John Verhaar, RIP

[Tom Givon]

Dear Friends,

This year has turned out to be rather devastating for us, or so it
seems. So once again it befalls upon me to inform you that we have lost
another founding member of our network, FR. JOHN VERHAAR, SJ.

John was a founder and long-time editor of the journal FOUNDATIONS OF
LANGUAGE, which he later converted into the prime venue for
empirical--typological, functional, discourse, diachronic,
cognitive--linguistics. He got us together with our good publisher, John
Benjamins of Amsterdam, and was prime mover in initiating two of our
book series, TYPOLOGICAL STUDIES IN LANGUAGE (1982---) and the
long-running SL COMPANION SERIES.

It took much courage, integrity and foresight on John's part to have
made his deliberate, fateful move towards our network; in particular
given the zeitgeist. Nonetheless, once he made up his mind, John put all
his intellectual resources, conviction and considerable ingenuity into
making it possible for our kind of linguistics to thrive.

John was an inspired, wide-ranging and restless intellectual explorer,
fortified by his three-fold love of and commitment to serious
epitemology, responsible science, and the Mysteries of his Catholic
Faith. As a good neo-Thomist, John strove to integrate these three
guide-posts of his life into a single, coherent perspective. But unlike
many others who have attempted this daunting leap, he was patient enough
to recognize that such an integration was a monumental undertaking, and
that it should not be attempted rashly, nor do violence to either of its
three supporting pillars. The old Taoist paradox of unity in diversity
seems to have served John as beacon.

Above all, John was a wonderful friend, a generous colleague, a
supportive editor, and a courageous and compassionate human being. His
commitment to other cultures and their languages was exercised not only
in his work in Indonesia and New Guinea, but also wherever he went and
met the world. We will sorely miss him.

Requiescat In Pacem, gentle soul. Hasta lo que viene.

                                                   T. Givon