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Barbara LeMaster

Title: Anthropology Department Chair
Professor in Anthropology
Professor in Linguistics
Email: Barbara.LeMaster@csulb.edu
Phone: (562) 985-5171
Office: F03-303

Education History

Bachelor’s Degree: 1979, double major in Linguistics & Anthropology, U.C. Berkeley.
Master’s Degree: 1983, Department of Anthropology, UCLA.
Ph.D.: 1990, Department of Anthropology, UCLA.
Postdoctoral Fellowship: 1994, in Medical Anthropology, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, UCLA.

 

Courses Taught

 LING 325: Models of Grammar
 LING/ANTH 170:  An Introduction to Linguistics
 LING 425/ANTH 421:  Education Across Cultures
LING/EDEL/EDP 431:  Cultural and Linguistic Diversity in Schooling
 LING 428:  Applied Linguistics
 LING 470/ANTH & WST 475:  Language and Gender
 LING 533/ANTH 530:  Seminar in Ethnography of Communication
 LING 540:  Seminar in Sociolinguistics
 ANTH 120:  Cultural Anthropology
 ANTH/LING 170:  An Introduction to Linguistics
 ANTH 412IC:  Culture and Communication
 ANTH 436:  Medical Anthropology
 ANTH 501:  The History of Anthropology Theory (and Contemporary Theory)
 ANTH 530/LING 533:  Seminar in Ethnography of Communication
 ANTH 630:  Seminar in Anthropological Linguistics
 ANTH 675:  Internship in Applied Anthropology

Research Focus and Teaching Specialties

My teaching and research interests are in issues of emergence and maintenance of ethnic, cultural, and gender identities in historical and ethnographic contexts, specifically examining the use of resistance and power in unequal social relationships. This includes an interest in general practices and discourses of social control, the dynamic interaction of disadvantaged people in situations of unequal social relationships. It also includes an interest in the effects of educational language policies on group structure and language use; and, an interest in the expression of gender, ethnicity, and cultural identity through language variation. My work involves descriptive linguistic and sociolinguistic analyses of Deaf sign languages, ethnographies of Deaf communities, and issues of gender socialization in schools. The contexts of my research are primarily in educational and community settings.

 

Selected Publications

LeMaster, B.  2010. “Authority and Preschool Disputes:  Learning to behave in the classroom,” Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 20: 166-178.

LeMaster, B., R. Moges, C. Trueblood. 2007. Gendered Phonology, Morphology, and Animacy in American Sign Language. Presented at the International Gender and Language Association (IGALA) meetings in Valencia, Spain in November, 2006; and to be published in the IGALA4 proceedings in 2007.

LeMaster, B. 2006. Language Contraction, Revitalization and Irish Women. In Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 16:2:211-228

LeMaster, B. and L. Monaghan. 2004. “Variation in Sign Languages.” In Alessandro Duranti (Ed.) A Companion to Linguistic Anthropology. Blackwell Press. Pp. 141-166. Reprinted in Monaghan, Leila (editor), Cultural Approach to Interpersonal Communication. 2006: 426-430.

LeMaster, B. 2003. “School Language and Shifts in Irish Deaf Identity.” In Leila Monaghan, Constance Schmaling, Karen Nakamura, and Graham Turner (Eds.), Many Ways to be Deaf: International Variation in Deaf Communities. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press. Pp. 153-172.

LeMaster, B. and M. Hernandez-Katapodis. 2002. Learning to Play School: The Role of Topic in Gendered Discourse Roles among Preschoolers. In Benor, S., Rose, M., Sharma, D., Sweetland, J, and Q. Zhang (eds.). Gendered Practices in Language. Stanford, California: CSLI Publications. Pp. 213-236.