Arthur Seymour Abramson (January 26, 1925 – December 15, 2017) was an American

linguist Linguistics is the 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. Linguis ...

phonetician Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds, or in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sign. Linguists who specialize in studying the physical properties of speech are phoneticians. ...

, and

speech scientist Speech science refers to the study of production, transmission and perception of speech. Speech science involves anatomy, in particular the anatomy of the oro-facial region and neuroanatomy, physiology, and acoustics. Speech production The p ...

. Abramson was born in

Jersey City, New Jersey Jersey City is the second-most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey, after Newark.University of Connecticut The University of Connecticut (UConn) is a public land-grant research university in Storrs, Connecticut, a village in the town of Mansfield. The primary 4,400-acre (17.8 km2) campus is in Storrs, approximately a half hour's drive from H ...

and served as head of the department from 1967 to 1974. Abramson was a Senior Scientist at

Haskins Laboratories Haskins Laboratories, Inc. is an independent 501(c) non-profit corporation, founded in 1935 and located in New Haven, Connecticut, since 1970. Haskins has formal affiliation agreements with both Yale University and the University of Connecticut; ...

New Haven, Connecticut New Haven is a city in the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located on New Haven Harbor on the northern shore of Long Island Sound in New Haven County, Connecticut and is part of the New York City metropolitan area. With a population of 134,02 ...

, and he was also a member of Haskins's Board of Directors and the secretary of the corporation. He served as president of the

Linguistic Society of America The Linguistic Society of America (LSA) is a learned society for the field of linguistics. Founded in New York City in 1924, the LSA works to promote the scientific study of language. The society publishes three scholarly journals: ''Language'', ...

in 1983. Abramson was best known for his work with colleague Leigh Lisker on voice onset timing. He was also an expert on Southeast Asian Languages and spent much time working with colleagues in

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...

. His other research interests included experimental

phonetics Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds, or in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sign. Linguists who specialize in studying the physical properties of speech are phoneticians. ...

, the production and perception of speech, laryngeal control in

consonant In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are and pronounced with the lips; and pronounced with the front of the tongue; and pronounced wit ...

s, and distinctive tone, particularly in the Thai language. He died on December 15, 2017.

Education

Arthur Abramson received his B.A. in 1949 from

Yeshiva University Yeshiva University is a private Orthodox Jewish university with four campuses in New York City."About YU
on the Yeshiva Universit ...

. He received his M.A. in 1950 and Ph.D. in 1960 from

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

Selected publications

* Abramson, A.S. (1962) ''The Vowels and Tones of Standard Thai: Acoustical Measurements and Experiments''. Bloomington: Indiana U. Res. Center in Anthropology, Folklore, and Linguistics, Pub. 20. * * * * Abramson, A.S. and D.M. Erickson. (1992) Tone splits and voicing shifts in Thai: Phonetic plausibility. In P''an Asiatic Linguistics: Proceedings of the Third International Symposium on Language and Linguistics'', Vol. I (pp. 1–16). Bangkok: Chulalongkorn University.

External links

Haskins Laboratories

University of Connecticut Linguistics Department

References

1927 births 2017 deaths Linguists from the United States Haskins Laboratories scientists Speech perception researchers Columbia University alumni Yeshiva University alumni University of Connecticut faculty Linguistic Society of America presidents People from Jersey City, New Jersey Fellows of the Linguistic Society of America {{US-linguist-stub