Fieldwork · Documentation · Stewardship
Research and archival practice connect linguistic questions with the responsibilities of documenting, describing, and sharing knowledge. The records below distinguish authored research, institutional archival work, and collaborative initiatives.
Nilgiris, Tamil Nadu
Research on language maintenance and multilingual practices among Toda and Kota communities in the Nilgiris. This work investigates language choice and change in relation to social life and structural inequalities. It forms the empirical foundation of the 2025 monograph Multilinguality, Vitality, and Endangerment.
Centre for Endangered Languages, Sikkim University
Work on documenting and organising language collections within the Sikkim–Darjeeling Himalayas Endangered Language Archive (SiDHELA). The experience informed published research on the development of language archives in India and collaborative approaches to their creation.
Research and technology co-authors listed in the published paper
Collaboration on approaches connecting community-based linguistic data collection with annotation, dataset preparation and language-technology workflows. The 2025 paper Field to Model: Pairing Community Data Collection with Scalable NLP through the LiFE Suite describes a pipeline spanning field collection, data processing and model development.
Digital heritage and archival infrastructure
Contribution to the organisation, digitisation, description and long-term accessibility of linguistic and cultural heritage collections through a digital repository. This work concerns the practical relationship between archival metadata, preservation infrastructure and responsible access.
With Alternative Media Centre and participating artists and practitioners
Suvadugal brings together documentation of performing-arts practices, artists, instruments, and associated material culture. Recent work has included documentation and 3D scanning of Silambam objects and a curated exhibition on Silambam material traditions. The initiative connects field documentation with questions of interpretation, attribution, digital representation and the continuity of artistic knowledge.
This is a collaborative initiative involving documentation and scanning teams, organisers, and community practitioners.