Dennis Baron

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Not to be confused with Dennis Barton.
Dennis Baron
Born (1944-05-09) May 9, 1944 (age 79)
NationalityAmerican
Occupation
University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign
Websiteenglish.illinois.edu/directory/profile/debaron

Dennis Baron (born May 9, 1944) is a professor of English and linguistics at the

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.[1][2] His research focuses on the technologies of communication; language legislation and linguistic rights; language reform; gender issues in language; language standards and minority languages and dialects; English usage; and the history and present state of the English language.[3]

Education and professional history

Baron received a B.A. from

Jewish descent.[6][7]

Baron has held a

Fulbright Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship. He twice chaired the National Council of Teachers of English Committee on Public Language, which gives out the annual Doublespeak and George Orwell Awards;[8] he edited the monograph series Publications of the American Dialect Society,[5] and he has served on professional committees of the Modern Language Association and the Linguistic Society of America
.

Research

Baron's most recent work, A Better Pencil: Readers, Writers, and the Digital Revolution, describes people's relationship with computers and the internet describing how the digital revolution influences reading and writing practices, and how the latest technologies differ from what came before. Baron explores the use of computers as writing tools. Both pencils and computers were created for tasks that had nothing to do with writing. Pencils, crafted by woodworkers for marking up their boards, were quickly repurposed by writers and artists. The computer crunched numbers, not words, until writers saw it as the next writing machine. Baron also explores the new genres that the computer has launched: email, the instant message, the web page, the blog, social-networking pages like

MySpace and Facebook, and communally generated texts like Urban Dictionary, and YouTube.[9]

In The English-Only Question: An Official Language for Americans?, Baron writes about the philosophical, legal, political, educational, and sociological implications of the

minority languages during the past two centuries, and how battles to save English or minority languages have been fought in the press, the schools, the courts, and the legislatures of the country.[10]

In his Guide to Home Language Repair Baron answers the questions that he is most frequently asked about English grammar.[11]

Declining Grammar and Other Essays on the English Vocabulary contains essays about English words, and how they are defined, valued, and discussed. "Language Lore," examines some of the myths and misconceptions that affect attitudes toward language—and towards English in particular. "Language Usage," examines some specific questions of meaning and usage. "Language Trends," examines some controversial trends in English vocabulary, and some developments too new to have received comment before. "Language Politics," treats several aspects of linguistic politics, from special attempts to deal with the ethnic, religious, or sex-specific elements of vocabulary to the broader issues of language both as a reflection of the public consciousness and the

U.S. Constitution and as a refuge for the most private forms of expression.[12]

Grammar and Gender traces the history of the sexual biases that exist in the English language and describes past and present efforts to correct these biases by reforming usage and vocabulary.[13]

In Grammar and Good Taste: Reforming the American Language, Baron writes about the history of American language, the development of the concept of Federal English in post-Revolutionary America, the movements for spelling reform, for the creation of a language academy on the model of the

French Academy, and the role of the common schools in directing the course of English through grammar instruction.[14]

Contributions to public discussions of language and technology

Baron blogs regularly about communication technology and about language issues on the Web of Language and has written articles on language issues for The New York Times;[15] The Washington Post; the Los Angeles Times;[16] the Chicago Tribune; and other newspapers, on topics such as official English, American resistance to studying foreign languages, and grammar. He has been a columnist for The Chronicle of Higher Education[17] and has written for Inside Higher Ed. Baron has also been quoted as an expert in many articles about language.[18][19][20][21]

Baron has been interviewed on CNN,[22] NPR, the CBC, the BBC,[23] the Voice of America, and other radio and television stations discussing topics ranging from the impact of computers on language, to gender-neutral language, to official English, to slang and profanity.[4]

Baron has been a legal expert witness, interpreting the language of contracts and advertising materials and offering opinions on the readability of documents. Baron was lead author, together with colleagues

Justice Scalia's majority opinion deciding the case.[24][27]

Bibliography

References

  1. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Department of English website
    Retrieved 2009-08-24.
  2. ^ Selected biographies of contributors to "Do You Speak American?" Retrieved 2009-08-24.
  3. ^ Directory entry Archived 2016-03-03 at the Wayback Machine from The Linguist List. Retrieved 2009-08-24.
  4. ^
    University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Department of English website
    Retrieved 2009-08-25.
  5. ^ a b Media contacts Archived 2006-06-19 at the Wayback Machine, American Dialect Society. Retrieved 2009-08-24.
  6. ^ Candy Sagon, "Chicken Soup for the; The Successful Book Series Nurtures the Soul. Now It's Time to Get Back to the Bowl.", The Washington Post, January 13, 1999.
  7. ^ Dennis Baron, "McLanguage Meets the Dictionary", The Chronicle of Higher Education, December 19, 2003.
  8. ^ Public language awards committee, NCTE. Retrieved 2009-08-24.
  9. ^ A Better Pencil: Readers, Writers, and the Digital Revolution at Oxford University Press website. Retrieved 2009-08-25.
  10. ^ The English-Only Question: An Official Language for Americans? at Yale University Press website. Retrieved 2009-08-25.
  11. ^ Guide to Home Language Repair Archived 2009-09-25 at the Wayback Machine at National Council of Teachers of English website. Retrieved 2009-08-25.
  12. ^ Declining Grammar--and Other Essays on the English Vocabulary at Education Resources Information Center. Retrieved 2009-08-25.
  13. ^ Grammar and Gender at Yale University Press website. Retrieved 2009-08-25.
  14. ^ Grammar and Good Taste: Reforming the American Language at Education Resources Information Center. Retrieved 2009-08-25.
  15. ^ Dennis Baron, "America Doesn't Know What the World Is Saying", The New York Times, October 27, 2001.
  16. ^ Dennis Baron,"Don't write off the pencil; Worried that computers spell the end of handwriting? You're missing the point", Los Angeles Times, January 23, 2007.
  17. ^ Search results for Dennis Baron at The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved 2009-08-25.
  18. CNN.com
    , March 6, 2009.
  19. ^ Andrea Higbie,"George W. Bush: 'Awesome!'", Salon.com, July 23, 2008.
  20. ^ Mary Ann Hogan, "E-Mail: A Language From Cyberspace", Los Angeles Times, April 26, 1994.
  21. ^ Stephanie Rosenbloom, "Mi, a Name I Call Myself. And You Are?", The New York Times, April 13, 2006.
  22. ^ Transcript for CNN Sunday Morning, March 5, 2006.
  23. ^ BBC Radio Programmes - Word of Mouth, Episode 5, (broadcast summary, September 3, 2007).
  24. ^ a b J. Harvie Wilkinson III, "Of Guns, Abortions, and the Unraveling Rule of Law Archived 2011-07-16 at the Wayback Machine, 95 Va. L. Rev 253, 267-268 (2009).
  25. ^ Brief for Professors of Linguistics and English Dennis E. Baron, Ph.D., Richard W. Bailey, Ph.D. and Jeffrey P. Kaplan, Ph.D. in Support of Petitioners, District of Columbia v. Heller, 128 S. Ct. 2783 (No. 07-290), at American Bar Association website. Retrieved 2009-08-25.
  26. ^ District of Columbia v. Heller, 128 S.Ct. 2783, ____ (Stevens, J., dissenting).
  27. ^ District of Columbia v. Heller, 128 S.Ct. 2783, ____ (Scalia, J., for the majority).
  28. doi:10.1017/S0021875800018132
    .
  29. doi:10.2307/368430
    .
  30. doi:10.2307/414742
    .

External links
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