Robert Anderson Hall Jr. (April 4, 1911December 2, 1997) was an American linguist who specialized in

Romance languages The Romance languages, also known as the Latin or Neo-Latin languages, are the languages that are Language family, directly descended from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-E ...

Early life

Hall was born in

Raleigh, North Carolina Raleigh ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the List of municipalities in North Carolina, second-most populous city in the state (after Charlotte, North Carolina, Charlotte) ...

, on April 4, 1911. Most of his childhood was spent in

Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario to the north and east and by the U.S. states of Wisconsin to the east, Iowa to the so ...

and

New England New England is a region consisting of six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the ...

. He received his BA from Princeton in 1931, having majored in French and German literature. He then began an MA at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

, where he studied linguistics with

Harry Hoijer Harry Hoijer (September 6, 1904 – March 11, 1976) was a linguist and anthropologist who worked on primarily Athabaskan languages and culture. He additionally documented the Tonkawa language, which is now extinct language, extinct. Hoijer's few w ...

and

Leonard Bloomfield Leonard Bloomfield (April 1, 1887 – April 18, 1949) was an American linguist who led the development of structural linguistics in the United States during the 1930s and the 1940s. He is considered to be the father of American distributionalis ...

and classical

Indo-European languages The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the northern Indian subcontinent, most of Europe, and the Iranian plateau with additional native branches found in regions such as Sri Lanka, the Maldives, parts of Central Asia (e. ...

(

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

Avestan Avestan ( ) is the liturgical language of Zoroastrianism. It belongs to the Iranian languages, Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family and was First language, originally spoken during the Avestan period, Old ...

, and

Old Persian Old Persian is one of two directly attested Old Iranian languages (the other being Avestan) and is the ancestor of Middle Persian (the language of the Sasanian Empire). Like other Old Iranian languages, it was known to its native speakers as (I ...

) with Carl Darling Buck and George Bobrinskoy. He took a break from his graduate studies at Chicago in order to travel to Italy to study

Italian literature Italian literature is written in the Italian language, particularly within Italy. It may also refer to literature written by Italians or in other languages spoken in Italy, often languages that are closely related to modern Italian, including ...

and

historical linguistics Historical linguistics, also known as diachronic linguistics, is the scientific study of how languages change over time. It seeks to understand the nature and causes of linguistic change and to trace the evolution of languages. Historical li ...

, which led to his receiving a DLitt from the University of Rome in 1934. Upon returning to United States, he completed the remaining requirements for his MA, which was awarded in 1935. As he had already received a DLitt from the University of Rome, he chose not to pursue a PhD at Chicago.

Career

Hall began his academic career at the

University of Puerto Rico The University of Puerto Rico (Spanish language, Spanish: ''Universidad de Puerto Rico;'' often shortened to UPR) is the main List of state and territorial universities in the United States, public university system in the Commonwealth (U.S. i ...

in 1936, and then moved to Princeton in 1939 and

Brown Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing and painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors Orange (colour), orange and black. In the ...

in 1940. In 1943, he went to work at U.S. Armed Forces Institute (USAFI) in Washington, where he helped to produce textbooks for French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese as part of the "Spoken Language" series. This series was to have a significant effect on the teaching of foreign languages in the United States. He also contributed to the Armed Services Training Program (ASTP). At the invitation of J Milton Cowan, Hall joined the faculty at Cornell in 1946 and helped to found the Division of Modern Languages there. When he retired in 1975, he received the title of Professor Emeritus of Linguistics and Italian. In addition to the Romance languages, he had a strong interest in

pidgin A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a grammatically simplified form of contact language that develops between two or more groups of people that do not have a language in common: typically, its vocabulary and grammar are limited and often drawn f ...

and creole languages. He also took an interest in the controversial Kensington Runestone, which he believed to be genuine. Hall was a critic of the theories of

Noam Chomsky Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American professor and public intellectual known for his work in linguistics, political activism, and social criticism. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a ...

Personal life

In 1936, Hall married Frances L. Adkins, with whom he had three children (one son and two daughters). After Adkins's death in 1975, Hall married Alice M. Colby-Hall. A fan of

P. G. Wodehouse Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse ( ; 15 October 1881 – 14 February 1975) was an English writer and one of the most widely read humorists of the 20th century. His creations include the feather-brained Bertie Wooster and his sagacious valet, Je ...

, Hall wrote a book on Wodehouse's comic style and served as the president of the Wodehouse Society from 1983 to 1985. He died from

Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a neurodegenerative disease primarily of the central nervous system, affecting both motor system, motor and non-motor systems. Symptoms typically develop gradually and non-motor issues become ...

at the Cayuga Medical Center in

Ithaca, New York Ithaca () is a city in and the county seat of Tompkins County, New York, United States. Situated on the southern shore of Cayuga Lake in the Finger Lakes region of New York (state), New York, Ithaca is the largest community in the Ithaca metrop ...

, on December 2, 1997, at the age of 86.

Notable works

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hall, Robert A. Jr. 1911 births 1997 deaths 20th-century American linguists 20th-century American philologists Linguists of Romance languages Linguists of pidgins and creoles Princeton University alumni University of Chicago alumni Sapienza University of Rome alumni University of Puerto Rico faculty Princeton University faculty Brown University faculty Cornell University faculty