The second half of my Nueva Vida trip went very well: I finished transcribing a total of 2.5 hours of recordings (about 13,000 words) in Western Máíhɨ̃ki, and recorded several hours of new material with one of the oldest speakers of that dialect. Fortune also smiled on me in terms of Northern dialect data collection. I was able to do significant lexical work with a Northern Máíhɨ̃ki speaker who visited Nueva Vida for the MP's linguistics workshop, and I talked at some length to five more speakers who were passing through Nueva Vida on the way back to Tótóyà from the federation congress.
I also picked up a new hobby on the Yanayacu: the hula hoop! Since Nueva Vida is essentially a swamp, it's not possible to run or walk for exercise, so the only options are swimming and things that you can do inside. Chris Beier brought along a weighted adult hula hoop for just this reason, and by the end of the field season I was a pro with it. She was also kind enough to give me the hula hoop as a farewell gift - so it should see some further use in Estrecho! I wish I could provide photographic evidence of this development, but alas my stills camera was on the fritz for most of the field season.
Since the rest of the MP team went back to Berkeley on Tuesday, my hula hoop and I are alone in Iquitos for the week. I spent the first few days after we arrived wrapping up team work, and now I'm getting ready for the first solo phase of my trip - buying supplies, packing my luggage, preparing materials, and catching up with some of you :) - through Monday the 26th. Then early Tuesday, I fly to El Estrecho, where all the gnats are strong, all the scenery is beautiful, and all the subordinate clauses are above average.
(The Plaza de Armas, or town square, of El Estrecho. Photo by Chris Beier)
No comments:
Post a Comment