Bio

I was born and raised in Oita, Japan, where I was surrounded by people who spoke the same language and shared a similar cultural background. Due to the lack of diversity, I used to believe that people with blue eyes saw the world colored blue. Although I eventually outgrew this belief, in high school, I came across the concept of “Linguistic Relativity”: the idea that an individual’s spoken language affects their perception of the world. I was curious if this was simply a more sophisticated version of my blue eEyes hypothesis and was determined to learn more about language.

I moved to Tokyo for college, majoring in English linguistics. Afterwards, while pursuing a masters of arts in linguistics, I was shocked to learn that, in contrast to the popular claim that “everyone in Japan speaks Japanese,” there are multiple languages spoken in Okinawa prefecture that are not dialects of Japanese, but typologically distinct languages. Since then, I have worked documenting one of the languages – Miyako.

I came to the U.S. in 2016 to study linguistic documentation and typology. Instead, I wrote a dissertation about heritage language acquisition because I was fascinated by Japanese heritage children I taught in a small community in Buffalo, N.Y. My experience as an international student challenged me and opened my eyes to some of the struggles that those in minority groups face in the U.S. At Carnegie Mellon University, I advocate for people in minority groups and provide support for our international students.

Department Member Since 2023