Visiting Assistant Professor
Department of Linguistics
The Ohio State University
222 Oxley Hall
1712 Neil Ave
Columbus, OH 43210-1298

rebecca at ling dot osu edu

Education
2010 Ph.D. in linguistics, University of California, Berkeley.
Dissertation: Aspect, Modality, and Tense in Badiaranke
Dissertation committee: Line Mikkelsen (chair), Lev Michael, and Alan Timberlake.
2005 M.A. in linguistics, University of California, Berkeley.
2005 Linguistic Society of America Summer Institute, Harvard/MIT.
2005 DOBES Endangered Language Documentation Training Week, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen.
2000 B.A. in astrophysics, valedictorian, summa cum laude, Williams College, Williamstown, MA.
Honors thesis: h and chi Persei: An Analysis of Cluster Membership.

Grants and Fellowships
2011-2013 ACLS (American Council of Learned Societies) New Faculty Fellowship, Linguistics, The Ohio State University
2008 Dean's Normative Time Fellowship, University of California, Berkeley
2005-2008 With Larry Hyman (PI), NSF/NEH Documenting Endangered Languages Grant
2005 Linguistic Society of America Bloch Memorial Fellowship
2004-2007 National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship
2004 West African Research Association Pre-Doctoral Fellowship
2004 Rocca Pre-Dissertation Summer Research Award from the UC Berkeley Center for African Studies
2003 Pre-Doctoral Humanities Fellowship from UC Berkeley (2 years)
1996-2000 Honors at Williams College, including valedictorian; Phi Beta Kappa; Sigma Xi; Willis I. Milham Award in astronomy; James A. Baxter Honor Scholarship; 1944 Class Scholarship; Class of 1960 Scholar in Physics.

Fieldwork
2008 2 months' fieldwork on Badiaranke (Atlantic) in Paroumba, Senegal and Sounkoutou, Guinea. Elicited data from consultants as well as recording, transcribing, and analyzing longer texts.
2006 3 months' fieldwork on Badiaranke in Paroumba, Senegal and surrounding villages.
2005-2006 Elicitation on Kuki-Thado (Tibeto-Burman) in Berkeley, CA.
2004 2 months' fieldwork on Badiaranke in Paroumba, Senegal.
2000-2002 Developed fluency in Pulaar (Atlantic) as a Peace Corps volunteer in Thiangaye, Senegal.

Publications
2011 Modal aspects of Badiaranke aspect. Lingua 121(8):1315-1343.
Accepted The Syntax and Semantics of Stem 1 and Stem 2 in Thadou-Kuki.
2005 Cover, Rebecca T., and Yuni Kim. Proceedings of the 31st Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society: General Session and Parasession on Prosodic Variation and Change. Berkeley, CA: Berkeley Linguistics Society.
2005 Cover, Rebecca T., and Yuni Kim. Proceedings of the 31st Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society: Special Session on Languages of West Africa. Berkeley, CA: Berkeley Linguistics Society.

Conference Presentations
2012 The semantics of pluractionality in Badiaranke. 43rd Annual Conference on African Linguistics, New Orleans, LA, March 17.
2012 Semantic fieldwork on Badiaranke TAM. Poster at the 86th Annual Meeting of the Linguistic Society of America (LSA), Portland, OR, January 8.
2010 Modal orientation and aspect. 84th Annual Meeting of the LSA, Baltimore, MD, January 10.
2009 A preliminary look at Badiaranke counterfactuals. Workshop on Counterfactuals, Causality, and Inertia, Stanford, CA, October 18, 2009.
2009 The modality of aspect in Badiaranke. California Universities Semantics and Pragmatics (CUSP), Los Angeles, CA, May 24.
2009 Sequence of tense in an aspect language. 83rd Annual Meeting of the LSA, San Francisco, CA, January 10.
2007 Modal aspects of Badiaranke aspect. Western Conference on Linguistics (WeCoL), San Diego, December 1.
2007 The narrative tense that isn't: Narrative morphology in Badiaranke. 38th Annual Conference on African Linguistics (ACAL 38), Gainesville, March 23.
2007 The semantics of aspect in Badiaranke. 81st Annual Meeting of the LSA, Anaheim, January 5.
2006 Reflections on inflection: TAMP in Badiaranke. 37th Annual Conference on African Linguistics, Eugene, April 8, 2006.
2006 Focus on ko: The syntax and semantics of identificational focus in Pulaar. 80th Annual Meeting of the LSA, Albuquerque, January 6.
2005 When antecedents matter: Possessive pronouns in Pulaar. 79th Annual Meeting of the LSA, Boston, January 8.
2005 When endangered languages don't "feel" endangered: The case of Badiaranke. Poster at the 79th Annual Meeting of the LSA, Oakland, January 7.

Informal Presentations
2008 The role of tense in an aspect language. UC Berkeley Syntax and Semantics Circle, September 25.
2007 Inclusory constructions. UC Berkeley Syntax and Semantics Circle (with Alice Gaby), November 9.
2007 The narrative tense that isnŐt: Narrative morphology in Badiaranke. UC Syntax and Semantics Circle, March 16.
2006 The role of linguistic theory in grammar writing. UC Berkeley Grammar Reading and Writing Group, October 20.
2006 Reflections on inflection: TAMP in Badiaranke. UC Berkeley Syntax and Semantics Circle, March 24.
2006 Aspects of aspect in Badiaranke: Progress and problems. UC Berkeley Data Group, March 17.
2006 Tense/aspect/polarity/person in Badiaranke: An overview. UC Berkeley Data Group, January 27.
2005 Focus on ko: The syntax and semantics of identificational focus in Pulaar. UC Berkeley Syntax and Semantics Circle, November 28.
2005 An introduction to ELAN. Berkeley Endangered Language Lexicography Outfit, November 6.
2004 When antecedents matter: Possessive pronouns in Pulaar. UC Berkeley Syntax and Semantics Circle, November 12.

Non-Linguistics Publications
2008 D.R. Parker, R. Gramling, R.E. Goldman, C.B. Eaton, D. Ahern, R.T. Cover, and J. Borkan. Physicians' perceptions of barriers and facilitators regarding adoption of the National Cholesterol Education Program guidelines. Preventive Cardiology 11(1):29-35.
2006 R.E. Goldman, D.R. Parker, C.B. Eaton, J.M. Borkan, R. Gramling, R.T. Cover, and D.K. Ahern. Patients' perceptions of cholesterol, cardiovascular disease risk, and risk communication strategies. Annals of Family Medicine 4:205-212.
2000 Wolk, Scott J., Rebecca T. Cover, Ray Jayawardhana, and Thomas J. Hearty. MBM12: A younger version of the TW Hydrae Association? In From Darkness to Light: Origin and Evolution of Young Stellar Clusters, ed. by Thierry Montmerle and Philippe Andre.

Teaching
Autumn 2011 ACLS New Faculty Fellow, The Ohio State University.
  • Instructor, Linguistics 597.01: Language Endangerment and Language Death.
  • Spring 2011 James R. Gray Lecturer, University of California, Berkeley.
  • Instructor, Linguistics 181: Lexical Semantics.
  • Instructor, Linguistics 5: Language and Linguistics.
  • Instructor, Linguistics 55AC: The American Languages.
  • Fall 2010 James R. Gray Lecturer, University of California, Berkeley.
  • Instructor, Linguistics R6: Endangered Languages.
  • Fall 2009 Instructor, Linguistics R6: Endangered Languages, University of California, Berkeley.
    Fall 2007 Graduate Student Instructor, Linguistics 100: Introduction to Linguistic Science, University of California, Berkeley. Instructor: Joseph Sabbagh.
    Spring 2007 Graduate Student Instructor, Linguistics 55: The American Languages, University of California, Berkeley. Instructor: Robin Lakoff.
    1997-1999 Teaching Assistant, Astronomy, Williams College.

    Service
    2005-2007 Student representative to faculty meetings, Department of Linguistics, University of California, Berkeley.
    2005-2007 Student representative to the Linguistic Society of America Executive Committee.
    2005-2007 Member of the Linguistic Society of America's Committee on Membership Services and Information Technology.
    2005-2006 Member of the Linguistic Society of America's Information Technology Advisory Group.
    2005 Co-organizer (with Yuni Kim) of the 31st Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society, Feb. 18-20.

    Other Experience
    2003 Research Assistant, Department of Family Medicine, Memorial Hospital of Rhode Island, Pawtucket, RI. Conducted research on cholesterol management in primary health care.
    2000-2002 Peace Corps Rural Health Volunteer, Thiangaye, Senegal. Worked and lived as a health educator in northern Senegal, teaching villagers in Pulaar about AIDS, maternal health, hygiene, first aid, and other nationally prioritized health subjects.
    2000 Peace Corps Trainee, Thies, Senegal. Completed intensive 12-week training program on Pulaar (oral and written), Senegalese culture, and non-formal education techniques.
    1999 Summer Intern, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, MA. Reduced optical data in preparation for honors thesis.
    1999 Team Member, Williams College Eclipse Expedition to Romania. Prepared telescope, focused digital images, and wrote computer code to image the solar corona during total eclipse of the sun.

    Professional Membership
    2003-present Linguistic Society of America

    Languages
    English native
    Pulaar (Atlantic)fluent
    Badiaranke (Atlantic)proficient
    Frenchproficient
    Italianproficient
    Hebrewfair
    Swahilibeginner
    Bambara (Mande)elicitation
    Kuki-Thado (Kuki Chin)elicitation