Professional Bio
Ginger Pizer teaches courses in linguistics, including Introduction to Linguistics, Sociolinguistics, Descriptive English Grammar, and the History of the English Language. Her research combines approaches from sociolinguistics, first language acquisition, and the linguistics of signed languages to address issues of language use in family contexts, especially among families whose linguistic repertoires include American Sign Language. She has conducted research on the use of “baby signs” between hearing parents and hearing infants and has also investigated the adaptations that deaf parents make to their ASL when they address their deaf infants. She is currently writing up her research on families with deaf parents and hearing children, and she is developing a project on the language acquisition of deaf children in Mississippi.
Education
Ph.D. 2008 University of Texas at Austin
M.A. 2002 University of Texas at Austin
B.A. 1994 Brown University
Teaching interests:
Linguistics, sociolinguistics, linguistic anthropology
Courses taught:
Publications
Meier, R. P., Pizer, G., and Shaw, K. M. (under review) Child-directed signing.
Pizer, G., Walters, K., and Meier, R. P. 2007. Bringing Up Baby with Baby Signs: Language Ideologies and Socialization in Hearing Families. Sign Language Studies, 7, 387-430.
http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/sign_language_studies/v007/7.4pizer.pdfPizer, G., Shaw, K. M., and Meier, R. P. 2008. Joint Attention and Child-Directed Signing in American Sign Language. Supplement to the Proceedings of the 32nd Boston University Conference on Language Development.
http://www.bu.edu/linguistics/APPLIED/BUCLD/supp32.htmlPizer, G. 2008. “It’s like he can’t be bothered”: Ideologies of Effort in CODA Family Narratives. Texas Linguistic Forum 51: Proceedings of the Fifteenth Annual Symposium About Language and Society–Austin.
http://studentorgs.utexas.edu/salsa/proceedings/2007/Pizer.pdf
Pizer, G. and Meier, R. P. 2008. Child-Directed Signing in ASL and Children’s Development of Joint Attention. Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Theoretical Issues in Sign Language Research, Florianopolis, Brazil.Pizer, G. 2004. Baby Signing as Language Socialization: The Use of Visual-Gestural Signs with Hearing Infants. Texas Linguistic Forum 47: Proceedings of the Eleventh Annual Symposium About Language and Society–Austin, 165-171.
http://studentorgs.utexas.edu/salsa/proceedings/2003/pizer.pdf
