Rui Yamawaki

I am interested in community-centered language revitalization, bi/multilingualism, documentary linguistics, language education, first and second language acquisition, and anaphora resolution.

I work with speakers of Rarámuri (also known as Tarahumara) in Chihuahua, Mexico. 

My aim is to respectfully support their goals related to language revitalization and reclamation work. I hope to navigate language work from a place of humility, sensitivity, and gratitude – because above all else, language work should be about the people. To me, this means respecting and listening to the voices of community members, of those who have experienced injustice at the hands of colonial and racist powers. 

At the center of my academic objectives is a trifecta of motives: my multilingualism driving my interest in bilingual research, my connection to the Rarámuri community framing this research in the context of minoritized languages, and my sense of social responsibility pushing me to be an ally and an advocate.

For the majority of my life, I have lived on unceded Indigenous land and currently live and work on Hawaiian lands that were yielded under duress.