Thomas Givon


Thomas Givon is a linguist and writer. He is one of the founders of "West Coast Functionalism", today classified as a usage-based model of language, and of the linguistics department at the University of Oregon. Givón advocates an evolutionary approach to language and communication.

Education

Givón earned his bachelor of science degree cum laude in agriculture from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1959. Attending UCLA, he received a Master of Science degree in horticulture in 1962, a C.Phil in Plant Biochemistry, a Master of Arts degree in linguistics in 1966, and a PhD in linguistics in 1969, as well as an TESL certificate in 1965.

Career

In 1966 Givón worked for System Development Corporation as a research associate in lexicography. The following year he went to University of Zambia where he researched Bantu languages. In 1969 he became an assistant professor of Linguistics and African Languages at University of California at Los Angeles. He was promoted to associate professor there in 1974 and full professor in 1979. In 1981 he moved to University of Oregon as professor of linguistics until 2002 when he became Distinguished Professor of Linguistics and Cognitive Science. Givón's last general linguistic project was The Genesis of Complex Syntax: Diachrony, Ontogeny, Cognition, Evolution.

Work in linguistics

His work covers many language areas, as well as many areas of theoretical linguistics:.
Givón is said to have coined the aphorism that "today's morphology is yesterday's syntax", in a development of Antoine Meillet's work on grammaticalisation.
He was the editor of the book series Typological Studies in Language published by John Benjamins Publishing Company.

Other writings

Givon has written a series of novels and historical translations through his publishing house, White Cloud Publishing, and is a google blogger.