Alexis Manaster Ramer
Encyclopedia
Alexis Manaster Ramer is a Polish-born American linguist (PhD 1981, University of Chicago
).
He has published extensively on syntactic typology
(esp. in relation to Australian, Eskimo
, and Austronesian languages
); on phonological theory
and its relation to phenomena such as versification and speech errors; on comparative linguistics and etymology (Indo-European
, Uto-Aztecan, Yiddish), on glottochronology
and genetic classification of languages (Nostratic, Altaic, Haida-Nadene, Pakawan/Coahuiltecan
, Tonkawa
-Nadene); on poetics
(Vedic
, Homeric
, medieval Yiddish
); and on the history of linguistics.
Manaster Ramer is the founder of the ACL
special interest group on Mathematical linguistics (SIGMOL) and the organizer of the first Mathematics of Language conference.
He is honored by a festschrift
edited by Fabrice Cavoto, The Linguist's Linguist: A Collection of Papers in Honour of Alexis Manaster Ramer, Munich: LINCOM Europa, 2002.
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
).
He has published extensively on syntactic typology
Linguistic typology
Linguistic typology is a subfield of linguistics that studies and classifies languages according to their structural features. Its aim is to describe and explain the common properties and the structural diversity of the world's languages...
(esp. in relation to Australian, Eskimo
Eskimo
Eskimos or Inuit–Yupik peoples are indigenous peoples who have traditionally inhabited the circumpolar region from eastern Siberia , across Alaska , Canada, and Greenland....
, and Austronesian languages
Austronesian languages
The Austronesian languages are a language family widely dispersed throughout the islands of Southeast Asia and the Pacific, with a few members spoken on continental Asia that are spoken by about 386 million people. It is on par with Indo-European, Niger-Congo, Afroasiatic and Uralic as one of the...
); on phonological theory
Phonology
Phonology is, broadly speaking, the subdiscipline of linguistics concerned with the sounds of language. That is, it is the systematic use of sound to encode meaning in any spoken human language, or the field of linguistics studying this use...
and its relation to phenomena such as versification and speech errors; on comparative linguistics and etymology (Indo-European
Indo-European
Indo-European may refer to:* Indo-European languages** Aryan race, a 19th century and early 20th century term for those peoples who are the native speakers of Indo-European languages...
, Uto-Aztecan, Yiddish), on glottochronology
Glottochronology
Glottochronology is that part of lexicostatistics dealing with the chronological relationship between languages....
and genetic classification of languages (Nostratic, Altaic, Haida-Nadene, Pakawan/Coahuiltecan
Coahuiltecan
Coahuiltecan or Paikawa was a proposed language family in John Wesley Powell's 1891 classification of Native American languages that consisted of Coahuilteco and Cotoname. The proposal was expanded to include Comecrudo, Karankawa, and Tonkawa...
, Tonkawa
Tonkawa
The Tickanwa•tic Tribe , better known as the Tonkawa , are a Native American people indigenous to present-day Oklahoma and Texas. They once spoke the now-extinct Tonkawa language believed to have been a language isolate not related to any other indigenous tongues...
-Nadene); on poetics
Poetics
Aristotle's Poetics is the earliest-surviving work of dramatic theory and the first extant philosophical treatise to focus on literary theory...
(Vedic
Vedic period
The Vedic period was a period in history during which the Vedas, the oldest scriptures of Hinduism, were composed. The time span of the period is uncertain. Philological and linguistic evidence indicates that the Rigveda, the oldest of the Vedas, was composed roughly between 1700–1100 BCE, also...
, Homeric
Homeric scholarship
Homeric scholarship is the study of Homeric epic, especially the two large surviving epics, the Iliad and Odyssey. It is currently part of the academic discipline of classical studies, but the subject is one of the very oldest topics in all scholarship or science, and goes back to antiquity...
, medieval Yiddish
Yiddish literature
Yiddish literature encompasses all belles lettres written in Yiddish, the language of Ashkenazic Jewry which is related to Middle High German. The history of Yiddish, with its roots in central Europe and locus for centuries in Eastern Europe, is evident in its literature.It is generally described...
); and on the history of linguistics.
Manaster Ramer is the founder of the ACL
Association for Computational Linguistics
The Association for Computational Linguistics is the international scientific and professional society for people working on problems involving natural language and computation. An annual meeting is held each summer in locations where significant computational linguistics research is carried out...
special interest group on Mathematical linguistics (SIGMOL) and the organizer of the first Mathematics of Language conference.
He is honored by a festschrift
Festschrift
In academia, a Festschrift , is a book honoring a respected person, especially an academic, and presented during his or her lifetime. The term, borrowed from German, could be translated as celebration publication or celebratory writing...
edited by Fabrice Cavoto, The Linguist's Linguist: A Collection of Papers in Honour of Alexis Manaster Ramer, Munich: LINCOM Europa, 2002.