I'm a forth-year graduate student in Linguistics at the University of Washington. My primary interests are in dialect contact, language variation and change, and social networks. The one big question that seems to guide most of my thinking in linguistics is: To what extent is linguistic output based on linguistic input, and how do social groupings influence that input (in perception) and output (in production)? Trying to answer this question means I get to look at both sociolinguistic and internal variation and change; in fact, a big part of approaching the question is teasing the two apart.

I'm privileged to have Alicia Beckford Wassink and Richard Wright for advisors. Before studying linguistics full-time I received a BA in Music (piano) and in English (writing) from William Paterson University.

My masters thesis, a study of the linguistic consequences of social networks in Seattle's Central District, is available here.

Currently, I'm lead RA of the Pacific Northwest Vowels project. In the Linguistics Department I do my work in the socio lab and phonetics lab. Starting this fall, I'll be the editor of the UW Working Papers in Linguistics. Read my CV for more.