vision statement: a tranifesto
The UCSB Trans Research In Linguistics Lab (TRILL) promotes understandings of language, power, and identity through trans-centering research and community engagement. We are committed not only to trans analytic lenses, but also social and linguistic justice for gender non-normative communities, within and beyond academia. We understand ‘transness’ broadly, taking into account the ways gendered identities are produced by and in conversation with various forms of domination and resistance. Thus, we recognize gender as necessarily intersecting with other subjectivities and positionalities, among them race, ethnicity, and citizenship; disability and neurodiversity; linguistic and semiotic repertoires and communicative modalities; class; and sexuality. Through our academic and community-based work, language is central because of its capacity to both oppress and empower, to dehumanize and to make whole, to bring suffering and to bring joy.
TransTalks & Other TRILL Events
-
![AAA 2023: "Transitions" theme logo]()
TRILL Members at AAA 2023
Lab members organized and participated in several panels at the Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association:
“Trans-cending Realms and Selves, Pasts and Futures: Language and the Politics of Remembering” (Organizer: Dozandri C. Mendoza)
“Trans linguistic logics: Spatial and embodied epistemologies across modalities” (Organizers: Lal Zimman, Joshua Raclaw & Ariana Steele)
“Trans linguistic logics: Pronominal and grammatical epistemologies” (Organizers: Joshua Raclaw, Ariana Steele & Lal Zimman)
-
![]()
TransTalk: "Considering semiotic agency in studying trans language"
Dr. J. Calder (they/she), University of Colorado, Boulder
April 17, 2023, 10:30am-12:00pm
Zoom & South Hall 4430CFor Zoom link, email the TRILL lab manager at transresearchinlinguisticslab at gmail dot com
-
![Members of TRILL on Zoom with Dr. Kirby Conrod]()
TransTalk: Research workshop on neopronouns
Dr. Kirby Conrod (they/them), Swarthmore College
January 23, 2023, 10:30am-12:00pm
Zoom & South Hall 4430C -
![]()
TransTalk: "'I don’t know, it’s something that I have been playing with a little bit': The social contexts that continuously mediate trans men’s disclosure decisions"
Tristen Kade (he/they), UC Santa Barbara (Sociology)
February 23, 2023, 10:30am-12:00pm
Zoom & South Hall 4430C -
![Members of TRILL on Zoom with Dr. Túlio Bermúdez Mejía]()
TransTalk: "Euphoric Transmutation: Queer linguistics beyond representation and inclusion"
Dr. Túlio Bermúdez Mejía (he/they/él/ellx)
University of ChicagoNovember 28, 2022, 10:30am-12:00pm
TRILL Members
-
Dr. Lal Zimman (he/they)
Lab Director / PI
Research interests: trans linguistics, sociophonetics, embodiment, pronouns, trans inclusive language & pedagogy, stance & affect, trans voice training & SLP, online trans communities, drag performance and media, language & social justice
-
Dozandri C. Mendoza (they/them/elle)
PhD Candidate, Linguistics
Research interests: sociocultural linguistics, linguistic anthropology, queer/trans Latinx performance, drag and Ballroom culture, patería/Puerto Rican Studies, semiotics, discourse analysis, sociophonetics
-
deandre miles-hercules (they/them)
PhD Candidate, Linguistics
Research interests: TBA
-
Jordan Tudisco (they/them)
PhD Candidate, Comparative Literature
Research interests: trans memoirs, fiction and poetry; transness and race; French linguistics and non-binary French; trans self-determination and self-representation; trans criminalization and incarceration; trans pornography; trauma and memory; postcolonial studies; transphobia and TERF hate speech
-
Kristian Ali (she/her)
PhD Candidate, Linguistics
Research Interests Sign language linguistics, Language documentation and description, Typology, Phonology, Caribbean sign languages, Linguistic ethnography, Tactile languages, Language and social justice
-
Cedar Brown (they/them)
PhD Student, Linguistics
Research interests: sociocultural linguistics, trans linguistics, computational linguistics, linguistic anthropology, discourse analysis, sociophonetics, trans inclusive language, online trans communities, language and identity, trans/queer theory, community-engaged research
-
Julien De Jesus (they/them)
PhD Student, Linguistics
Research interests: sociocultural linguistics, linguistic anthropology, queer/trans Latinx performance, drag and Ballroom culture, patería/Puerto Rican Studies, semiotics, discourse analysis, sociophonetics
-
Solaire Denaud (she/her)
PhD Student, Comparative Literature
Research interests: TBA
-
Nicky Macias (she/they/ella)
PhD Student, Linguistics
Research interests: Sociocultural signed linguistics; signed language interpreting; trans interpreter communities; interpreter ethics; embodiment and interpreting; trans linguistics; signed sociophonetics; language ethnography
-
Marissa Morgan (she/her)
PhD Student, Linguistics
Research interests: Sociocultural linguistics; linguistic anthropology; discourse analysis; African-American Language and Culture; embodiment; space and place; language and ritual; discourses of death, grief and mourning
-
Marina Zhukova (she/her)
PhD Student, Linguistics
Research Interests: sociocultural linguistics, computational linguistics, language and identity, language and gender, emoji, co-speech gestures, Russian
-
Cooper Bedin (any pronouns)
MA Student, Linguistics
Research Interests: computational modeling of sociolinguistic phenomena, sociophonetics, (gender-)inclusive language, algorithmic justice, cognitive linguistics, psycholinguistics
-
Ece Genc (they/them)
BA student
Research interests: TBA
TRILL Alumnx
-
Archie Crowley (they/them)
PhD, Linguistics (2023), University of South Carolina
Dissertation: Language Ideologies and Linguistic Activism in Transgender Communities in the U.S. South
Current affiliation: Elon University
-
Brooke English (it/its)
MA, Linguistics (2022)
MA thesis: r/TransVoice: Emotions and Community-Based Voice Training
Research interests: language and identity, science and technology studies, trans/queer theory, community-engaged research
-
Jazmine Exford (she/her)
PhD, Linguistics (2023)
Dissertation: Raciogendered Embodiment and Indexicality in the Acquisition Experiences of Racialized Spanish Language Learners
Current affiliation: Assistant Professor of Spanish Linguistics, Florida International University
-
Crystal Gong (they/them)
BA, Linguistics (2022)
Current affiliation: Nagoya University
Capstone project: “‘My kokoro is male!’ Bodily resources for constructing gender and sex in IS: otoko demo nai onna demo nai sei”
-
Aris Keshav (they/he)
MA, Linguistics (2021)
Current affiliation: Concordia University
MA thesis: I love you: Normativity, Power, and Romance in Metalinguistic Commentary
-
Chloe Willis (she/they)
PhD, Linguistics (2023)
Dissertation: The Theoretical and Methodological Implications of Bisexuality in Language and Sexuality Research
Reviews & testimonials
“Anthropology in ruins.”
–A review of the title of our 2022 AAA panel, “Pronouns, bottoms, cat-ears, and cuerpes, girl: For an intersectional trans linguistic anthropology”
Research Areas
Resources
