William H. Baxter

William H. Baxter (白一平 , born c. 1949) is a professor in the Department of Asian Languages and Cultures and the Department of Linguistics at the University of Michigan. His specialty is the historical study of the Chinese language. He earned his Ph.D. in Linguistics in 1977 at Cornell University.^[1]

Baxter's A Handbook of Old Chinese Phonology^[2] is the standard reference for the reconstruction of Old Chinese, i.e. the language of the pre-Qin period. He is currently collaborating with Laurent Sagart at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris on an improved reconstruction of the pronunciation, vocabulary, and morphology of Old Chinese.^[3] Preliminary versions of the reconstruction have been published online.^[4]

See also

• Baxter's transcription for Middle Chinese

External links

• Home page

References

1. ^ Curriculum Vitae, William H. Baxter.
2. ^ Baxter, William H. (1992), A Handbook of Old Chinese Phonology, Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, ISBN 978-3-11-012324-1. 
3. ^ "Sounds from the Ground: Recently Excavated Warring-States Texts and the Linguistic Reconstruction of Early Chinese", Winter 2010 Center for Chinese Studies Noon Lecture Series – Bill Baxter.
4. ^ Baxter-Sagart Old Chinese reconstruction