Letters to Language

Language accepts letters from readers that briefly and succinctly respond to or comment upon either material published previously in the journal or issues deemed of importance to the field. The editor reserves the right to edit letters as needed. Brief replies from relevant parties are included as warranted.

A birthday reception of the LSA

August 28, 2004

To the Editor:

On the 80th anniversary of the formation of the LSA and within hailing distance still of a new century (it is surely indulging in exaggeration to claim a new millennium) it may be of interest to note an aspect of the reception offered the LSA’s appearance on the scene. An important reflection may be found in the international review Litteris 5.148–59 (1928), though by ‘international’ what is really meant is trans-Atlantic West European (inasmuch as most of our founding fathers, or their Doktorväter, had their post-baccalaureate training and diplomas from those regions). Here the foundation of the LSA (1924), the first four volumes of Language (1925–28), the first three Language monographs (1925–26), the first Language dissertation (1927), and the first LSA Bulletin (1926, ‘Opportunities for advanced work in the US’) were meticulously passed in review.

The reviewer, Holger Pedersen, was not inconsiderable. A gigantic Junggrammatiker, who in his youth by the turn of the century had contributed brilliantly and seminally to a half-dozen branches of Indo-European (IE) scholarship (including Celtic, Albanian, Armenian, Slavic, Baltic—his Anatolian and Tocharian came later), his views on traditional subjects and theories carried commanding authority—and have stood the test of time.

Yet Pedersen was a perceptive, receptive, progressive yet critical thinker AND worker. His monumental (and still fundamental) two-volume comparative Celtic grammar (Vergleichende Grammatik der keltischen Sprachen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1909–13) is by far the first major IE reference work to recognize and use substantively Saussure’s (1878) laryngeal theory (-ies; cf. La 5^e déclinaison latine, 1926, and remarks he made on Sturtevant’s work referred to in the following). Note therefore Pedersen’s remarks on Sapir, especially in relation to the much-neglected Baudouin de Courtenay (153, ‘Sound patterns…’); on Bloomfield, yet without rancour (150ff.); and on Sturtevant (156–57; closer to home for Pedersen, but still very avant-garde in 1928).

Finally, observe Pedersen’s persistent attention to data and observation along with theory; cf. in this connection his indispensable and almost universally neglected fieldwork and observation in Albanian (1890s–1900) and pioneering fieldwork in Aran (Connaught) Irish.

Note also changes, from our point of view, such as the perceived role of the innovative Linguistic Institute; on this matter, one might compare portions of my remarks as chairman of an LSA committee (1962–1964) in a report, ‘Survey of the state and future of the Linguistic Institute’ (LSA Bulletin 38.39–91, 1965, and note also p. 20, §10 and p. 21, §6 (and p. 20, §3) of the same Bulletin, published as Part 2 of a Supplement to Language 41.3).

It would be impudent of me to read more closely for you this master’s words on the occasion. But we see here already a brisk and promising trans-Atlantic conversation.

Eric P. Hamp
University of Chicago

Editor’s reply

Such historical perspectives are always welcome. More on Pedersen, elected an honorary member of the LSA in 1930, can be found in the ‘Notes’ of Language 30.194 (1954), where Bernard Bloch records his death on Sunday, October 25, 1953. Details on Pedersen’s biography and bibliography are contained in Carol Henriksen’s entry in Lexicon grammaticorum (ed. by H. Stammerjohann, Niemeyer, 1996, p. 710) and in Henning Andersen’s in The encyclopedia of language and linguistics (ed. by R. E. Asher and J. M. Y. Simpson, Pergamon, 1994, vol. 6, pp. 2997–98). Pedersen’s important contributions to Armenian studies are given an appreciation by Rüdiger Schmitt in his ‘Einführung’ leading off the reprint volume Holger Pedersen: Kleine Schriften zum Armenischen (Olms, 1982...