Talk:Lyle Campbell

Date of birth
Lyle Campbell seems to have been born in the 1940's. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.160.202.155 (talk) 10:39, 8 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Seems reasonable to think so but its not really precise enough to be of any help to anyone.·Maunus· ƛ · 10:45, 8 September 2008 (UTC)
 * This may be of no help whatsoever, but I studied with him in the mid 1980s and I would guess his birth year as 1942 based on him being 42 years old in 1984. That's what I remember his age to have been then. I could be off by a year one way or another. I was actually at one of his birthday parties.  I'll see what I can find on the net.LiPollis (talk) 15:15, 8 September 2008 (UTC)


 * According to Library of Congress authorities file, you're right LiPollis. The publisher's data sheet from one of his books gives his bdate as Oct 22, 1942, see here.--cjllw ʘ  TALK 23:54, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

good source of info in Campbell's own words
Seeing as one of his current students seems to want to edit away the fact that Campbell got his undergraduate degrees at Brigham Young University, it is important that we find as many sources as possible to back up his basic Biography and his fields of study. When I studied with Campbell in the mid 1980s, he did not ever cover up his past study at BYU, it's just that he found his real calling in his Graduate work and Post-graduate studies, where he has made his most significant contributions to the field. The link I am going to provide doesn't mention BYU by name, but it should give other editors insight into the unusual split in his areas of interest in his own words. It's slightly out of date since the Bio was written when he was teaching in Utah. It gives a nice overview of how and why he wound up working in endangered Central American languages as well as in Finno-Ugric. Here's the link: Famous Linguists - Lyle Campbell. I hope this helps a bit. LiPollis (talk) 15:19, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I don't think undergraduate institutions are really that important for academics - the PhD granting institution is usually the one that needs to be mentioned.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 17:35, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I agree, and it's one of the reasons I'd like to see better coverage of his accomplishments. If I recall correctly, sometime when he was at LSU, there was an article in Scientific American suggesting that if there was ever a "Mother Tongue" to be found or clues that lead back to a universal commonality among langauges, it would be Campbell that found it. This was and is amusing since Campbell doesn't generally approve or agree with the numerous recunstructed "hypotehtical language families" that are all the rage these days by purely hypothetical Linguistics working from data sets already reconstructed and hypothetical on their face. That statement was just journalistic hyperbole good for grabbing attention, but the article DID give some good coverage to his important work with Central American languages.  With formidable Linguists like Campbell and another with whom I studied, Wallace Chafe, their articles should be so much longer and better detailed but it's a hard field to properly document in this format.  I hope we can find a way to make better known their significant expansion of the field.  LiPollis (talk) 23:55, 2 August 2016 (UTC)