Victor A. Friedman (born October 18, 1949) is an American linguist and

Slavist Slavic (American English) or Slavonic (British English) studies, 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 ...

. He is the Andrew W. Mellon Distinguished Service Professor in Humanities 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 ...

. He holds an appointment in the Department of Linguistics and an associate appointment in the Department of

Anthropology Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, society, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including archaic humans. Social anthropology studies patterns of behav ...

. He has published numerous articles in English, Macedonian, and Albanian.

Career

Friedman was born in Chicago into a family of descendants of Jewish immigrants from the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

and

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

. He received his B.A. in

Russian language Russian is an East Slavic languages, East Slavic language belonging to the Balto-Slavic languages, Balto-Slavic branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family. It is one of the four extant East Slavic languages, and is ...

and

literature Literature is any collection of Writing, written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, Play (theatre), plays, and poetry, poems. It includes both print and Electroni ...

Reed College Reed College is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Portland, Oregon, United States. Founded in 1908, Reed is a residential college with a campus in the Eastmoreland, Portland, Oregon, E ...

in 1970. Friedman's PhD was in

Slavic languages The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavs, Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic language, Proto- ...

and literatures and in general linguistics at the

in 1975. His dissertation, ''The Grammatical Categories of the Macedonian Indicative'', was the first publication about modern Macedonian in the U.S. and won the Mark Perry Galler Prize for best dissertation in the Humanities Division at Chicago. From 1975 until 1993, Friedman taught at the

University of North Carolina The University of North Carolina is the Public university, public university system for the state of North Carolina. Overseeing the state's 16 public universities and the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics, it is commonly referre ...

, where he served as department chairman. In 1993, he was appointed to a professorship at the University of Chicago. He has held visiting positions at

Cornell University Cornell University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university based in Ithaca, New York, United States. The university was co-founded by American philanthropist Ezra Cornell and historian and educator Andrew Dickson W ...

, the University of Skopje, the

Central European University Central European University (CEU; , ) is a private research university in Vienna. The university offers graduate and undergraduate programs in the social sciences and humanities, which are accredited in Austria and the United States. The univ ...

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

Kyoto University , or , is a National university, national research university in Kyoto, Japan. Founded in 1897, it is one of the former Imperial Universities and the second oldest university in Japan. The university has ten undergraduate faculties, eighteen gra ...

, the

University of Helsinki The University of Helsinki (, ; UH) is a public university in Helsinki, Finland. The university was founded in Turku in 1640 as the Royal Academy of Åbo under the Swedish Empire, and moved to Helsinki in 1828 under the sponsorship of Alexander ...

, the University of Pristina, the

National University of Malaysia The National University of Malaysia (, abbreviated as UKM) is a public research university located in Bandar Baru Bangi, Hulu Langat District, Selangor, Malaysia. Its teaching hospital, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Medical Centre (UKMMC), ...

and

La Trobe University La Trobe University is a public university, public research university based in Melbourne, Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia. Its main campus is located in the suburb of Bundoora, Victoria, Bundoora. The university was established in 1 ...

. His expertise extends over all languages of the

Balkans The Balkans ( , ), corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throug ...

and the

Caucasus The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region spanning Eastern Europe and Western Asia. It is situated between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, comprising parts of Southern Russia, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. The Caucasus Mountains, i ...

, including Albanian, Aromanian, Azeri, Bosnian, Croatian, Bulgarian, Georgian,

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 ...

, Judezmo, Lak, Macedonian, Romanian, Romani, Russian, Serbian, Tadjik, and Turkish. His research has been multidisciplinary and has involved extensive fieldwork in the Balkans. In 1994 he served as a senior policy and political analyst to the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...

regarding policy in the

former Yugoslavia The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (commonly abbreviated as SFRY or SFR Yugoslavia), known from 1945 to 1963 as the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia, commonly referred to as Socialist Yugoslavia or simply Yugoslavia, was a country ...

, and since then he has been involved in other consultative roles in the region.

Awards and honors

* "1300 Years of Bulgaria" jubilee medal (1982) * University of Skopje Gold Plaque (1981, 2003, 2007) * Member of the Macedonian Academy of Arts and Sciences (1994) * Member of Matica Srpska (1995) * Member of the Academy of Arts and Sciences of

Kosovo Kosovo, officially the Republic of Kosovo, is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe with International recognition of Kosovo, partial diplomatic recognition. It is bordered by Albania to the southwest, Montenegro to the west, Serbia to the ...

(2004) * Member of the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of

Albania Albania ( ; or ), officially the Republic of Albania (), is a country in Southeast Europe. It is located in the Balkans, on the Adriatic Sea, Adriatic and Ionian Seas within the Mediterranean Sea, and shares land borders with Montenegro to ...

(2006) * Doctor Honoris Causa, University of Skopje (2007) * John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship (2008–09) * Annual Award for Outstanding Contributions to Scholarship, American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages (2009) * World Prize of Humanism (2013) * Annual Award for Distinguished Contributions to Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies Award, Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (2014)

Selected publications

* ''Macedonian'' (2002) - http://www.seelrc.org:8080/grammar/pdf/compgrammar_macedonian.pdf * ''Turkish in Macedonia and Beyond: Studies in Contact, Typology, and Other Phenomena in the Balkans and the Caucasus'' (2003) * ''Studies on Albanian and Other Balkan Languages'' (2004) * ''Očerki laksogo jazyka'' (2011) * ''Makedonistički studii 1'' (2011) - http://drmj.manu.edu.mk/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Македонистички-студии_В.-Фридман.pdf * ''Makedonistički studii 2'' (2015) - http://drmj.manu.edu.mk/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Macedonian_Studies2_V.Friedman.pdf *''The Balkan Languages'' (with Brian Joseph, 2025) - https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/balkan-languages/DF1897CA3A024BFF3AB73392CD28822E

References

External links

Friedman's CV and publications
on

's website {{DEFAULTSORT:Friedman, Victor Linguists of Slavic languages Macedonists Linguists from the United States Reed College alumni University of Chicago alumni University of Chicago faculty Living people 1949 births Jewish American academics 21st-century American Jews Members of the Kosova Academy of Sciences and Arts