24320/34320) - Spring 2021

This course focuses on current approaches to the study of bi- and multilingualism, taking a broad definition that understands bilingualism as the use of  more than one language. Individuals show a great deal of variability in the ways they acquire and use different languages, and can most We focus on the use of multilingualism in society, asking theoretical questions such as:

• How people use their multilingual repertoire in different settings and different kinds of interactions, ranging from face-to-face communication to multilingual practices
• The use of different languages (and linguistic varieties) in indexing social identity
• Theoretical questions in the differences between code-switching, the idea that speakers alternate between one language and another, versus translanguaging, the claim that both (or all) languages are constantly active, and the multilingual speaker actively chooses one or another depending on which is appropriate, in an integrated communicative approach
• How individuals are socialized into using different languages, and how language ideologies affect language policies and practices in the family, in educational settings, in the workplace, and more broadly in society

At the same time, we consider the practical study of multilingualism, assessing proficiency, language attitudes and awareness of multilingualism. The course is based on readings and a hands-on project involving data collection and analysis.

Multilingualism: Theory and Praxis (LING 24320/34320) - Winter 2020

This course focuses on current approaches to the study of bi- and multilingualism, taking a broad definition that understands bilingualism as the use of  more than one language. Individuals show a great deal of variability in the ways they acquire and use different languages, and can most We focus on the use of multilingualism in society, asking theoretical questions such as:

• How people use their multilingual repertoire in different settings and different kinds of interactions, ranging from face-to-face communication to multilingual practices
• The use of different languages (and linguistic varieties) in indexing social identity
• Theoretical questions in the differences between code-switching, the idea that speakers alternate between one language and another, versus translanguaging, the claim that both (or all) languages are constantly active, and the multilingual speaker actively chooses one or another depending on which is appropriate, in an integrated communicative approach
• How individuals are socialized into using different languages, and how language ideologies affect language policies and practices in the family, in educational settings, in the workplace, and more broadly in society

At the same time, we consider the practical study of multilingualism, assessing proficiency, language attitudes and awareness of multilingualism. The course is based on readings and a hands-on project involving data collection and analysis.