I'm a proud Midwesterner; I was born in Indiana and grew up in Minnesota. Probably the most phonetically-interesting aspect of my dialect is my Canadian raising, which applies only to /aj/ but can be encountered in unexpected locations ("spider", "tiger", "hire").
I do have interests that fall outside of academia. I'm an amateur genealogist. Among other findings, I'm a direct descendent of Thomas Mayhew, whose vowels Bill Labov once speculated about. I also enjoy trivia, nerdy open-ended video games, and strategy board games. I avidly follow politics, and am a big fan of Canada. I consider myself an urbanist and love a good transit system. I've been using the MetGo app to get around Buffalo sometimes. I'm both a county collector and a capitol collector (33 of 50 toured).
© 2010-2025 Chris Heffner; Updated 2025-03-09