ÌìÑÄÉçÇø

Beyond her role in building community and supporting folks in a variety of faiths as Augustana Campus chaplain, Andrea Wilhelm is fascinated by how people use language. She’s particularly interested in the Dënesųłiné language, working directly with Indigenous groups as an ally to promote linguistic survival and diversity. Through her study of Dënesųłiné, she has helped determine a new classification of how nouns can behave in different languages.

How would you describe your research?

I am interested in how people use language and how language works. I love different languages, and especially the Dënesųłiné language, spoken by an Indigenous group in Northern Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and the Northwest Territories. I have worked with Dënesųłiné people on documenting and revitalizing their language, so that children continue to have the chance to learn and use it. I am also interested in how words and sentences are put together and how the meaning of a sentence comes about. That is called semantics.

My other great interest is the Bible, especially in the original ancient Greek and Hebrew. I like to read the Bible, learn about the worlds of the people who told those stories a very, very long time ago, what they meant and what it can mean for us today.

When did you know you wanted to become an academic?

In junior high school, my Latin teacher said to me, “You will do a PhD one day.” I just laughed and said, “No way!” But later, I would always get bored with jobs outside university. So I kept going back. It’s how I discovered linguistics, the study of language, and the rest is history. I got a master’s and then a PhD and thought it was the coolest and most fun thing in the world. Later I studied the Bible and theology academically and that was also super fun and interesting. I guess if you need other academics and a university library to be happy, you know you are an academic yourself. :)

What’s a discovery you’ve made in your research that would surprise people?

When you work on Indigenous languages, “discovery” doesn’t fit. The speakers of those languages have known all this for a long time. However, what really surprised me and other linguists is how nouns work in Dënesųłiné. Linguists had come up with a classification of how nouns can behave in different languages, and I realized through my research that Dënesųłiné did not fit! So the classification had to be reworked. The neat thing is that the Dënesųłiné data actually led me to propose a simpler and more elegant classification. Previously, linguists had lumped things together in some cumbersome ways (for example, number marking and numeral classifiers), and Dënesųłiné shows us that this lumping together was not necessary.

What’s one big problem you want to address or a goal you want to achieve in your work?

What matters to me is justice and love. In linguistics that means linguistic diversity and communicative self-determination. Indigenous peoples have been denied this and I work on being their ally. In theology and biblical studies (my other discipline), I am interested in feminist and ecological readings of the Bible and in providing spiritual care and guidance in a way that helps people experience God’s love, mercy and justice. Another way to put it is that I am working against various, often intersecting, oppressions.

What brought you to working at Augustana?

The position of chaplain became available just as I was finishing my MDiv, and I applied!

What is one of your favourite things so far about Augustana?

Two things: First, the vibe. It's very personal and intimate, and people are so welcoming. Second, I get to do things that I love in a unique combination: teach, provide pastoral and spiritual care, be a leader and a servant, create community, hang out with wonderful students and colleagues, and be practical, musical and intellectual.

How do you see the Augustana community playing a role in your work?

I am chaplain to the whole Augustana community, so I am committed to responding to the community’s needs. I depend on the community connecting with me as I try to connect with it. We are interdependent or, as this year’s chaplaincy theme says, “In it together.”

Where did you grow up and what’s distinct to you about your hometown?

I grew up in a small town in southwest Germany. It is called Stein (“stone” in English). We speak a low Alemmanic dialect I am very proud of. It is expressive and fun, and very different from Standard German. Soft pretzels, Spätzle and Black Forest Cake are indigenous to my area. I make a mean Black Forest Cake.

What’s the last TV show or podcast series you binged?

Not recently, but a few years ago I really enjoyed the podcast on the Harry Potter books, done by two then-English grad students at ÌìÑÄÉçÇø’s North Campus. Highly recommended. I am just as likely to binge an academic book as entertainment—have done both.

What’s a book or film you would tell someone to read or watch to get to know you better?

An article, actually! “” by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson. (Her books, too.) I like how she writes and thinks. The article describes the importance of the land in Anishinaabe pedagogy and epistemology, and does it in the Anishnaabe way—by telling a traditional story. She also “translates” it for settlers like myself. I believe it has been a paradigm-shifting article for educators who have read it, certainly for me.

Who’s someone living or dead that you wish you could take for a coffee? And what would you talk to them about?

With the times we are in now, I would like to talk with Dietrich Bonhoeffer, one of the leaders of the confessing (= dissenting, opposing) church in Nazi Germany. He was murdered in a concentration camp in 1945. I would also be interested in talking with a high priest during Israel’s First Temple period (about 970 - 586 BCE).

If you had to eat the same meal every day for a week, what would it be?

Spaghetti with my own very tomatoey meat sauce for dinner. My sourdough rye bread with homemade jam for breakfast.

Learn more about Andrea

, MA, MDiv, PhD, was born and raised in Germany. She now lives as a settler on land that is part of Treaty 6 and of region 4 of the Métis Nation of Alberta. As a linguist, she works with Dene communities on language documentation and revitalization, as well as on ethical, decolonial research collaborations. As a theologian, she is the chaplain of the Augustana Campus of the ÌìÑÄÉçÇø. Currently she teaches religion and linguistics courses in Augustana’s Ethics and Global Studies program.