Geoffrey Pullum

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Professor Geoffrey K. Pullum (born March 8, 1945 in Irvine, Scotland) is a linguist specialising in the study of English. (The surname Pullum is pronounced ['pʊləm].) He is Professor of General Linguistics at the University of Edinburgh.

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[edit] Biography

Geoffrey Pullum had, by his own admission, a very mediocre academic career before university, ending in his leaving secondary school early at age 16. After working in several jobs and performing on keyboards (under the name Jeff Wright) as part of the rock band Geno Washington and the Ram Jam Band, he enrolled in the University of York in 1968, graduating in 1972 with a Bachelor of Arts with first class honours. In 1976 he completed a PhD in linguistics at University College London.

Pullum left Britain in 1980, taking visiting positions at the University of Washington and Stanford University. In 1987 he became a citizen of the USA. He worked at the University of California, Santa Cruz from 1981 to 2007. He is currently employed at the School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences, University of Edinburgh.

Pullum is also a frequent contributor to the blog Language Log upon which he can often be found arguing for linguistic descriptivism.

Pullum has an Erdős number of 3.[1]

[edit] Selected publications

[edit] References

  1. ^ Pullum, Geoffrey (2007-04-15). A Linguist with Erdős Number 2. Language Log. Retrieved on 2008-04-11.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

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