In our Scholar Development program, emerging scholars (known as Pike Scholars) are mentored by established scholars (the Fellows of the Pike Center) as they practice the craft of scholarship. We now invite you to get to know each of them a little better.
Pike Scholars
Pike Scholars are emerging scholars who are participating in the Scholar Development program of the center. Requirements for becoming a Pike Scholar include having a doctoral degree or being in the process of earning one.
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Virginia Beavon-Ham
Virginia Beavon-Ham earned a PhD in Linguistics at Leiden University in 2019. Her dissertation explores the tone system of Saxwe (a Kwa language), including evidence within this system of historic tone change. She is the Linguistics Coordinator for SIL Cameroon. Her ongoing research interests include the phonetic implementation of tone, the description of Saxwe grammar, and the interaction of tone and morphology. See publications.
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Rahel Beyer
Rahel Beyer received a PhD in Linguistics from University of Münster (Germany) in 2013. In her dissertation she studied the phonetic-phonological variation between two generations of dialect speakers that live in the Palatine speech island at the lower Rhine area (Germany). Since 2023, she has served as a language assessment specialist for SIL Cameroon. Her ongoing research interests are in sociolinguistics, multilingualism, language vitality, language attitudes and linguistic landscape. See publications.
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Carlos Benitez
Carlos received a PhD from Leiden University in Holland in 2021. The title of his dissertation was A grammar of Tagdal: A Northern Songhay language. He has done field research in West Africa and SE Asia. Most recently, he has been a member of the faculty of linguistics at Payap University in Chiang Mai, Thailand. His main interests are in the areas of sociolinguistics and language contact. See publications.
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Robert L Bradshaw
Robert L Bradshaw earned a PhD in Linguistics at James Cook University in 2022. The title of his dissertation is A Grammar of Doromu-Koki: A Papuan Language of Papua New Guinea. He is a Linguistics Consultant and Translation Advisor for SIL Papua New Guinea and an Adjunct Research Fellow with James Cook University. His ongoing research interests include language description, most recently concerning differential subject and frustrative marking, and clause chaining and linking. Other research focuses on language development, Papuan typology and historical-comparative linguistics. He is involved in equipping Papuan New Guineans engaged in language development through formal and informal training. See publications.
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Bronwen Cleaver
Bron Cleaver is half-way through a PhD program in Theology with specialisation in Bible Translation, at the University of The Free State in South Africa. The title of her dissertation is A design for a performance-based oral Bible translation in Southern Altai (Siberia). She is a Translation Consultant in Training with SIL, specialising in orality, and is an exegete and Project Manager for an Oral Bible Translation project, a written BT project and several Oral Bible storying projects among minority groups in Southern Siberia. Her research interests include orality, oral Bible translation and performance. See publications.
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Ndokobai Dadak
Ndokobai Dadak earned a PhD in Linguistics at Leiden University in 2021. His thesis was a descriptive grammar of Cuvok, a Central Chadic minority language of Cameroon. His work has been supported by a grant from the endangered Languages Documentation Program, ELDP. He is currently a Linguistics consultant with SIL, Cameroon Branch. Ndokobai’s current research interests include phonology, Morphology, sociolinguistics, participatory workshop, language documentation, description and language development. See publications.
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Anya Ezhevskaya
Anya Ezhevskaya is a PhD Candidate in World Arts at Dallas International University's Center for Excellence in World Arts. The working title of her in-progress dissertation is Russian Bards in America: Exploring Artistic Transplantation and Genre Evolution through Authored Song. She is a full-time translator and interpreter for NASA's International Space Station program, and serves as a translation/interpretation volunteer at Wycliffe Bible Translators. Anya is interested in creativity in extreme environments, creativity and artificial intelligence, and the use of arts, especially dance and movement therapy, in trauma healing. See publications.
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Rynj Gonzales
Rynj Gonzales is a Phd candidate in Linguistics at the University of the Philippines Diliman. She is working on a description of Itneg Inlaud [iti] for her dissertation. She serves with SIL Philippines as a Language Assessment consultant-in-traning and a member of the Language Documentation Team. She also assists as a facilitator-consultant for MTBMLE related activities under the Indigenous peoples education program of the Department of Education. With a grant from Pike Center, she is doing a language and culture documentation with the Itneg Ilaud indigenous cultural communities as part of their language development goals. Aside from this, Rynj is also currently working on a cross-linguistic analysis of person markers in Meso-Cordilleran languages. See publications.
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Matthew Harley
Matthew Harley earned a PhD in African Linguistics from the University of Edinburgh in 2005. His thesis was a descriptive grammar of Tuwuli, a minority language of SE Ghana. He is currently the Head of the Linguistics and Translation Department at the Theological College of Northern Nigeria in Jos and also serves as a linguistics consultant for SIL Nigeria. His current research interests include descriptive issues relevant to the documentation and development of Nigerian languages, and how linguistic insights can help improve the naturalness of translations from other languages. See publications.
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Elissa Ikeda
Elissa Ikeda earned a PhD in Applied Linguistics at the University of California, Los Angeles in 2007. She teaches in the Linguistics Department at Payap University in the areas of phonetics, phonology, orthography development, and academic writing. She co-founded the Payap PhonLab in 2020, creating a space for faculty and students to meet weekly to discuss ongoing research in phonetics and phonology. Her current interests include social writing, grammatical tone in Tibeto-Burman languages, and orthography development in Southeast Asia. See publications.
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Rachel Miles
Rachel Miles is currently enrolled in a PhD program in the linguistics department at the University of California San Diego. Her dissertation will focus on the basic argument structure in both situations of delayed first language exposure and emerging sign languages. She is currently a linguistics consultant in training with SIL’s Global Sign Languages Team. Her research interests centering on language deprivation and the impacts of delayed exposure to language on deaf communities intersect with issues of language development, language policy, and education.
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James Morrison
James Morrison earned a PhD in Intercultural Studies from Columbia International University in 2023. The title of his dissertation is “Steps Towards a Tibetan Understanding of Purity: a semantic and textual analysis.” James is a translator and translation consultant in a cluster project in the Himalayas. Broadly speaking, his research interests are in Tibetic languages, Tibetology, missiology and more recently in the contexualization of Scripture Engagement materials. See publications.
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Steve Parkhurst
Steve Parkhurst is currently pursuing a PhD in World Arts at Dallas International University. His research involves the linguistic study of deaf song and worship. He is a linguistic consultant for sign languages with SIL and has been on the SIL teaching staff at the University of North Dakota, Dallas International University, and the applied linguistics program with PROEL in Spain. His interests include anything related to sign languages, but particularly phonology, writing systems, sociolinguistics, translation, and creative or literary expression. See publications.
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George Payton
George Payton earned a PhD in Ancient Languages from Stellenbosch University in 2023. The title of his dissertation is A Cognitive Semantic Analysis of the Uses of Toledoth in the Hebrew Bible, with Special Reference to its Translation in the Book of Genesis. George teaches translation at Dallas International University, and is the Program Coordinator for the MA in Translation Advising, as well as the Graduate Certificate in Translation Consulting. His research interests include training in translation, Hebrew and Old Testament Studies. See publications.
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Benjamin Pehrson
Benjamin Pehrson is a PhD candidate at the Leiden University Centre for Linguistics. His thesis is a descriptive grammar of Onnele, an endangered Papuan language of the Torricelli family in Papua New Guinea. He serves as SIL-PNG's team leader for the Aitape West Language Program that partners with sixteen different language communities, and he is also a translation consultant and linguistics consultant-in-training. His ongoing research interests include biblical exegesis, Koine Greek, descriptive grammar, and discourse linguistics, and he seeks to equip PNG citizen language development practitioners in their application of these disciplines through formal and informal training. See publications.
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Sophia Pitcher
Sophia Pitcher earned a PhD in Hebrew Linguistics at the University of the Free State (South Africa) in 2020. Her thesis, A Prosodic Model for Tiberian Hebrew: A Complexity Approach to the Features, Structures, and Functions of the Masoretic Cantillation Accents, proposes a modern linguistic description and analysis of the Masoretic accents of the Hebrew Bible. She is currently a research fellow at the University of the Free State, an adjunct professor of Classical Hebrew at North Central University in Minneapolis, and serves as a Hebrew Bible exegete for the South African Sign Language Bible Translation Project. Sophia’s research interests include the intersection of Masoretic studies and prosodic phonology, and exploring the complexity of prosodic systems. See publications.
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Erin SanGregory
Erin SanGregory has been accepted to a PhD program in linguistics at the University of Oregon. She intends to investigate the morphosyntax of Wakhi, an under-described Pamir language of Afghanistan. Erin facilitates a mother-tongue preschool program and language development efforts among the Wakhi people, and she is also training as a linguistics consultant with SIL International. Her ongoing research focuses on the syntax of clitics and non-canonical case marking, both of which are essential to producing literature that sounds clear and natural to Wakhi readers. See publications.
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David Troolin
David Troolin earned a PhD in Anthropology and Development Studies from the University of Adelaide in 2018. The title of his thesis was Wanbel: Conflict, Reconciliation and Personhood among the Sam People, Madang Province. He is the Anthropology Coordinator for SIL Papua New Guinea and Translation Advisor for the Sam project. His current research focuses on how the Sam and others in Madang Province conceptualise wanbel ("one insides, reconciled") in their pursuit of the good life, as they navigate recent modernising influences such as Christianity, independence, development projects, and the “time of money.” See publications.
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Hessel Visser
Hessel Visser received his doctorate in 2022 from the Theological University in Apeldoorn, Netherlands. He researched the complex Person-Gender-Number system in the Naro language (a Khwe language, formerly called Central Khoesan) and its impact on translation. Naro boasts 18 different translation possibilities for “we” and another 13 for “you” and “they”, leading to several challenges but also opportunities in translation. He serves as Bible translation consultant with SIL in Southern Africa, mainly for the languages spoken by the marginalized San, nearly all of which he has been involved in. He is interested in biblical exegesis, Greek and Hebrew, and publishing further on translation and linguistic issues, especially in San languages, in order to accurately and clearly communicate the Bible message. See publications.
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Susan Gary Walters
Susan Gary Walters earned a PhD in Intercultural Education from Biola University in 2021. Her dissertation explores the Nuosu script and literacy in southwest China. She is an adjunct faculty with the Center for Excellence in World Arts at Dallas International University. Her research interests include adult education, and emic understandings of local language communities with their arts, orthographies, literacy, and learning. See publications.
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Juha Yliniemi
Juha Yliniemi holds a PhD degree in General Linguistics from the University of Helsinki (2019). The title of his thesis was A descriptive grammar of Denjongke (Sikkimese Bhutia). He is a Linguistics Specialist in the Southern Himalayas and a consultant at the Workshop in Grammatical Description at CanIL. His current research interests include iconicity of modified reduplication in the Himalayas and across language families, discourse particles, and language description and documentation in general. See publications.