Robert Sonkin was an American scholar of speech, language, and music.

Life

Sonkin was born into an Orthodox Jewish family in the Bronx

The Bronx

The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...

, New York

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

, on December 25, 1910.. Sonkin, who held degrees from City College (CCNY) (now the City College of the City University of New York [CUNY]) and 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...

, founded the speech clinic at City College. He met Charles L. Todd while they were both working in the Department of Public Speaking at City College in the late 1930s. In addition to doing ethnographic research with Todd in California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

, Sonkin also documented the African American

African American

African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...

 community of the town of Gee's Bend, Alabama

Gee's Bend, Alabama

Boykin, also known as Gee's Bend, is an African American majority community and census-designated place in a large bend of the Alabama River in Wilcox County, Alabama. As of the 2010 census, its population was 275...

, where other Farm Security Administration

Farm Security Administration

Initially created as the Resettlement Administration in 1935 as part of the New Deal in the United States, the Farm Security Administration was an effort during the Depression to combat American rural poverty...

 (FSA) work was being carried out. After the onset of World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, Sonkin participated in an Archive of American Folk Song-sponsored project to document the man-in-the-street's opinion of the war effort. Like Todd, Sonkin was drafted into the military during World War II, where he served in the Army Signal Corps.

At the end of the war, Sonkin returned to City College and became professor of speech. In 1977, collaborators Todd and Sonkin jointly published a biography of Alexander Bryan Johnson

Alexander Bryan Johnson

Alexander Bryan Johnson was an American philosopher and banker.-Biography:Born in Gosport, Hampshire, England, at age 16 he emigrated to the United States, and settled at Utica, where he was a banker for many years...

.

Sonkin retired from CUNY in 1976 and became professor emeritus. He died May 26, 1980, at the age of sixty-nine.

External links

• Library of Congress