Felicity Meakins

Felicity Meakins FASSA is a linguist specialising in Australian Indigenous languages, morphology and language contact, who was one of the first academics to describe Gurindji Kriol. She holds an Australian Research Council (ARC) Future Fellowship[1] focusing on language evolution and contact processes across northern Australia.[2][3][4]

Education and career

Meakins received her Bachelor of Arts (Honours) and Master of Arts at the University of Queensland. She completed her master's thesis, Lashings of Tongue: A Relevance Theoretic Account of Impoliteness, in 2001.[5] Meakins earned her Ph.D. from the University of Melbourne in 2008 for her work with the Aboriginal Child Language Project.[6] Rachel Nordlinger was main supervisor for Meakins' dissertation, Case-marking in contact: the development and function of case morphology in Gurindji Kriol, an Australian mixed language.[7]

She is currently an associate professor at The University of Queensland, Australia.[2] She also serves as a chief investigator with the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language (CoEDL).[8]

Together with Patrick McConvell, Meakins was the first linguist to describe Gurindji Kriol, a mixed language which emerged in the Kalkarindji community of northern Australia post-1970s.[9] She has performed fieldwork and facilitated language revitalisation work in this region since 2001[2] and published extensive documentation of languages in the Ngumpin-Yapa family, including a grammar of Bilinarra and dictionaries of Bilinarra and Gurindji.[10]

Meakins has publicly advocated for greater awareness of Australian Indigenous languages,[11] the benefits of bilingualism and bilingual education for Indigenous children,[12] and Gurindji history.[13][14] She has published several articles in The Conversation[15] (one of which has been republished in German),[16] performed a TEDx talk[17] and collaborated with Karungarni Arts and rangers from the Murnkurrumurnkurru Central Land Council. Her work chronicling Gurindji oral histories in particular attracted media attention around the fiftieth anniversary of the Wave Hill walk-off.[18][19][20]

Awards

In June 2017 Meakins was awarded an Australian Research Council (ARC) Future Fellowship,[1] a four-year mid-career award of $896,163, to focus on language evolution and contact processes across northern Australia.[2][3][4] The purpose of Future Fellowships is "to attract and retain the best and brightest mid-career researchers".[21]

Meakins had previously received an ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (2014–2017) and two ARC Discovery Projects awards (2009–2013 and 2015–2018).[2]

In 2020 Meakins was elected Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia (FASSA).[22]

Selected publications

Meakins has authored and edited more than fifty publications as of 2018.[23]

Books
  • Introducing Linguistic Fieldwork. Meakins, Felicity, Jennifer Green and Myfany Turpin. London: Routledge, 2018
  • Loss and Renewal: Australian Languages Since Colonisation. Edited by Felicity Meakins and Carmel O'Shannessy Berlin, Germany: De Gruyter Mouton, 2016.
  • Mayarni-kari Yurrk: More Stories from Gurindji Country. Edited by Erika Charola and Felicity Meakins Batchelor, NT, Australia: Batchelor Press, 2016.
  • Yijarni: True Stories from Gurindji Country. Edited by Erika Charola and Felicity Meakins Canberra, Australia: Aboriginal Studies Press, 2016.
  • Kawarla: how to make a coolamon. Wadrill, Violet, Wavehill Yamawurr, Biddy and Meakins, Felicity. Batchelor, NT, Australia: Batchelor Press, 2015.
  • A grammar of Bilinarra: an Australian Aboriginal language of the Northern Territory. Meakins, Felicity and Nordlinger, Rachel. Berlin, Germany: Mouton de Gruyter, 2014.
  • Bilinarra to English dictionary. Meakins, Felicity. Batchelor, NT, Australia: Batchelor Press, 2013.
  • Gurindji to English dictionary. Meakins, Felicity, McConvell, Patrick, Charola, Erika, McNair, Norm, McNair, Helen and Campbell, Lauren. Batchelor, NT, Australia: Batchelor Press, 2013.
  • Bilinarra, Gurindji and Malngin plants and animals: Aboriginal knowledge of flora and fauna from Judbarra/Gregory National Park, Nijburru, Kalkarindji and Daguragu, Northern Australia. Hector, Ivy Kulngari, Jungurra Kalabidi, George, Banjo, Spider, Nangari Ngarnjal Dodd, Topsy, Jangala Wirrba Wavehill, Ronnie, Danbayarri, Dandy, Nanaku Wadrill, Violet, Puntiyarri, Bernard, Bernard Malyik, Ida, Wavehill, Biddy, Morris, Helen, Campbell, Lauren, Meakins, Felicity and Wightmann, Glenn. Katherine, NT, Australia: Bilinarra, Gurindji and Malngin People; Department of Land Resource Management, 2012.
  • Case-marking in contact: The development and function of case morphology in Gurindji Kriol. Meakins, Felicity. Amsterdam, Netherlands: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2011.

Other

References
  1. "UQ welcomes 14 new ARC Future Fellows". UQ News. 2017-06-05. Retrieved 2018-01-19.
  2. "Dr Felicity Meakins - UQ Researchers". researchers.uq.edu.au. Retrieved 2017-07-19.
  3. "ARC Future Fellowship in Linguistics". School of Languages and Cultures. 16 June 2017. Retrieved 2017-07-19.
  4. "Future Fellowship awarded to Felicity Meakins – Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language". www.dynamicsoflanguage.edu.au. Retrieved 2017-07-19.
  5. Meakins, Felicity (2001). "Lashings of Tongue: A Relevance Theoretic Account of Impoliteness". Resarchgate.net.
  6. "Aboriginal Child Language Acquisition Project (ACLA1) — School of Languages and Linguistics | Faculty of Arts". Faculty of Arts. 2016-10-04. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  7. Meakins, Felicity (16 January 2008). "Case-marking in contact: the development and function of case morphology in Gurindji Kriol, an Australian mixed language" (PDF). University of Melbourne, University Library.
  8. "Chief Investigators – Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language". www.dynamicsoflanguage.edu.au. Retrieved 2017-07-19.
  9. McConvell, Patrick; Meakins, Felicity (2005-04-01). "Gurindji Kriol: A Mixed Language Emerges from Code-switching". Australian Journal of Linguistics. 25 (1): 9–30. doi:10.1080/07268600500110456. ISSN 0726-8602. S2CID 62281541.
  10. "Felicity Meakins - Google Scholar Citations". scholar.google.com.au. Retrieved 2017-07-19.
  11. Meakins, Felicity. "Some Australian Indigenous languages you should know". The Conversation. Retrieved 2017-07-19.
  12. Alouat, Jim (9 May 2012). "100 Aboriginal languages face extinction : newsbytes". newsbytes.com.au. Retrieved 2018-01-22. Dr Meakins said the 2008 Northern Territory Government’s decision to effectively end bilingual education flew in the face of all the research which clearly demonstrated the benefits of bilingualism for cognitive development.
  13. Meakins, Felicity. "Friday essay: the untold story behind the 1966 Wave Hill Walk-Off". The Conversation. Retrieved 2017-07-19.
  14. "Felicity Meakins' article in The Conversation, 19 Aug 2016 – Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language". www.dynamicsoflanguage.edu.au. Retrieved 2017-07-19.
  15. "Felicity Meakins". The Conversation. Retrieved 2017-07-19.
  16. Meakins, Felicity (2014-11-06). "Kiez-Australisch: Aborigines erfinden neue Sprachen". DIE WELT. Retrieved 2018-01-19.
  17. TEDx Talks (2014-02-10), The monolingual mindset: Felicity Meakins at TEDxSouthBankWomen, retrieved 2017-07-19
  18. "Truth beyond written records of the Wave Hill walk off". www.eurekastreet.com.au. Retrieved 2018-01-19.
  19. "Yijarni: True Stories from Gurindji Country – a sad, marvellous historical canon - Fully (sic)". Fully (sic). 2016-10-19. Retrieved 2018-01-19.
  20. James, Felicity (2016-03-30). "Indigenous elders keep traditional songs about life on Wave Hill station alive with new generation". ABC News. Retrieved 2018-01-19.
  21. "Future Fellowships". www.arc.gov.au. Australian Government, Australian Research Council. 2014-02-27. Retrieved 2018-01-21.
  22. "Academy Fellow: Associate Professor Felicity Meakins FASSA". Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia. Retrieved 2020-12-05.
  23. "Felicity Meakins | The University of Queensland (UQ) | ResearchGate". ResearchGate. Retrieved 2018-01-23.
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