<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body dir="auto">Hi All,<br><div><div class="">The next in our series of video oral histories of senior linguists on the YouTube channel “Linguistics Videos” is of James A. Matisoff, Professor Emeritus of the University of California, Berkeley, and a major figure in the development of Sino-Tibetan studies.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><span style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;" class="">Part 1:</span><br class=""><font color="#5856d6" face="Tahoma" size="2" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(88, 86, 214);" class=""><br class=""></span></font><a href="https://youtu.be/ElnEt6XTkHQ" target="_blank" class="" style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;">https://youtu.be/ElnEt6XTkHQ</a><br class=""><font color="#5856d6" face="Tahoma" class=""><br class=""></font><font color="#5856d6" face="Tahoma" size="2" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(88, 86, 214);" class=""><br class=""></span></font><span style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;" class="">Part 2:</span><br class=""><font color="#5856d6" face="Tahoma" size="2" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(88, 86, 214);" class=""><br class=""></span></font><a href="https://youtu.be/v2SMFrQfsvQ" target="_blank" class="" style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;">https://youtu.be/v2SMFrQfsvQ</a><span style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;" class=""> </span><br class=""><font color="#5856d6" face="Tahoma" class=""><br class=""></font><font color="#5856d6" face="Tahoma" size="2" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(88, 86, 214);" class=""><br class=""></span></font><span style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;" class="">Part 3:</span><br class=""><font color="#5856d6" face="Tahoma" size="2" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(88, 86, 214);" class=""><br class=""></span></font><a href="https://youtu.be/ZwST1ghIDoY" target="_blank" class="" style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;">https://youtu.be/ZwST1ghIDoY</a><br class=""><font color="#5856d6" face="Tahoma" class=""><br class=""></font><font color="#5856d6" face="Tahoma" size="2" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(88, 86, 214);" class=""><br class=""></span></font><span style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;" class="">Playlist with all three videos:</span><br class=""><font color="#5856d6" face="Tahoma" size="2" class=""><span style="caret-color: rgb(88, 86, 214);" class=""><br class=""></span></font><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElnEt6XTkHQ&list=PLEtFvGfLk90meu8VCDJj00JZWbQ4fPgse" target="_blank" class="" style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElnEt6XTkHQ&list=PLEtFvGfLk90meu8VCDJj00JZWbQ4fPgse</a><span style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;" class=""> </span><br class=""><div class="" style="direction: ltr; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 10pt;"><div class=""><br class=""></div></div>Other sets we have on the same channel currently are of Jeffrey Heath and Geoffrey Benjamin. Here is the link for the channel as a whole: </div><div class=""><a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClCOag0Y5va45AedwsB6xng" class="">https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClCOag0Y5va45AedwsB6xng</a> (scroll to the side to see all the videos available). We hope to have at least three more soon!</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">I should explain that I was inspired to do these video interviews/oral histories of senior people in the field by similar ones done by anthropologists (e.g. Marry Haas: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwab3RfDaWw" class="">Mary Haas interview - YouTube</a>) and a great series from the 1970’s in philosophy (e.g. one of two with John Searle: <a href="https://youtu.be/jOlJZabio3g" class="">https://youtu.be/jOlJZabio3g</a>). There is also this interview with Jack Goody: <a href="https://youtu.be/ITRrAbns5D0" class="">https://youtu.be/ITRrAbns5D0</a> .<div class="">I am a big fan of personal histories as a way of understanding the history of the field as well as understanding what motivates people to do what they did, and think the way they did, or the circumstances that led to them doing what they did. I teach a course on the development of linguistics since the early 19th century, and go into the individuals and why they did what they did, and why they morphed into different schools (e.g. Romanticists morphing into Neogrammarians, Neogrammarians morphing into Structuralists, etc.). It was of course very different in the past, when there were no computers and no shortcuts, so research was time-consuming, but the scholars got a very good understanding of their data as a totality rather than just doing some concordances of a database and seeing only bits of the data. So I have tremendous respect for the earlier generation of scholars, and hope to make their legacy more available.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Randy</div><div class="">
<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div style="text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div style="text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: white;" class="">-----</span></span><div style="orphans: 2; widows: 2; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; text-align: -webkit-auto; border-spacing: 0px;"><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; text-align: -webkit-auto; border-spacing: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; text-align: -webkit-auto; border-spacing: 0px;"><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: white;" class=""><b class="">Randy J. LaPolla, PhD FAHA</b> （羅</span><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: white; font-size: 13px;" class=""><font class="Apple-style-span" face="Song">仁地</font></span><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: white;" class="">）</span></div><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: white;" class="">Professor of Linguistics and Chinese, School of Humanities </span></div><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" class="">Nanyang Technological University</span></div><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(34, 34, 34);" class=""><span style="background-color: white;" class="">HSS-03-45, 14 Nanyang Drive </span></span></span><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.333333015441895px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-align: -webkit-auto;" class="">| </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(34, 34, 34);" class=""><span style="background-color: white;" class="">Singapore 637332</span></span></span></div><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span style="text-align: -webkit-auto; background-color: white; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;" class=""><a href="http://randylapolla.net/" class="">http://randylapolla.net/</a></span></div><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(34, 34, 34);" class=""><span style="background-color: white;" class="">Most recent book:</span></span></span></div><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><span style="background-color: white;" class=""><font color="#222222" face="Arial, sans-serif" size="2" class=""><a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Sino-Tibetan-Languages-2nd-Edition/LaPolla-Thurgood/p/book/9781138783324" class="">https://www.routledge.com/The-Sino-Tibetan-Languages-2nd-Edition/LaPolla-Thurgood/p/book/9781138783324</a></font></span></div></span></span></div></span></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div><br></div></div></div></body></html>