Mark Sicoli

Mark Sicoli is an Associate Professor at the University of Virginia, where he serves as Director of the Interdepartmental Program in Linguistics and Associate Editor of Language Documentation and Description. His work spans Zapotec-speaking communities in Mexico (since 1997) and Virginia Tribal Nations like the Nottoway (since 2020). As a Fellow of the UVA Institute for Advanced Technologies in the Humanities (IATH), he leads the Data Back! project (2025-2027), focusing on digital infrastructure for community-driven language documentation.

• Specialties: Multimodality, Embodied Interaction, Community-Engaged Research, Video Analysis, Ethnography, Semiotic Theory
• Research Themes: Language in Human Evolution, Human Social Organization, Anarchist Theory, Language Contact, Documentary Linguistics

His scholarship critiques evolutionary progress narratives through anarchist theory and interactional analysis, arguing that language evolved via mutual aid rather than self-interest. He has conducted NSF-funded projects on Zapotec and Chatino language surveys and whistled speech documentation, co-directing initiatives that trained 23 native speakers. His teaching includes collaborative courses like Language Revival in the Eastern Tribes with Nottoway citizens.

Key publications include Saying and Doing in Zapotec (2020), exploring how language emerges through joint action, and a 2025 chapter on Zapotec perception categories in the Oxford Handbook of the Languages of Perception. His work emphasizes decolonizing linguistics and empowering Indigenous communities in language preservation.

• Scientific Awards:
  • Fellow, UVA Institute for Advanced Technologies in the Humanities (IATH)