Mark Yoffe Liberman is 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. Lingu ...

. He has a dual appointment at the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a Private university, private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest- ...

, as Trustee Professor of Phonetics in the Department of Linguistics, and as a professor in the Department of Computer and Information Sciences. He is the founder and director of the Linguistic Data Consortium. Liberman is the Faculty Director of Ware College House at the

Early life

Liberman is the son of psychologists Alvin Liberman and Isabelle Liberman. Mark Liberman attended

Harvard College Harvard College is the undergraduate college of Harvard University, an Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636, Harvard College is the original school of Harvard University, the oldest institution of higher ...

but did not graduate. After two years' service in the

US Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

in Vietnam, he enrolled in graduate school in

linguistics 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. Ling ...

at MIT, from which he received a

Master of Science A Master of Science ( la, Magisterii Scientiae; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree in the field of science awarded by universities in many countries or a person holding such a degree. In contrast t ...

(1972) and a

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * '' Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. al ...

(1975).

Career

From 1975 to 1990, he was a Member of Technical Staff at

Bell Laboratories Nokia Bell Labs, originally named Bell Telephone Laboratories (1925–1984), then AT&T Bell Laboratories (1984–1996) and Bell Labs Innovations (1996–2007), is an American industrial Research and development, research and scientific developm ...

Research

Liberman's main research interests lie in

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. ...

, prosody, and other aspects of speech communication. His early research established the linguistic subfield of

metrical phonology Metrical phonology is a theory of stress or linguistic prominence. The innovative feature of this theory is that the prominence of a unit is defined relative to other units in the same phrase. For example, in the most common pronunciation of the p ...

. Much of his current research is conducted through

computational Computation is any type of arithmetic or non-arithmetic calculation that follows a well-defined model (e.g., an algorithm). Mechanical or electronic devices (or, historically, people) that perform computations are known as ''computers''. An espe ...

analyses of linguistic corpora. In 2017, Liberman was the recipient of the IEEE James L. Flanagan Speech and Audio Processing Award. Liberman is a founding co-

editor Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, photographic, visual, audible, or cinematic material used by a person or an entity to convey a message or information. The editing process can involve correction, condensation, or ...

of the ''

Annual Review of Linguistics The ''Annual Review of Linguistics'' is an annual peer-reviewed review journal published by Annual Reviews. It was established in 2015 and covers developments in the broad field of linguistics The founding co-editors were Barbara Partee and Mark ...

''. Liberman is also the founder of (and frequent contributor to)

Language Log ''Language Log'' is a collaborative language blog maintained by Mark Liberman, a phonetician at the University of Pennsylvania. Most of the posts focus on language use in the media and in popular culture. Text available through Google Search f ...

, a blog with a broad cast of dozens of professional linguists. The concept of the ''

eggcorn An eggcorn is the alteration of a phrase through the mishearing or reinterpretation of one or more of its elements,, sense 2 creating a new phrase having a different meaning from the original but which still makes sense and is plausible when used ...

'' was first proposed in one of his posts there.

Mobile phones and endangered languages

In 2012, Liberman and Steven Bird began a US$101,501 project "to use mobile telephones to collect larger amounts of data on undocumented

endangered languages An endangered language or moribund language is a language that is at risk of disappearing as its speakers die out or shift to speaking other languages. Language loss occurs when the language has no more native speakers and becomes a " dead lan ...

than would ever be possible through usual fieldwork." The project resulted in the

mobile app A mobile application or app is a computer program or software application designed to run on a mobile device such as a phone, tablet, or watch. Mobile applications often stand in contrast to desktop applications which are designed to run on d ...

Aikuma Aikuma is an Android App for collecting speech recordings with time-aligned translations. The app includes a text-free interface for consecutive interpretation, designed for users who are not literate. The Aikuma won Grand Prize in the Open Sou ...

Books

References

External links

*
Mark Liberman
at Ware College House, UPenn {{DEFAULTSORT:Liberman, Mark Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Phoneticians Linguists from the United States Harvard College alumni University of Pennsylvania faculty MIT School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences alumni American bloggers Scientists at Bell Labs Endangered languages Annual Reviews (publisher) editors Christopher H. Browne Distinguished Professor Fellows of the Linguistic Society of America