Claire Penn (1951–2018) was a South African

speech and language pathologist Speech is a human vocal communication using language. Each language uses phonetic combinations of vowel and consonant sounds that form the sound of its words (that is, all English words sound different from all French words, even if they are th ...

, and held the endowed chair of

Speech Pathology Speech is a human vocal communication using language Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which hum ...

and

Audiology Audiology (from Latin , "to hear"; and from Greek , ''-logia'') is a branch of science that studies hearing, balance, and related disorders. Audiologists treat those with hearing loss and proactively prevent related damage. By employing vario ...

at the

University of the Witwatersrand The University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg (), is a multi-campus South African public research university situated in the northern areas of central Johannesburg. It is more commonly known as Wits University or Wits ( or ). The university ...

, and was a former senior research specialist at the Human Sciences Research Council. She received the Order of Mapungubwe (Silver) in 2007, South Africa's highest honor, for her work in

linguistics Linguistics is the science, scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure ...

, sign language, child language,

aphasia Aphasia is an inability to comprehend or formulate language because of damage to specific brain regions. The major causes are stroke and head trauma; prevalence is hard to determine but aphasia due to stroke is estimated to be 0.1–0.4% in t ...

, and head injury.

Career

Penn was born in

Kenya ) , national_anthem = " Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu"() , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Nairobi , coordinates = , largest_city = Nairobi ...

and moved with her family to

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

at age 12. She attended the

(Wits), where she completed her bachelor's degree ('' cum laude'') in Speech and Hearing in 1972. She worked at Wits as clinical tutor from 1973 to 1976 before moving to

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

as a British council scholar. She returned to Wits to earn a PhD in 1983. She was a visiting scholar to Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, and Case Western Reserve University in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. In 2008 Penn was named Shoprite Checkers /

SABC 2 SABC 2 is a South African family public television channel owned by the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC). SABC 2 broadcasts programming in English, Sepedi, Afrikaans, Venda, and Tsonga. As of August 2018, the channel started broad ...

South Africa Woman of the Year for Science and Technology. In 2012, her visit and lecture on "Health Communication across Cultures: Some Perspectives from South Africa" was funded by Duke University.

Personal life

She had two children, and her hobbies included mountain climbing and hiking.

Awards and honours

She was awarded the Order of Mapungubwe in Silver in 2007 for "Excellent contribution to the field of speech and language pathology, especially in the area of linguistics, sign language, child language, aphasia and head injury and producing ground-breaking research in understanding the complexities of human communication."

References

External links

Staff profile
University of the Witwatersrand * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Penn, Claire 1951 births 2018 deaths Speech and language pathologists South African women scientists University of the Witwatersrand alumni University of the Witwatersrand academics 20th-century women scientists 21st-century women scientists