Durring the 2010-2011 year, I have been a Visiting Student Researcher in the department of linguistics at Stanford University while conducting my dissertation fieldwork in San Francisco (funded by a Dissertation Fieldwork Grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation). My dissertation, entitled "Talking like a man: Identity, socialization, biology, and the gendered voice among female-to-male transgender speakers," documents the  changes that occur in the voices of transgender people who have recently begun masculinizing hormone therapy as part of the process of transitioning from a female gender role to a male one (or, for some of my participants, some other masculine gender category).

Some of my hobbies and interests outside  research include: movies (especially documentaries, indie films, sophomoric comedies, and experimental film), NPR, keeping up with national news, disability studies, video games, reading fiction (especially nonfiction, sci-fi/fantasy/cyberpunk, 20th century/contemporary fiction – when I have the time!), maps/cartography, & vegan/vegetarian food/cooking/baking.

Download my full CV as a PDF (last updated November, 2011).

Frequently Asked Questions about my name:
How do you pronounce Lal?
Phonemically, my pronunciation of Lal is just like it's spelled: /lal/, though other [+back] [+low] vowels are also fine to my ear. In less technical terms, it shouldn't rhyme with Hal or pal - it should sound more like Paul or fall.

Is that short for anything?
Nope, that's it.

So what kind of name is Lal?
It comes from Sanskrit, meaning 'to play' or 'to caress'. It also means 'red' in Hindi, though the latter meaning is not what my parents had in mind when naming me (nor was the contemporary term of endearment, as appropriate as that might have been). Other, perhaps better known, Lals include the second Prime Minister to India, Lal Bahadur, Data's android daughter in a memorable episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and a few others.

What about your last name?
Much less interesting, but sometimes exotified in pronunciation (presumably because of my first name). It's actually just like Zimmerman, but without the 'er'.