32.2551, All: Obituary: Michael Jay Aceto (1962-2021)

[The LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List: Vol-32-2551. Wed Aug 04 2021. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 32.2551, All: Obituary: Michael Jay Aceto (1962-2021)

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Date: Wed, 04 Aug 2021 00:50:51
From: Ludmila Cope [copel at ecu.edu]
Subject: Obituary: Michael Jay Aceto (1962-2021)

 
Michael Jay Aceto (1962-2021) 

Sadly, we have lost a key figure in Creolistics and Caribbean linguistics:
Michael  Jay Aceto, Professor of English and Linguistics at East Carolina
University. Michael’s contributions to Creolists and Caribbean linguistics are
known to those who have ever even just cursorily glanced at the literature. 
His co-edited volume on Eastern Caribbean Englishes (1983) provided the first
collection of essays on the sociolinguistic diversity of the region and the
impetus for several new projects taken on by scholars and students alike.  

Michael’s graduate work in linguistics was undertaken at The University of
Texas at Austin under the direct supervision of Professor Ian Hancock. 
Professor Hancock challenged Michael intellectually, and set a model for
fieldwork and documentation of under-studied creoles and other contact
varieties.  Michael accepted the challenge and secured funding for his
dissertation work in Panama, pursuing the status and sociolinguistic history
of Panamanian creole – at the time, an unknown variety of the Eastern
Caribbean.  

Michael began publishing at an early stage of his career, while in graduate
school and some of Michael’s most cited articles were published during his
tenure as a graduate student at UT.  

Michael held academic appointments at the University of Puerto Rico and Old
Dominion University before eventually moving to East Carolina University in
Greenville, which he loved.  His career flourished at ECU resulting in a
number of his most important publications.  Facing the issues that confront
all linguists who hold appointments outside the disciplinary department,
Michael engaged the students in the English program in such a way that
garnered their respect for linguistics and what it could tell them about the
literary aspects of English.  We often commiserated about being outsiders in
our respective departments and how we could further integrate what we did into
the curriculum and ideology of our departments.  

Michael held a keen skepticism for non-empirical Creolistics. His own work was
empirically based, deriving from in situ field research on several
understudied varieties (Barbudan creole, Statian creole, Panamanian creole,
and Kokoy, to mention only the most well-known contributions).  His skepticism
and empiricism gained him immense respect from his colleagues, and he held an
important editorial position on the Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages for
many years.  

I will miss Michael’s sharp wit, his open-mindedness, and his spirit of
discovery. Linguistics will miss his significant contributions to the
discipline and what documentation of marginalized languages can show us about
larger patterns of social and structural variation.  

Jeffrey P. Williams, Texas Tech University
 


Linguistic Field(s): Sociolinguistics

Language Family(ies): Caribbean



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