Wayles Browne

Last updated
E. Wayles Browne
WaylesBrown.jpg
Born (1941-07-19) July 19, 1941 (age 82)
Washington, D.C.
Education Harvard University
MIT
University of Zagreb
Occupation(s)Professor emeritus of linguistics, translator
Employer Cornell University
Known for Slavic languages
General linguistics
Translation

Eppes Wayles Browne III (born July 19, 1941, [1] Washington, DC) is a linguist, Slavist, translator and editor of Slavic journals in several countries. Browne is a professor emeritus of linguistics [2] at Cornell University, with research interests in Slavic and general linguistics, notably the study and analysis of Serbo-Croatian, where he is one of the leading Western scholars.

Contents

Biography

Browne was born in Washington, DC, the son of Eppes Wayles Browne Jr. (1909–1980) and Virginia (née Senders) Browne (1909–2011). [3] [4] Browne's Slavic studies began with his undergraduate career at Harvard University (A.B., 1963, in linguistics and Slavic languages), and continued with graduate work at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Novi Sad (then in SFR Yugoslavia), culminating in a Ph.D. degree (dated 1980, defended in January 1981, and awarded in 1983) from the University of Zagreb. [5] He studied with some of the finest linguists and Slavicists of the 20th century, including Roman Jakobson, Horace G. Lunt, Morris Halle, and Pavle Ivić. His dissertation, directed by Rudolf Filipović  [ hr ], [6] was entitled Relativna rečenica u hrvatskom ili srpskom jeziku u poređenju s engleskom situacijom ("Relative Clauses in the Croatian or Serbian Language in Comparison with the English Situation") and is one of the first serious attempts to analyze Serbo-Croatian syntax within a generative grammar framework. It was later published in revised form, in 1986, as Relative Clauses in Serbo-Croatian, as part of the Zagreb English-Serbo-Croatian Contrastive Project, by the Institute of Linguistics of University of Zagreb.

Besides his present position at Cornell, where he has taught since 1974, Browne has taught at Brown University and Yale University. He has also held research positions at MIT and at the University of Zagreb.

Linguistics

Browne's main interests lie in the syntax of Serbo-Croatian and other South Slavic languages (with particular attention to relative clauses, clitic placement rules, and complement clauses) and in the contributions data from these languages can make to theoretical work in general linguistics. He has also published works on the topic of the Balkan language area, Slavic historical grammar, comparative and contrastive grammar, and pedagogical grammar.

He served as the co-editor of Annual Workshop on Formal Approaches to Slavic Linguistics: the Cornell Meeting, 1995 (Michigan Slavic Publications, 1997), and has authored more than 65 articles and 20 reviews, covering topics not just in Serbo-Croatian and South Slavic linguistics but also in Slavic linguistics more generally (including work on Russian and on Czech) and in linguistic theory.

As part of a team of scholars, described by the Slavic and Balkan languages professor Christina Kramer as "each recognized internationally in his language area", [7] he wrote the widely cited definitive sketch of Serbo-Croatian grammar: "Serbo-Croat" (pp. 306–387 in The Slavonic Languages, B. Comrie and G. Corbett, eds., Routledge Publishers, 1993). Several reviewers commented favourably on Browne's contribution: Roland Sussex considered it superior to an independent monograph on the same language, [8] while Edna Andrews wrote in her review of the book's 2002 second edition, "Wayles Browne does an outstanding job ... and his contribution continues to be one of the best in the field." [9] Browne has also served as linguistics editor for The Slavic and East European Journal. [10]

In the Introduction of the recently published book A Linguist's Linguist: Studies in South Slavic Linguistics in Honor of E. Wayles Browne [11] that "brings together a leading cohort of specialists in South Slavic linguistics to celebrate Wayles Browne's body of works in this area," the editors Steven Franks, Vrinda Chidambaram, and Brian Joseph described Wayles Browne's as "a unique and almost irreplaceable intellectual resource for specialists in Slavic linguistics, working on a myriad of topics in a variety of languages and from a range of theoretical perspectives. He has been a subtle yet persistent force in bringing Slavic puzzles to the attention of the larger world of linguists and in defining the larger significance of these puzzles." [12]

In general linguistics, Browne has done research in syntax, morphology, and phonology as well as in relative clauses and other subordinate clauses, interrogatives, [13] clitic rules, word order, [14] reflexive verbs, and accent rules, [15] publishing numerous pieces in such major journals as Balkanistica , Folia Slavica , and Linguistic Inquiry .

Translations

Browne's literary translations are mostly from Serbo-Croatian varieties (Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian). He has been the principal English translator and editor for the Bosnian poet Sasha Skenderija since 1993, [16] [17] and he has also translated the works of Mak Dizdar, [18] Izet Sarajlić, [19] Milorad Pejić [20] and others. [21] Browne has also translated Croatian scholarly works, [22] and translates from or teaches other South Slavic languages, in addition to Polish, [23] Czech, [24] Russian, Belarusian, [25] Rusyn, [26] and Old Church Slavonic. [27]

Personal life and views

In 1994, Browne and his wife provided accommodation at their home for a student refugee from the Bosnian War, who arrived in the United States as part of a scheme organised by the Fellowship of Reconciliation. [28] He later criticised the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia for its effect on civilians, while acknowledging, "if somebody is going to intervene militarily, Slobodan Milošević is a very good person to intervene against." [29]

Works

Major work in linguistics

Selected literary translations

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slavic languages</span> Subfamily of Indo-European languages

The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic, spoken during the Early Middle Ages, which in turn is thought to have descended from the earlier Proto-Balto-Slavic language, linking the Slavic languages to the Baltic languages in a Balto-Slavic group within the Indo-European family.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Serbo-Croatian</span> South Slavic language

Serbo-Croatian – also called Serbo-Croat, Serbo-Croat-Bosnian (SCB), Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS), and Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS) – is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro. It is a pluricentric language with four mutually intelligible standard varieties, namely Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian, and Montenegrin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Serbian language</span> South Slavic language of the Balkans

Serbian is the standardized variety of the Serbo-Croatian language mainly used by Serbs. It is the official and national language of Serbia, one of the three official languages of Bosnia and Herzegovina and co-official in Montenegro and Kosovo. It is a recognized minority language in Croatia, North Macedonia, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bosnian language</span> Standardized variety of Serbo-Croatian

Bosnian, sometimes referred to as Bosniak language, is the standardized variety of the Serbo-Croatian pluricentric language mainly used by ethnic Bosniaks. Bosnian is one of three such varieties considered official languages of Bosnia and Herzegovina, along with Croatian and Serbian. It is also an officially recognized minority language in Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Kosovo.

Slavic or Slavonicstudies, also known as Slavistics, is the academic field of area studies concerned with Slavic peoples, languages, literature, history, and culture. Originally, a Slavist or Slavicist was primarily a linguist or philologist researching Slavistics. Increasingly, historians, social scientists, and other humanists who study Slavic cultures and societies have been included in this rubric.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Comparison of standard Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin and Serbian</span> Comparison of registers of the Serbo-Croatian language

Standard Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian are different national variants and official registers of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">South Slavic languages</span> Language family

The South Slavic languages are one of three branches of the Slavic languages. There are approximately 30 million speakers, mainly in the Balkans. These are separated geographically from speakers of the other two Slavic branches by a belt of German, Hungarian and Romanian speakers.

Radoslav Katičić was a Croatian linguist, classical philologist, Indo-Europeanist, Slavist and Indologist, one of the most prominent Croatian scholars in the humanities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shtokavian</span> Prestige dialect of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language

Shtokavian or Štokavian is the prestige supradialect of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language and the basis of its Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin standards. It is a part of the South Slavic dialect continuum. Its name comes from the form for the interrogative pronoun for "what" što. This is in contrast to Kajkavian and Chakavian.

The history of the Slavic languages stretches over 3000 years, from the point at which the ancestral Proto-Balto-Slavic language broke up into the modern-day Slavic languages which are today natively spoken in Eastern, Central and Southeastern Europe as well as parts of North Asia and Central Asia.

The term North Slavic languages is used in three main senses:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gora dialect</span> Variety of South Slavic spoken by the Gorani people

The Gorani or Goranski, also Našinski language, is the variety of South Slavic spoken by the Gorani people in the border area between Kosovo, North Macedonia, and Albania. It is part of the Torlakian dialect group, which is transitional between Eastern and Western South Slavic languages.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sasha Skenderija</span> Bosnian-American poet (born 1968)

Sasha Skenderija is a Bosnian-American poet currently residing in Prague.

Kenneth E. Naylor, Jr. was an American linguist and Slavist, one of the leading experts on Serbo-Croatian and South Slavic languages in general.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Croatian language</span> South Slavic language

Croatian is the standardised variety of the Serbo-Croatian pluricentric language mainly used by Croats. It is the national official language and literary standard of Croatia, one of the official languages of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, the Serbian province of Vojvodina, the European Union and a recognized minority language elsewhere in Serbia and other neighbouring countries.

Serbo-Croatian is a South Slavic language with four national standards. The Eastern Herzegovinian Neo-Shtokavian dialect forms the basis for Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian.

Serbo-Croatian is a South Slavic language that, like most other Slavic languages, has an extensive system of inflection. This article describes exclusively the grammar of the Shtokavian dialect, which is a part of the South Slavic dialect continuum and the basis for the Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian standard variants of Serbo-Croatian. "An examination of all the major 'levels' of language shows that BCS is clearly a single language with a single grammatical system."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Snježana Kordić</span> Croatian linguist

Snježana Kordić is a Croatian linguist. In addition to her work in syntax, she has written on sociolinguistics. Kordić is known among non-specialists for numerous articles against the puristic and prescriptive language policy in Croatia. Her 2010 book on language and nationalism popularises the theory of pluricentric languages in the Balkans.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dialects of Serbo-Croatian</span>

The dialects of Serbo-Croatian include the vernacular forms and standardized sub-dialect forms of Serbo-Croatian as a whole or as part of its standard varieties: Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian. They are part of the dialect continuum of South Slavic languages that joins through the transitional Torlakian dialects the Macedonian dialects to the south, Bulgarian dialects to the southeast and Slovene dialects to the northwest.

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References

  1. ↑ "United States Public Records, 1970-2009", database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QJJG-7PVV  : 14 June 2020), Eppes Wayle Browne, 1981-2007.
  2. ↑ Department of Linguistics, Cornell University. "Wayles Browne". Cornell University. Retrieved 24 December 2012.
  3. ↑ "Miss Virginia Senders Weds Mr. Eppes Wayles Browne". The Shreveport Journal. Shreveport, LA. December 1, 1934. p. 5. Retrieved September 6, 2023– via Newspapers.com. Open Access logo PLoS transparent.svg
  4. ↑ "Births". The Times. Shreveport, LA. July 21, 1941. p. 5. Retrieved September 6, 2023– via Newspapers.com. Open Access logo PLoS transparent.svg
  5. ↑ Catalogue of the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Zagreb
  6. ↑ "LINGUIST List 12.1056: Obituary: Rudolf Filipovic". 14 April 2001.
  7. ↑ Christina E. Kramer; Comrie, Bernard; Corbett, Greville G. (Autumn 1995). "Review of The Slavonic Languages". The Slavic and East European Journal. American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages. 39 (3): 473–474. doi:10.2307/308267. JSTOR   308267.
  8. ↑ Roland Sussex (January 1999). "Kordić Snježana. Serbo-Croatian". The Slavonic and East European Review . 77 (1): 142–144.
  9. ↑ Edna Andrews (Summer 2005). "Bernard Comrie and Grenville G. Corbett, eds. The Slavonic Languages". The Slavic and East European Journal. 49 (2): 351–352. doi:10.2307/20058293. JSTOR   20058293.
  10. ↑ George Gutsche (Winter 1993). "Minutes". The Slavic and East European Journal. American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages. 37 (4): 617–620. doi:10.2307/308491. JSTOR   308491.
  11. ↑ A linguist's linguist : studies in South Slavic linguistics in honor of E. Wayles Browne / edited by Steven Franks, Vrinda Chidambaram, & Brian Joseph. Bloomington, IN: Slavica Publishers. 2009. p. 480. ISBN   978-0-89357-364-5. LCCN   2009018477. Introduction (p. 1-13)
  12. ↑ "Slavica Publishers" . Retrieved 2009-06-29.
  13. ↑ Wayles Browne (June 1996). "Difficulties in Testing Wh-movement". Suvremena Lingvistika. 41–42 (1–2): 81–86.
  14. ↑ Wayles Browne (2003). "Razlike u redu riječi u zavisnoj rečenici: kontaktni i distantni položaj veznika da2 i glagola (Unterschiede der Wortstellung im abhängigen Satz: Kontakt- und Distanstellung der Konjunktion da2 zum Verb)". Wiener Slawistischer Almanach. 57: 39–44.
  15. ↑ Wayles Browne (2002). "Open and Closed Accent Types in Nouns in Serbo-Croatian" (PDF). The Kenneth e. Naylor Memorial Lecture Series in South Slavic Linguistics (3).
  16. ↑ Skenderija, Sasha; Wayles Browne (2008). Why the Dwarf Had to be Shot. Austin, Texas: Black Buzzard Press. p. 96. ISBN   978-0-938872-39-9. Afterword (p. 90-92) and About the Translators (p.94) describe history of Skenderija/Browne collaboration.
  17. ↑ Skenderija, Saša (2011). Rt Dobre Nade. Tešanj, Bosnia: Tešanj : Centar za kulturu i obrazovanje. pp. 47, [1], 47, [1] p. bilingual (Bosnian English) tête-bêche edition. ISBN   978-9958-792-78-6. OCLC   732098431.
  18. ↑ Mak Dizdar (July 2007). "Dark Blue River". Spirit of Bosnia. 2 (3).
  19. ↑ Wayles Browne (March 1994). "Poetry from OSIP: Two Bosnian Poets". Bookpress. 4 (2): 6–7.
  20. ↑ Pejić, Milorad (2009). "Friends in the Universe". Spirit of Bosnia . Retrieved 2012-12-23.
  21. ↑ Marko Vesovic (April 2008). "Grave, Cavern". Spirit of Bosnia. 3 (2).
  22. ↑ "Faculty & Student Achievements". Cornucopia: Medieval Studies at Cornell. Retrieved 2009-02-11.
  23. ↑ "Szkoła Języka i Kultury Polskiej Uniwersystet Śląski".
  24. ↑ Anderson, Stephen R. and Wayles Browne (1973). "On Keeping Exchange Rules in Czech". Papers in Linguistics. 6 (1–4): 445–82. doi:10.1080/08351817309370350.
  25. ↑ "NAABS Member News" (PDF). Archived from the original on July 22, 2011.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
  26. ↑ "Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Literatures". slavic.osu.edu. Archived from the original on 2008-07-06.
  27. ↑ "Cornucopia - Medieval Studies at Cornell". www.arts.cornell.edu. Archived from the original on 2008-05-17.
  28. ↑ Rebecca James (February 13, 1994). "Bosnian student finds shelter from war; she plans to enroll at Tompkins Cortland Community College". The Post-Standard – via LexisNexis.
  29. ↑ Sean Copeland (March 31, 1999). "Cornell U. community reacts to Kosovo". University Wire– via LexisNexis.
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