Arthur S. Abramson
Encyclopedia
Arthur S. Abramson is an American linguist
, phonetician
, and speech scientist
. He is a Professor Emeritus of Linguistics at the University of Connecticut
http://www.ucc.uconn.edu/~wwwling/ABRAMSON.HTML, where he was the founding chair, and a Senior Scientist at Haskins Laboratories
http://www.haskins.yale.edu/staff/abramson.html in New Haven, Connecticut
. He is also a member of the Board of Directors http://www.haskins.yale.edu/board.html of Haskins and is the Secretary of Haskins and its Board. Abramson is best known for his work with colleague Leigh Lisker
on voice onset timing
. He is also an expert on Southeast Asian Languages and has spent much time working with colleagues in Thailand
. His other research interests include experimental phonetics
, the production and perception of speech
, laryngeal control
in consonants, and distinctive tone
, particularly in the Thai language
.
. He received his M.A. in 1950 and Ph.D. in 1960 from Columbia University
.
Linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
, phonetician
Phonetics
Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that comprises the study of the sounds of human speech, or—in the case of sign languages—the equivalent aspects of sign. It is concerned with the physical properties of speech sounds or signs : their physiological production, acoustic properties, auditory...
, and speech scientist
Speech perception
Speech perception is the process by which the sounds of language are heard, interpreted and understood. The study of speech perception is closely linked to the fields of phonetics and phonology in linguistics and cognitive psychology and perception in psychology...
. He is a Professor Emeritus of Linguistics at the University of Connecticut
University of Connecticut
The admission rate to the University of Connecticut is about 50% and has been steadily decreasing, with about 28,000 prospective students applying for admission to the freshman class in recent years. Approximately 40,000 prospective students tour the main campus in Storrs annually...
http://www.ucc.uconn.edu/~wwwling/ABRAMSON.HTML, where he was the founding chair, and a Senior Scientist at Haskins Laboratories
Haskins Laboratories
Haskins Laboratories is an independent, international, multidisciplinary community of researchers conducting basic research on spoken and written language. Founded in 1935 and located in New Haven, Connecticut since 1970, Haskins Laboratories is a private, non-profit research institute with a...
http://www.haskins.yale.edu/staff/abramson.html in New Haven, Connecticut
New Haven, Connecticut
New Haven is the second-largest city in Connecticut and the sixth-largest in New England. According to the 2010 Census, New Haven's population increased by 5.0% between 2000 and 2010, a rate higher than that of the State of Connecticut, and higher than that of the state's five largest cities, and...
. He is also a member of the Board of Directors http://www.haskins.yale.edu/board.html of Haskins and is the Secretary of Haskins and its Board. Abramson is best known for his work with colleague Leigh Lisker
Leigh Lisker
Leigh Lisker was an eminent American linguist and phonetician. Most of his career was spent at the University of Pennsylvania, where he was a professor and then emeritus professor of linguistics. Dr. Lisker received his A.B. in 1941, with a major in German, his M.A. in 1946, and a Ph.D. in 1949 in...
on voice onset timing
Voice onset time
In phonetics, voice onset time, commonly abbreviated VOT, is a feature of the production of stop consonants. It is defined as the length of time that passes between when a stop consonant is released and when voicing, the vibration of the vocal folds, or, according to the authors, periodicity begins...
. He is also an expert on Southeast Asian Languages and has spent much time working with colleagues in Thailand
Thailand
Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...
. His other research interests include experimental phonetics
Phonetics
Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that comprises the study of the sounds of human speech, or—in the case of sign languages—the equivalent aspects of sign. It is concerned with the physical properties of speech sounds or signs : their physiological production, acoustic properties, auditory...
, the production and perception of speech
Speech perception
Speech perception is the process by which the sounds of language are heard, interpreted and understood. The study of speech perception is closely linked to the fields of phonetics and phonology in linguistics and cognitive psychology and perception in psychology...
, laryngeal control
Larynx
The larynx , commonly called the voice box, is an organ in the neck of amphibians, reptiles and mammals involved in breathing, sound production, and protecting the trachea against food aspiration. It manipulates pitch and volume...
in consonants, and distinctive tone
Tone (linguistics)
Tone is the use of pitch in language to distinguish lexical or grammatical meaning—that is, to distinguish or inflect words. All verbal languages use pitch to express emotional and other paralinguistic information, and to convey emphasis, contrast, and other such features in what is called...
, particularly in the Thai language
Thai language
Thai , also known as Central Thai and Siamese, is the national and official language of Thailand and the native language of the Thai people, Thailand's dominant ethnic group. Thai is a member of the Tai group of the Tai–Kadai language family. Historical linguists have been unable to definitively...
.
Education
Arthur Abramson received his B.A. in 1949 from Yeshiva UniversityYeshiva University
Yeshiva University is a private university in New York City, with six campuses in New York and one in Israel. Founded in 1886, it is a research university ranked as 45th in the US among national universities by U.S. News & World Report in 2012...
. He received his M.A. in 1950 and Ph.D. in 1960 from Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
.
Selected publications
- Abramson, A.S. (1962) The Vowels and Tones of Standard Thai: Acoustical Measurements and Experiments. Bloomington: Indiana U. Res. Center in Anthropology, Folklore, and Linguistics, Pub. 20.
- Abramson, A.S. and D.M. Erickson. (1992) Tone splits and voicing shifts in Thai: Phonetic plausibility. In Pan Asiatic Linguistics: Proceedings of the Third International Symposium on Language and Linguistics, Vol. I (pp. 1–16). Bangkok: Chulalongkorn University.