James A. Matisoff (born July 14, 1937) is a professor emeritus of Linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley and noted authority on Tibeto-Burman languages and other languages of mainland Southeast Asia. July 14 is the 195th day (196th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 170 days remaining. ... 1937 (MCMXXXVII) was a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). ... Emeritus (IPA pronunciation: or ) is an adjective that is used in the title of a retired professor, bishop or other professional. ... Linguistics is the scientific study of human language, and someone who engages in this study is called a linguist. ... The University of California, Berkeley (also known as UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, and by other names, see below) is the oldest and flagship campus of the ten-campus University of California system. ... The Tibeto-Burman linguistic subfamily of the proposed Sino-Tibetan language family is spoken in various central and south Asian countries: Myanmar (the Burmese language as well as the languages of minorities like the Karens and Kachins), Tibet (Tibetan language), northern Thailand (Lahu, Lisu, Akha languages), southern China, Nepal, Bhutan... Location of Southeast Asia Southeast Asia is a subregion of Asia. ...

Matisoff was born July 14, 1937 in Boston, Massachusetts to a working-class family. He attended Harvard from 1954 to 1959 and received a degree in Romance Languages and Literatures (A.B.) in 1958 and a degree in French Literature (A.M.) in 1959. After studying Japanese at International Christian University for one year (1960-1961), he returned to Harvard to study linguistics. He was not satisfied with the linguistics program at Harvard and opted to transfer to the University of California, Berkeley, where he completed his PhD in Linguistics in 1967. July 14 is the 195th day (196th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 170 days remaining. ... 1937 (MCMXXXVII) was a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). ... Boston is a town and small port c. ... Official language(s) English Capital Boston Largest city Boston Area  Ranked 44th  - Total 10,555 sq mi (27,360 km²)  - Width 183 miles (295 km)  - Length 113 miles (182 km)  - % water 13. ... Harvard University (incorporated as The President and Fellows of Harvard College) is a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. ... The Romance languages, a major branch of the Indo-European language family, comprise all languages that descended from Latin, the language of the Roman Empire. ... French literature is, generally speaking, literature written in the French language, particularly by citizens of France; it may also refer to literature written by people living in France who speak other traditional non-French languages. ... International Christian University (国際基督教大学: Kokusai Kirisutokyō Daigaku) is a non-denominational Christian university located in Mitaka, Tokyo, Japan. ...

Matisoff's doctoral dissertation was a grammar of the Lahu language, a Tibeto-Burman language belonging to the Loloish branch of the Lolo-Burmese family. He spent a year doing field work on Lahu during his graduate studies and made several field studies thereafter. His Grammar of Lahu was notable both for its depth of detail and the theoretical eccleticism which informed his description of the language. The Lahu people (Chinese: 拉祜族 Lāhùzú; own names: Ladhulsi or Kawzhawd) are an ethnic group. ... The Tibeto-Burman linguistic subfamily of the proposed Sino-Tibetan language family is spoken in various central and south Asian countries: Myanmar (the Burmese language as well as the languages of minorities like the Karens and Kachins), Tibet (Tibetan language), northern Thailand (Lahu, Lisu, Akha languages), southern China, Nepal, Bhutan...

After four years teaching at Columbia University (1966-1969), Matisoff accepted a professorship at Berkeley, where he remained until his retirement in 2001. Columbia University is a private university whose main campus lies in the Morningside Heights neighborhood of the Borough of Manhattan in New York City. ...

During his time at Berkeley, Matisoff founded and directed the Sino-Tibetan Etymological Dictionary and Thesaurus (STEDT) project, a long running project aimed at producing an etymological dictionary of Sino-Tibetan organized by semantic field. Etymology is the study of the origins of words. ... Sino-Tibetan languages form a language family of about 250 languages of East Asia, second only to Indo-European in terms of the number of speakers. ...

The term Cheshirisation, coined by Matisoff, refers to the Cheshire Cat, a character in the book Alice in Wonderland, who has the ability to disappear. The last thing that remains visible is his smile. Although not an established scientific term, the word Cheshirisation can help to describe a linguistic phenomenon where the sound of part of a word is lost due to language change. However, before disappearing this sound triggers some phonetic changes in its vicinity or prevents them. These phonetic changes would be the Cheshire smile. Examples are the umlaut in Germanic languages (a lost i or j triggers fronting), initial mutations in Celtic (a lost vowel triggers lenition, a lost nasal triggers nasalisation), Lahu (a lost consonant prevents sound change) or the tone split in Chinese (a voiced consonant triggers a low tone and is subsequently devoiced). The Cheshire cat as John Tenniel envisioned it in the 1866 publication The Cheshire Cat is a fictional cat appearing in Lewis Carrolls Alice in Wonderland. ... Alice in Wonderland is the widely known and used title for Alices Adventures in Wonderland, a book written by Lewis Carroll -- as well as several movie adaptations of the book -- and is also the setting for several short stories. ... In linguistics, the process of umlaut (from German um- around + Laut sound) is a modification of a vowel which causes it to be pronounced more similarly to a vowel or semivowel in a following syllable. ... Consonant mutation is the phenomenon in which a consonant in a word is changed according to its morphological and/or syntactic environment. ... The Lahu people (Chinese: 拉祜族 Lāhùzú; own names: Ladhulsi or Kawzhawd) are an ethnic group. ...

Bibliography

External links

• Personal page at the STEDT project website
• Faculty page at the UC Berkeley Department of Linguistics
• STEDT project page