On the effect he hopes to have on students and CSUN...

I just want to be able to look back and hope that I did my part, as small as it might’ve been, in helping improve my students’ lives and making the world a better place.

On the most exciting trends in his field, and why we should care...

The advances in the study of prosody and acoustics have created the need to revise all traditional descriptions of the phonetics and phonology of the languages of the world. This is very important for continuous advances in natural language processing in the fields of computer science and artificial intelligence. If we want machines and computers to communicate and interact with us, this type of linguistic research is absolutely imperative.

"Failure and challenges are important. They shape how you face life."

On what drives or compels him to keep pushing the boundaries...

I work with language. It’s such an innate faculty and so deeply entrenched in humanity that people take it for granted. Aside from the obvious use as a communication tool, language has many complex cultural and social uses. Exploring this biological, physical, social, and cultural complexity is what it’s all about.

On what it means to be at CSUN...

It means contributing to the fabric of humanity by forming and inspiring the future of our species.

On how students have influenced his teaching...

Linguistics can be theoretical or abstract, so I always try to find a way to connect it to their culture, their place, or their daily life. You have to find ways to engage them given their life situations. The challenges the students have in their lives, you have to realize all the hard-core things they go through. People have a lot of personal commitments – family, kids, one job, two jobs, three jobs, but the desire to progress and move forward in life gives them a special drive. They dream more, they have more aspirations. They are not brought down easily. It’s a motivation. In a way, failure and challenges are important. They shape how you face life. If you have everything served to you and you’ve never had challenges, the first time you fail you’re going to fall apart.