Education

Since November 2017: PhD student at the Institute for Latin American Studies, FU Berlin (working title of thesis: Contact and Exchange of Ethnobotanical Knowledge in the Bolivian Lowlands)

November 2015 – Juli 2018: Certificate as a teacher for German as a foreign language, Goethe-Institut

September 2015: MA (Magister) at the University of Leipzig in Anthropology, Hispanic Studies and African Studies; MA thesis: “Ethnobotanische Klassifikationen im Baure, Bolivien” (Ethnobotanical Classifications in Baure, Bolivia)

Scientific Career

October 2014 – March 2016 and September 2016 – February 2017: Assistant in the language documentation project “GIZAC – Gwarayu and the Intermediate Zone (Amazonia – Chaco, Bolivia)” (SOAS/ELDP funding), University of Leipzig

September 2014 – August 2015 and April 2016 – August 2016: Assistant in the research project “Cross-linguistic patterns in the encoding of three-participant events” (Volkswagen foundation, DobeS funding) for the Bora language, University of Cologne

September 2015 – January 2016: Assistant in the research project “Articulation speed variation cross-linguistically” (Volkswagen foundation, DobeS funding) for the Bora language, University of Cologne

July 2014 – May 2015: Student assistant in the research project “Tsammalex – a lexical database on plants and animals”, Max-Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Department of Linguistics, Leipzig

April 2013 – July 2014: Student assistant in the research project “The relative frequencies of nouns, pronouns, and verbs cross linguistically” (Volkswagen foundation, DobeS funding) for the Bora language, Max-Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Department of Linguistics, Leipzig

November 2012 – August 2014: Student assistant in the research project “Referentiality” (Volkswagen foundation, DobeS funding) for the Baure language, University of Leipzig

October 2011 – October 2012: Student assistant in the language documentation project “The documentation of Baure – A language of the Bolivian Amazonia” (Volkswagen foundation, DobeS funding), University of Leipzig

October 2010 – March 2013: Student assistant in the language documentation project “Inheritance and contact in a language complex: the case of Taa varieties (Tuu family)” (ESF, EuroBABEL funding), Humboldt University Berlin/Max-Planck-Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Department of Linguistics, Leipzig

June 2009 – August 2009: Student assistant at the Institute of Anthropology, University of Leipzig

Scholarships

Since January 2018: PhD scholarship, Stiftung Lateinamerikanische Literatur (Foundation for Latin American Literature)

April/May 2013: DAAD scholarship for the field research in Baures, Bolivia

Fieldwork

October/November 2018: Field research in the Bolivian lowlands for PhD thesis

April/May 2013: field research in Baures, Bolivia on ethnobotanical classification in Baure for my MA thesis

Other

March 2017 – July 2017: Teacher for German as a foreign language, Volkshochschule Leipzig

Research interests

South America (especially Amazonia), Bolivian Lowlands, Ecuador

Linguistic Anthropology

Ethnobiology

Language contact

Language documentation

Endangered languages

PhD Project

Working title: Contact and Exchange of Ethnobotanical Knowledge in the Bolivian Lowlands

Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Michael Dürr

Abstract

In my PhD project I investigate contact scenarios between different ethnolinguistic groups in the lowlands of Bolivia through analyzing loanwords in the ethnobotanical vocabulary and ethnobotanical knowledge. My hypothesis is that aspects of precolonial and colonial population history can be understood by investigating loanwords, belonging of knowledge from an emic perspective and oral history. Plants can be considered a particularly suitable object for this kind of study because of their continuity over time. They are easily accessible to all people, they can be exchanged easily and they are essential elements of subsistence. On the other hand, cultural importance and focus on certain plants can vary considerably between different ethnolinguistic groups. The ethnobotanical vocabulary is one of the lexical domains with the highest loan rates and therefore a good subject for the study of linguistic and cultural contact. I will work with methods from anthropology, ethnobiology, language documentation, historical linguistics and the study of language contact.

 Co-authored publications

Sell, Lena & Lena Terhart (2016): Klassifikationen im Baure. München: Lincom Europa.

 Materials for language communities

2015    Diccionario flora y fauna Guarasu. GIZAC. Santa Cruz de la Sierra: Kipus. With: Swintha Danielsen.(financially supported by ELF – Endangered Languages Fund).

2014   Shi vikoyepin to chinepi - Vamos a contar cuentos en baure: Chinepinev 2. 2nd story book for the Baure. With: Swintha Danielsen, Nadine Gutbrod, Simone Herbst, Federico Villalta. Santa Cruz: APCOB (UNESCO Chair Language and Cultural Diversity Funding).

2014   To vi’a - Nuestro cuerpo: Las partes del cuerpo en el idioma baure. Poster with vocabulary of body parts. With: Roberto Herrera Miranda, Swintha Danielsen, Lena Terhart, Simone Fass.

2010   Chinepinev − Cuentos de los Baure. Book with Baure songs and stories, illustrated by 8 students of two arts' colleges in Berlin. With: Swintha Danielsen, Lena Terhart, Femmy Admiraal, Franziska Riedel.

Presentations

October 8, 2018: “Arqueología lingüística de los nombres de plantas en paunaka (aruák)” (Linguistic Archaeology of plant names in Paunaka (Arawak)) III Jornadas de Tierras Bajas: Antropología, Arqueología, Historia. Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia.

October 7, 2018: “Nombres de plantas prestados: indicadores de contactos interétnicos en las tierras bajas de Bolivia” (Borrowed Plant Names: Idicators for Interethnic Contact in the Bolivian Lowlands) III Jornadas de Tierras Bajas: Antropología, Arqueología, Historia. Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia.

March 31, 2017 (Sell, Lena & Lena Terhart): "Revision and Republication of a Historical Dictionary of Guarayu". Challenges of electronic dictionary publication 2.0, University of Leipzig.

July 20, 2016 (Terhart, Lena & Lena Sell): „Sprachdokumentation im bolivianischen Tiefland“ (Language Documentation in the Bolivian Lowlands) Language Documentation, Corpus Building and Corpus-Based Studies, PhD Workshop on Methods in Language Documentation and Description, University of Freiburg.

June 30, 2016 (Danielsen, Swintha; Lena Terhart & Lena Sell): „Sprach-Revitalisierung in Bolivien: Die Arbeit linguistischer Dokumentationsprojekte der Universität Leipzig“ (Language Revitalization in Bolivia: The Work of Linguistic Documentation Projects at the University of Leipzig) Institute for Romance Studies, University of Leipzig.

June 2, 2016 (Danielsen, Swintha; Lena Terhart & Lena Sell): "Ethnobiology and Classifying in Bolivian Endangered Languages“ University of Leiden.

Mai 1, 2015 (Naumann, Christfried; Robert Forkel; Steven Moran & Lena Sel)l: “Tsammalex: A lexical database on plants and animals“. Diversity Linguistics: Restrospect and Prospect, Max-Plack-Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig