By any measure, Harvard Professor Steven Pinker, who holds the Johnstone Family Chair of Psychology, is one of the most influential intellectual leaders in the world. He is also someone who believes in robust intellectual discourse and free thought and speech. That propensity for academic freedom has now made him a target of hundreds of academics and graduate students who are seeking his removal from the Linguistic Society of America. The letter is one of the most chilling examples of the new orthodoxy that has taken over our academic institutions. The signatories seek his removal for holding opposing views on issues like underlying causes of police shootings and other research. The cited grievances are at best nuanced and at worst nonsensical. Yet, hundreds signed their names and academic affiliations to try to punish a professor for holding opposing views to their own. We have been discussing these cases across the country including a similar effort to oust a leading economist from the University of Chicago. It is part of a wave of intolerance sweeping over our colleges and our newsrooms — a campaign that will devour its own in the loss of academic freedoms and free speech. (I should note that I do not know Dr. Pinker and, to the best of my knowledge, I have never met him).
As a blog focused on free speech and academic freedom issues, the merits of these disagreements is less important than the effort to silence or punish opposing views. However, the underlying postings (and Pinker’s apparent viewpoints) are relevant to understanding the growing intolerance for conflicting viewpoints. We will briefly discuss the six objections below. In so doing, I will have spent more written analysis addressing the attacks on Pinker than these academics and students spent in accusing him of the most vile predilections. My complaint is not that his views are beyond criticism. My objection is to the lack of substantial evidence or analysis, and, most importantly, the effort to remove him from a key academic group. Indeed, the letter states many of the signatories want him to be effectively barred from academic discourse.
Pinker has been vocal in his opposition to the level of police shootings in our society and has recognized their devastating impact on the African American community. He has however suggested that the level of police shootings may be the result of poor training and the excessive use of force generally by police in the United States. He is not alone in raising that issue. We have previously discussed how the United States has far greater use of lethal force that virtually any other nation. Pinker, and others, have not denied that racism plays a role or that we have systemic racist problems in society. Rather he has suggested that, if we want to reduce police shootings, we may want to consider whether they are being driven by a police culture and common training that tend to escalate the level of force used in these situations.
Thus, in the first cited tweet (from 2015), Pinker is chastised for linking to a New York Times articles that suggests that “Police don’t shoot blacks disproportionately” but rather says that there are larger societal and structural issues at play in these studies. The critics used this tweet as their first example of Pinker’s unacceptable viewpoints and state:
“Let the record show that Dr. Pinker draws this conclusion from an article that contains the following quote: “The data is unequivocal. Police killings are a race problem: African-Americans are being killed disproportionately and by a wide margin.” (original emphasis) We believe this shows that Dr. Pinker is willing to make dishonest claims in order to obfuscate the role of systemic racism in police violence.”
The carefully edited quote reveals not just intellectual intolerance but intellectual dishonesty. Here is the full quote:
“The data is unequivocal. Police killings are a race problem: African–Americans are being killed disproportionately and by a wide margin. And police bias may be responsible. But this data does not prove that biased police officers are more likely to shoot blacks in any given encounter.
Instead, there is another possibility: It is simply that — for reasons that may well include police bias — African–Americans have a very large number of encounters with police officers. Every police encounter contains a risk: The officer might be poorly trained, might act with malice or simply make a mistake, and civilians might do something that is perceived as a threat. The omnipresence of guns exaggerates all these risks.”
That is precisely what Pinker was saying in the tweet, but the signatories falsely suggest that he misrepresented the article.
In the second tweet, the signatories do not even try to quote from a linked article that Pinker cites:
Again, the article itself adopts the same balanced analysis that does not deny the role of racism in shootings but also highlights that training and cultural issues could be driving the high number of fatal shootings:
“Police violence is tangled up with racism and systemic injustice. We desperately need to do more to address that, foremost by shoring up the criminal-justice system so that it holds police officers accountable when they kill. But it’s also true that deadly mistakes are going to happen when police officers engage in millions of potentially dangerous procedures a year. What aviation teaches us is that it should be possible to “accident proof” police work, if only we are willing to admit when mistakes are made.”
Rather than acknowledge that nuanced intellectual point, the signatories adopt a common attack on free speech today: Pinker is guilty of “both-sides” rhetoric.” We saw this attack succeed recently in the infamous decision of the New York Times to apologize for publishing the opposing views of a United States Senator and then forcing out the editor who approved the opinion editorial. (Indeed, these Times articles were a painful reminder of the journalistic integrity that once defined that newspaper).
The third objection concern Pinker referring to New York subway shooter Bernhard Goetz as “mild mannered.” The critics refer to his racist views and insist that Pinker is being impermissibly “casual.” However, a search on Lexis found dozens of similar references to Goetz. CNN, the New York Times, and others include descriptions of Goetz as a “mild mannered” individual. One can be mild mannered and still be a criminal and a racist.
The fourth objection is that Pinker claimed that it was “statistically obtuse” to claim that the killings of a deranged California student was proof of a pattern of violence against women. His point appears to be a classic correlation versus causation critique. One can easily disagree with this observation but he seems to be objecting to taking the case itself as proof of the pattern. What is fascinating is that the letter is premised originally on the fact that this student killed six women. In reality, the student killed 2 women and 4 men. Even though twice the number of men were murdered, the letter corrects the error but not conclusion: “Regardless of the identities of the victims, the murderer was driven by misogyny.”
The fifth objection is truly mind blowing. Pinker is attacked for “publicly co-opt[ing] the academic work of a Black social scientist to further his deflationary agenda.” It may require a linguistics degree to fully appreciate what coopting academic work to advance a deflationary agenda actually means. This is made more difficult by the fact that these academics and students do not actually see the need to explain how Pinker “misrepresents the work.” He is just declared dishonest. However, these signatories seem to double up on the fifth and sixth objections since the link is directed to the study by Lawrence D. Bobo, the W. E. B. Du Bois Professor of the Social Sciences at Harvard University.
So let’s go to the sixth objection over these tweets:
The signatories insist that even using the term “urban crime/violence” is a “dogwhistle” for racists. However, again, a search of that terminology has been used dozens of times by civil rights leaders and Democratic leaders.
Once again, there is plenty to challenge in these viewpoints. Indeed, I would have seen this letter as an excellent foundation for a debate on campus. Pinker seems to want to have such academic discourse in making these points. The problem is not that he is being challenged on these points but that they are being used as an effort to remove him from an intellectual society. These six objections are used as the basis to claim that Pinker has shown “a pattern of downplaying the very real violence of systemic racism and sexism, and, moreover, a pattern that is not above deceitfulness, misrepresentation, or the employment of dogwhistles.”
What makes this even more dubious is the following statement from these signatories:
“We want to note here that we have no desire to judge Dr. Pinker’s actions in moral terms, or claim to know what his aims are. Nor do we seek to “cancel” Dr. Pinker, or to bar him from participating in the linguistics and LSA communities (though many of our signatories may well believe that doing so would be the right course of action).”
Really, the foregoing language was not a “desire to judge Dr. Pinker’s actions in moral terms, or claim to know what his aims are”? Moreover, I am not sure what “cancelling” means if it does not include stripping Pinker of his association with the leading intellectual group in his field. It is also worth noting that “many” of the signatories did want him barred for being able to work with other academics in the field. Rather than simply engage Pinker in honest academic debate, they want him barred from being able to share or defend his views in the linguistic or LSA communities.
Below is their open letter, which I encourage you to read.
—————————————-
Dear Linguistic Society of America,
This is an open letter by members of the linguistics community calling for the removal of Dr. Steven Pinker from both our list of distinguished academic fellows and our list of media experts. We, the undersigned, believe that Dr. Pinker’s behavior as a public academic is not befitting of a representative of our professional organization, that the LSA’s own stated goals make such a conclusion inevitable, and that the LSA should publicly reaffirm its position and distance itself from Dr. Pinker.
Induction into the list of LSA fellows is one of the highest signals of prestige in the linguistic community. Often, fellows are seen as the first line of academic linguistic authority, and trustworthy sources of linguistic knowledge. Lay people and members of the press reach out to fellows and media experts for official statements. We feel that fellows therefore have a responsibility that comes with the honor, credibility, and visibility allotted them by their distinguished appointment. Dr. Pinker does not live up to this standard.
As we demonstrate below, Dr. Pinker’s behavior is systematically at odds with the LSA’s recently issued statement on racial justice, which argues that “listening to and respecting [the experience of students of color] is crucial, as is acknowledging and addressing rather than overlooking or denying the role of the discipline of linguistics in the reproduction of racism.” Instead, Dr. Pinker has a history of speaking over genuine grievances and downplaying injustices, frequently by misrepresenting facts, and at the exact moments when Black and Brown people are mobilizing against systemic racism and for crucial changes.
Though no doubt related, we set aside questions of Dr. Pinker’s tendency to move in the proximity of what The Guardian called a revival of “scientific racism”, his public support for David Brooks (who has been argued to be a proponent of “gender essentialism”), his expert testimonial in favor of Jeffrey Epstein (which Dr. Pinker now regrets), or his dubious past stances on rape and feminism. Nor are we concerned with Dr. Pinker’s academic contributions as a linguist, psychologist and cognitive scientist. Instead, we aim to show here Dr. Pinker as a public figure has a pattern of drowning out the voices of people suffering from racist and sexist violence, in particular in the immediate aftermath of violent acts and/or protests against the systems that created them.
Below, we document six relevant occasions that show how Dr. Pinker’s behavior is systematically and directly at odds with the LSA’s stated aims. We believe that these examples show that Dr. Pinker is untenable as an LSA fellow and should not be allowed to retain that status.
- In 2015, Dr. Pinker tweeted “Police don’t shoot blacks disproportionately”, linking to a New York Times article by Sendhil Mullainathan.
Let the record show that Dr. Pinker draws this conclusion from an article that contains the following quote: “The data is unequivocal. Police killings are a race problem: African-Americans are being killed disproportionately and by a wide margin.” (original emphasis) We believe this shows that Dr. Pinker is willing to make dishonest claims in order to obfuscate the role of systemic racism in police violence.
- In 2017, when nearly 1000 people died at the hands of the police, the issue of anti-black police violence in particular was again widely discussed in the media. Dr. Pinker moved to dismiss the genuine concerns about the disproportionate killings of Black people at the hands of law enforcement by employing an “all lives matter” trope (we refer to Degen, Leigh, Waldon & Mengesha 2020 for a linguistic explanation of the trope’s harmful effects) that is eerily reminiscent of a “both-sides” rhetoric, all while explicitly claiming that a focus on race is a distraction. Once again, this clearly demonstrates Dr. Pinker’s willingness to dismiss and downplay racist violence, regardless of any evidence.
- Pinker (2011:107) provides another example of Dr. Pinker downplaying actual violence in a casual manner: “[I]n 1984, Bernhard Goetz, a mild-mannered engineer, became a folk hero for shooting four young muggers in a New York subway car.”—Bernhard Goetz shot four Black teenagers for saying “Give me five dollars.” (whether it was an attempted mugging is disputed). Goetz, Pinker’s mild-mannered engineer, described the situation after the first four shots as follows: “I immediately looked at the first two to make sure they were ‘taken care of,’ and then attempted to shoot Cabey again in the stomach, but the gun was empty.” 18 months prior, the same “mild-mannered engineer” had said “The only way we’re going to clean up this street is to get rid of the sp*cs and n*****s”, according to his neighbor. Once again, the language Dr. Pinker employs in calling this person “mild-mannered” illustrates his tendency to downplay very real violence.
- In 2014, a student murdered six women at UC Santa Barbara after posting a video online that detailed his misogynistic reasons. Ignoring the perpetrator’s own hate speech, Dr. Pinker called the idea that such a murder could be part of a sexist pattern “statistically obtuse”, once again undermining those who stand up against violence while downplaying the actual murder of six women as well as systems of misogyny.
- On June 3rd 2020, during historic Black Lives Matter protests in response to violent racist killings by police of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and many many others, Dr. Pinker chose to publicly co-opt the academic work of a Black social scientist to further his deflationary agenda. He misrepresents the work of that scholar, who himself mainly expressed the hope he felt that the protests might spark genuine change, in keeping with his belief in the ultimate goodness of humanity. A day after, the LSA commented on its public twitter account that it “stands with our Black community”. Please see the public post by linguist Dr. Maria Esipova for a more explicit discussion of this particular incident.
- On June 14th 2020, Dr. Pinker uses the dogwhistle “urban crime/violence” in two public tweets (neither of his sources used the term). A dogwhistle is a deniable speech act “that sends one message to an outgroup while at the same time sending a second (often taboo, controversial, or inflammatory) message to an ingroup”, according to recent and notable semantic/pragmatic work by linguistic researchers Robert Henderson & Elin McCready [1,2,3]. “Urban”, as a dogwhistle, signals covert and, crucially, deniable support of views that essentialize Black people as lesser-than, and, often, as criminals. Its parallel “inner-city”, is in fact one of the prototypical examples used as an illustration of the phenomenon by Henderson & McCready in several of the linked works.[1]
We believe our appeal to remove Dr. Pinker from the LSA fellows list and the list of media experts falls within the purview of the LSA because of the goals that the LSA has set for itself. In its public statement on race, the LSA “encourag[es] linguists to critically reflect on the changing nature of academic, social, cultural, and linguistic understandings of race”, and explicitly states that “there is no linguistic justice without racial justice… [this stance] requires that linguists actively work to promote equity and social justice in ways that benefit underrepresented scholars and communities of color”. We believe that the examples above show that Dr. Pinker’s established pattern of behavior stands in direct opposition to the LSA’s publicly stated aims, and the work they call for.
We want to note here that we have no desire to judge Dr. Pinker’s actions in moral terms, or claim to know what his aims are. Nor do we seek to “cancel” Dr. Pinker, or to bar him from participating in the linguistics and LSA communities (though many of our signatories may well believe that doing so would be the right course of action). We do, however, believe that the examples introduced above establish that Dr. Pinker’s public actions constitute a pattern of downplaying the very real violence of systemic racism and sexism, and, moreover, a pattern that is not above deceitfulness, misrepresentation, or the employment of dogwhistles. In light of the fact that Dr. Pinker is read widely beyond the linguistics community, this behavior is particularly harmful, not merely for the perception of linguistics by the general public, but for movements against the systems of racism and sexism, and for linguists affected by these violent systems.
Sincerely,
The Linguistics Community
(If you would like to add your name to this open letter, please sign using this google form. All signatures will be alphabetized by last name, and added to the document at regular intervals. Everyone who identifies as a linguist is welcome, and encouraged to sign. For comments, or questions, please reach out to lettertothelsa2020@gmail.com.
Addendum: Unfortunately, due to the form being abused both to threaten the editors, and to interfere with the signing process, we can, at this point, only accept signatures via email, and will only accept signatures from valid .edu addresses, or equivalent.)
Errata:
The UCSB incident involved the murder of 2 women and 4 men, not 6 women as stated in the text. Regardless of the identities of the victims, the murderer was driven by misogyny, as demonstrated both by his manifesto and the fact that the perpetrator targeted a sorority house. Dr Pinker’s tweet either ignores or denies this aspect of the event.
| # | Name | Affiliation | Role |
| 1 | A, Pranav | Science Park, Hong Kong | NLP Engineer |
| 2 | Abner, Natasha | University of Michigan | Assistant Professor |
| 3 | Abramovitz, Rafael | MIT | PhD student |
| 4 | Ackerman, Lauren | Newcastle University | |
| 5 | Adamson, Luke | Harvard University | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 6 | Adger, David | Queen Mary University of London | Professor of Linguistics |
| 7 | Ahmed, Anaïs | ||
| 8 | Ahmed, Samuel | ||
| 9 | Ahn, Byron | Princeton | Assistant Professor |
| 10 | Alam ,Marghoob | ||
| 11 | Alden, Paul | University of Maryland | |
| 12 | Altshuler, Daniel | University of Oxford | Associate Professor |
| 13 | Ananthanarayan, Sunkulp | The University of Texas at Austin | |
| 14 | Anderson, Carolyn | University of Massachusetts, Amherst | PhD candidate |
| 15 | Anderson, Catherine | McMaster University | Associate Professor |
| 16 | Andersson, Samuel | Yale University | PhD Student |
| 17 | Antonenko, Andrei | Stony Brook University | Lecturer |
| 18 | Aravind, Athulya | MIT Linguistics | Assistant Professor |
| 19 | Arehalli, Suhas | Johns Hopkins University | PhD student |
| 20 | Arnett, Catherine | UC San Diego | Graduate Student |
| 21 | Arregi, Karlos | The University of Chicago | Associate Professor |
| 22 | Arunachalam, Sudha | New York University | Associate Professor |
| 23 | Asinari, Sarah | University of Connecticut | PhD Student |
| 24 | Atkinson, Emily | University of Michigan | Postdoctoral Research Fellow |
| 25 | Auger, Julie | Université de Montréal | Associate Professor |
| 26 | Austen, Martha | The Ohio State University | PhD Candidate |
| 27 | Babaji, Charles | Analytical Engineer | |
| 28 | Babinski, Sarah | Yale University | PhD Candidate |
| 29 | Bai, Justin | CU Boulder | PhD student |
| 30 | Baier, Nico | University of British Columbia | Postdoc |
| 31 | Baird, Maggie | University of Massachusetts, Amherst | PhD Student |
| 32 | Bakos, Jon | Indiana State University | Assistant Professor |
| 33 | Bakst, Sarah | University of Wisconsin–Madison | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 34 | Ballwahn, Isaac | New York University | |
| 35 | Banerjee, Neil | Massachusetts Institute of Technology | PhD candidate |
| 36 | Baratta, Amy | ||
| 37 | Barchas-Lichtenstein, Jena | Knology | Researcher |
| 38 | Barnes, Sonia | Marquette University | Associate Professor |
| 39 | Baron, Bertille | Georgetown University | PhD Candidate |
| 40 | Baron, Christopher | MIT | PhD Student |
| 41 | Barros, Matthew | Washington University in St. Louis | Lecturer |
| 42 | Barry, Daniel | The Graduate Center, CUNY | |
| 43 | Bartell, Stefan | University of Delaware | graduate student |
| 44 | Barzilai, Maya L. | Georgetown University | PhD Candidate |
| 45 | Basu, Sanjay | Life Member, AAAI / Life Member, ACM | NLP Services |
| 46 | Bauman, Carina | NYU | Alum |
| 47 | Beam de Azcona, Rosemary G. | Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia | Professor |
| 48 | Becker, Kara | Reed College | Associate Professor |
| 49 | Becker, Michael | UMass Amherst | |
| 50 | Beckman, Mary | Fellow, Linguistics Society of America | |
| 51 | Beer, Samuel | University of Virginia | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 52 | Belew, Anna | University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa | Adjunct Assistant Professor |
| 53 | Bell, Elise | UCLA | |
| 54 | Bell, Regina | Binghamton University | Alum |
| 55 | Bender, Emily M. | University of Washington, Department of Linguistics | Professor |
| 56 | Benkato, Adam | UC Berkeley | Assistant Professor |
| 57 | Bennett, Ryan | University of California, Santa Cruz | Associate Professor |
| 58 | Berez-Kroeker, Andrea | University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Department of Linguistics | Associate Professor |
| 59 | Berhow, Lori | Iowa State University | Alum |
| 60 | Bermúdez, Natalia | University of Chicago | Assistant Professor |
| 61 | Bigelow, Lauren | University of Toronto | PhD Student |
| 62 | Bisnath, Felicia | University of Michigan, Ann Arbor | PhD student |
| 63 | Bjorkman, Bronwyn | Queen’s University | Assistant Professor |
| 64 | Blamire, Emily | University of Toronto | |
| 65 | Blaxter, Tamsin | Gonville & Caius College, University of Cambridge | |
| 66 | Blix, Hagen | New York University | PhD Candidate |
| 67 | Blum, Eileen | Rutgers University | PhD Candidate |
| 68 | Blum, Mirella | University of Edinburgh | Student |
| 69 | Blümel, Andreas | University of Göttingen | Postdoctoral researcher |
| 70 | Bodeveryy, Lise | Vanderbilt University | Alum |
| 71 | Borer, Hagit | Queen Mary University of London | Department chair |
| 72 | Bossi, Madeline | UC Berkeley | |
| 73 | Bouavichith, Dominique A. | University of Michigan | PhD Candidate |
| 74 | Bourgerie Hunter, Marie | Private sector computational linguist | |
| 75 | Bowen, Caroline | Macquarie University | Research Fellow |
| 76 | Bowern, Claire | Yale university | Professor |
| 77 | Bowie, David | University of Alaska Anchorage | Professor |
| 78 | Bowman, Samuel R. | New York University | Assistant Professor |
| 79 | Bradley, Evan | Penn State University | Associate Professor of Psychology |
| 80 | Brickhouse, Christian | Stanford | PhD candidate |
| 81 | Brodkin, Dan | UC Santa Cruz | PhD Student |
| 82 | Brown, Meredith | ||
| 83 | Brunetto, Valentina | University of Leeds | |
| 84 | Buchwald, Adam | New York University | |
| 85 | Bui, Thuy | Hoa Sen University | Assistant Professor |
| 86 | Burkholder, Ross | Calvin University | Affiliate Professor |
| 87 | Butler, Becky | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill | Adjunct Assistant Professor |
| 88 | Byrd, Andrew | University of Kentucky | Associate Professor of Linguistics |
| 89 | Cable, Seth | University of Massachusetts Amherst | Associate Professor |
| 90 | Callesano, Salvatore | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign | Assistant Professor |
| 91 | Campbell-Kibler, Kathryn | Ohio State University | |
| 92 | Campolong, Kelsey | Ulster University | PhD Researcher |
| 93 | Canjura, Julian | Northern Arizona University | Graduate student |
| 94 | Canning, Dominique | University of Michigan | PhD Candidate |
| 95 | Carmichael, Katie | Virginia Tech | associate professor |
| 96 | Carruthers, Brendan | Cognitive Science B.A. | |
| 97 | Catlin, Sara | Stony Brook University | |
| 98 | Chacón, Dustin A. | New York University Abu Dhabi | Research Scientist |
| 99 | Chadwick, Stacie | ||
| 100 | Chambers, Summer | University of Virginia | Linguistics MA |
| 101 | Chang, Charles B. | Boston University | Associate Professor |
| 102 | Chatten, Alicia | New York University | |
| 103 | Chemey, Natasha | Rutgers University | Graduate Fellow |
| 104 | Chen, Daniel | CU Boulder | PhD student |
| 105 | Chen, Tingchun | ||
| 106 | Cheng, Hung-Shao | New York University Department of Communicative Sciences and Disorders | PhD student |
| 107 | Chong, Adam | Queen Mary University of London | Lecturer |
| 108 | Christofori, Ulrike | San Joaquin Delta College | Instructor |
| 109 | Clare, Emily | ||
| 110 | Clark, McKenzie | Student | |
| 111 | Clauss, Michael | University of Massachusetts Amherst | |
| 112 | Clem, Emily | University of California, San Diego | Assistant Professor |
| 113 | Clemens, Lauren | University at Albany | Assistant professor |
| 114 | Clevenger, Joanna | California State University, San Bernardino | Graduate Student |
| 115 | Clifford, Lily | Stanford University | PhD Student |
| 116 | Clopper, Cynthia | Ohio State University | Professor |
| 117 | Cockrum, Paul | The Ohio State University | Graduate Student |
| 118 | Conner, Katherine | The Ohio State University | PhD Student |
| 119 | Connor, Janet | University of Chicago | PhD Candidate |
| 120 | Conrod, Kirby | University of Washington | |
| 121 | Coon, Jessica | McGill University | Associate Professor |
| 122 | Coons, Caitlin | The University of Texas at Austin | PhD student |
| 123 | Copeland, Samantha | University of North Texas | Student |
| 124 | Cornall, Termy | ||
| 125 | Cotter, William | University of Arizona | |
| 126 | Cournane, Ailís | New York University | Assistant Professor |
| 127 | Cowper, Elizabeth | University of Toronto | |
| 128 | Cox, Julia | ||
| 129 | Cox, Taylor | Arizona State University | Research Technician |
| 130 | Craft, Justin T. | University of Michigan | Ph.D Student |
| 131 | Craioveanu, Radu | University of Toronto | PhD candidate |
| 132 | Crouch, Caroline | UC Santa Barbara | graduate student |
| 133 | Crowley, Archie | University of South Carolina | PhD Student |
| 134 | Culbertson, Jennifer | University of Edinburgh | Reader |
| 135 | Cunningham, Emma | Software Engineer | |
| 136 | D’Angelo, Jason | Georgetown University | Phd. Candidate |
| 137 | D’Arcy, Alexandra | University of Victoria | Professor |
| 138 | Dahlberg-Dodd, Hannah | ||
| 139 | Daitya, Patrick | Monash University Linguistics Society | President |
| 140 | Daland, Robert | Apple, Inc. | Software Engineer |
| 141 | Dale, Christopher | ||
| 142 | Danis, Nicholas | Washington University in St. Louis | Lecturer |
| 143 | Davidson, Diana | ||
| 144 | Davidson, Lisa | NYU | Professor |
| 145 | Davis, Emory | Johns Hopkins University | Postdoctoral Fellow |
| 146 | Davis, Jenny | University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign | Associate Professor |
| 147 | de Haas, Nynke | Utrecht University | Lecturer |
| 148 | De Santo, Aniello | University of Utah | Assistant Professor |
| 149 | de Vries, Hanna | Leiden University | Lecturer |
| 150 | DeGiulio, Stephen | Santa Fe Community College | Professor |
| 151 | DeMarco, Stephanie | Birmingham City University | Education Developer |
| 152 | Denis, Derek | University of Toronto Mississauga | Assistant Professor |
| 153 | DeRoma, Cynthia Zocca | Yale University | Lector |
| 154 | Devlin, Kerri | UCLA | Graduate Student |
| 155 | DiCanio, Christian | University at Buffalo | Assistant Professor |
| 156 | Dinkin, Aaron | San Diego State University | Assistant Professor |
| 157 | Dockum, Rikker | Swarthmore College | Visiting Assistant Professor |
| 158 | Dolatian, Hossep | Stony Brook University | Alum |
| 159 | Doliana, Aaron | University of Maryland | PhD Student |
| 160 | dos Santos, Wesley | University of California, Berkeley | PhD student |
| 161 | Drake, Shiloh | ||
| 162 | Driscoll, Trevor | MIT | |
| 163 | Drummond, Emily | University of California, Berkeley | Graduate student |
| 164 | Duncan, Daniel | Newcastle University | Lecturer in Sociolinguistics |
| 165 | Durryyah, Nazahat | Boston University | Alum, Linguistics Blogger |
| 166 | Dusek, Ondrej | Charles University, Prague | Assistant Professor |
| 167 | Easterday, Shelece | University of Hawai’i at Mānoa | Assistant Professor |
| 168 | Eberhardt, Maeve | University of Vermont | Associate Professor |
| 169 | Elliott, Patrick | Massachusetts Institute of Technology | Postdoctoral Associate |
| 170 | Esipova, Maria | Princeton University, Program in Linguistics | Postdoctoral Research Associate |
| 171 | Everdell, Michael | The University of Texas, Austin | PhD Student |
| 172 | Farinella, Alessa | UMass Amherst | PhD Student |
| 173 | Farkas, Rebecca | ||
| 174 | Farris-Trimble, Ashely | Simon Fraser University | Associate Professor |
| 175 | Faytak, Matthew | UCLA | Postdoctoral Fellow |
| 176 | Feeny, Graham | New York University Department of Communicative Sciences and Disorders | PhD Student |
| 177 | Feldscher, Cara (Danny) | Michigan State University | PhD graduate |
| 178 | Figueroa, Megan | University of Arizona | |
| 179 | Finley, Sara | Pacific Lutheran University | Associate Professor |
| 180 | Fleckenstein, Kristen | Coastal Carolina University | Assistant Professor |
| 181 | Fleisher, Nicholas | University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee | Associate Professor |
| 182 | Fletcher, Lauren | University of Edinburgh | PhD Student NLP |
| 183 | Fong, Suzana | MIT | graduate student |
| 184 | Forrest, Jon | University of Georgia | Assistant Professor |
| 185 | Fox, Bonnie | University of Hawai’i | |
| 186 | Francez, Itamar | University of Chicago | Associate Prof. |
| 187 | Francis, Elaine | Purdue University | Associate Professor |
| 188 | Franich, Kathryn | University of Delaware | Assistant Professor |
| 189 | Fraser, Katherine | University of the Basque Country | PhD Student |
| 190 | Freeman, Aaron | UPenn | Alum |
| 191 | Frishberg, Nancy | ||
| 192 | Fruehwald, Josef | University of Kentucky | Assistant Professor |
| 193 | Fuchs, Martin | Utrecht University | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 194 | Gaby, Alice | Monash University | |
| 195 | Gadanidis, Tim | University of Toronto | PhD student |
| 196 | Gal, Susan | University of Chicago | professor |
| 197 | Ganeshan, Ashwini | Ohio University | Assistant Professor |
| 198 | García León, Javier | University of North Carolina at Charlotte | Assistant Professor |
| 199 | Gardner, Bethany | Vanderbilt University | PhD student |
| 200 | Garza, Joyhanna | UCSB Linguistics | PhD Candidate |
| 201 | Gasser, Emily | Swarthmore College | Assistant Professor |
| 202 | Gautam, Vasundhara | Dialpad | Speech Recognition Engineer |
| 203 | Gebhard, Jessica | ||
| 204 | Gegg-Harrison, Whitney | University of Rochester | Associate Professor |
| 205 | Geguera, Ria Mai | NYU | Research Staff |
| 206 | Geissler, Christopher | Yale University | PhD Candidate |
| 207 | Gerald, JPB | CUNY – Hunter College | |
| 208 | German, Austin | The University of Texas at Austin | PhD student |
| 209 | Getz, Heidi | ||
| 210 | Getzen, Cara | TESL Student | |
| 211 | Gillon, Carrie | The Vocal Fries | Co-host |
| 212 | Glödstaf, Walther | University of Illinois Urbana Champaign | PhD student |
| 213 | Göbel, Alexander | University of Massachusetts, Amherst | Graduate Student |
| 214 | Gölz, Miriam | Brandeis University | graduate student |
| 215 | Gonering, Brennan | UC Davis | Graduate student |
| 216 | Gonzalez-Marquez, Monica | RWTH | |
| 217 | Good, Jeff | University at Buffalo | Professor |
| 218 | Gorman, Kyle | Graduate Center, City University of New York | |
| 219 | Govindarajan, Venkata S | University of Texas at Austin | PhD Student Computational Linguistics |
| 220 | Gowda, Yadav | MIT | PhD student |
| 221 | Grama, James | University of Duisburg-Essen | Research Fellow |
| 222 | Green, Caitlin | ||
| 223 | Green, Elizabeth | University of Texas at Austin | |
| 224 | Greenbank, Emily | Victoria University of Wellington | Research Fellow |
| 225 | Greenwood, Anna | Program Manager | |
| 226 | Greeson, Daniel | Michigan State University | Graduate student |
| 227 | Grestenberger, Laura | University of Vienna | Assistant Professor |
| 228 | Grieve-Smith, Angus | The New School | |
| 229 | Grishin, Peter | MIT | PhD Student |
| 230 | Grothues, Natalie | University of Colorado Boulder | PhD student |
| 231 | Guo, Alice | University of Toronto | Alum |
| 232 | Haber, Eli | University of Chicago | |
| 233 | Hagedorn, Christina | City University of New York – College of Staten Island | Assistant Professor |
| 234 | Hagiwara, Robert | University of Manitoba | |
| 235 | Hall-Lew, Lauren | University of Edinburgh | Reader |
| 236 | Hall, Daniel Currie | Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, Nova Scotia | associate professor; LSA member |
| 237 | Halpert, Claire | University of Minnesota | Associate Professor |
| 238 | Hansen, Daniel | University of Chicago | PhD Student |
| 239 | Hao, Yiding | Yale University | PhD Candidate |
| 240 | Hara, Yurie | Hokkaido University | Associate Professor |
| 241 | Harley, Heidi | University of Arizona | Professor |
| 242 | Harper, Sarah | University of Southern California | PhD Candidate |
| 243 | Harvey, Meg | University of Arizona | |
| 244 | Hauk, Bryn | ||
| 245 | Heap, David | University of Western Ontario | Associate Professor |
| 246 | Heath, Jevon | University of Pittsburgh | Director of Undergraduate Studies |
| 247 | Heaton, Hayley | University of Michigan | Linguistics PhD |
| 248 | Heider, Paul | Medical University of South Carolina | Senior Research Scientist |
| 249 | Henderson, Robert | University of Arizona | Associate Professor of Linguistics |
| 250 | Hendery, Rachel | Western Sydney University, Australia | Associate Professor |
| 251 | Henley, Katherine | ||
| 252 | Henry, Cassidy | University of Maryland | |
| 253 | Hetherington, Rebecca | University of Melbourne | |
| 254 | Hill, Angelica | University of Massachusetts Amherst | PhD student |
| 255 | Holgate, Eric | University of Texas at Austin | PhD. Candidate |
| 256 | Hoops, Tracie | CSU Fullerton | MA student |
| 257 | Hope, Maxwell | University of Delaware | PhD student |
| 258 | Horesh, Uri | Achva Academic College | |
| 259 | Hou, Lynn | University of California, Santa Barbara | |
| 260 | Hughes, Brianne | MA Linguistics | |
| 261 | Hyett, James | University of Toronto | Alum |
| 262 | Irvine, Melissa | ||
| 263 | Jacobs, Cassandra | University of Wisconsin | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 264 | Jaggers, Zachary | University of Oregon | Postdoctoral Scholar |
| 265 | Jamieson, E | University of Edinburgh | |
| 266 | Janoff, Arianna | ||
| 267 | Jenks, Peter | UC Berkeley | Associate Professor |
| 268 | Jensen, Monica | University of Washington | PhD Student |
| 269 | Jent, Brandon | University of Kentucky | Alumnus, MA Linguistic Theory and Typology |
| 270 | Jeong, Sunwoo | Seoul National University | Assistant professor |
| 271 | Jeretic, Paloma | New York University | PhD Candidate |
| 272 | Jerro, Kyle | University of Essex | Lecturer |
| 273 | Jones, Kyra | ||
| 274 | Jones, Taylor | University of Pennsylvania | PhD Graduate |
| 275 | Joyce, Taylor | The University of Texas at Austin | PhD Student |
| 276 | Kalin, Laura | Princeton University | Assistant Professor |
| 277 | Kane, Aurora | University of California, Berkeley | PhD Student |
| 278 | Karlin, Robin | UW-Madison | Postdoctoral researcher |
| 279 | Kasstan, Jonathan | University of Westminster | Assistant Professor |
| 280 | Kastner, Itamar | University of Edinburgh | |
| 281 | Kennedy, Robert | University of California, Santa Barbara | Senior Lecturer |
| 282 | Khan, Sameer ud Dowla | Reed College | Associate Professor |
| 283 | Kiesling, Scott F. | University of Pittsburgh | Professor & Chair |
| 284 | Kim, Christina | University of Kent | Senior lecturer |
| 285 | Kim, Judy | Yale University | Postdoc |
| 286 | Kimper, Wendell | University of Manchester | Lecturer |
| 287 | Kirchner, Jessica | Senior Linguist | |
| 288 | Klassen, Jeffrey | University of Saskatchewan | Sessional Lecturer |
| 289 | Klausner, Lukas Daniel | St. Pölten University of Applied Sciences | Researcher |
| 290 | Klecha, Peet | Linguist | |
| 291 | Kolozsvari, Robyn | ||
| 292 | Konnelly, Lex | University of Toronto | PhD Candidate |
| 293 | Kosse, Maureen | CU Boulder | Grad Student |
| 294 | Kostyszyn, Kalina | Stony Brook University | PhD student |
| 295 | Kotek, Hadas | Computational Linguist | |
| 296 | Koulidobrova, Helen | Central Connecticut State University | Associate Professor |
| 297 | Koval, Pasha | University of Connecticut | PhD candidate |
| 298 | Kramer, Ruth | Georgetown University | |
| 299 | Kraus, Kaj | Gallaudet University | PhD Student |
| 300 | Kraus, Kelsey | UC Santa Cruz | PhD graduate |
| 301 | Kucharska, Rosa | University of Manchester | Undergraduate student |
| 302 | Kuo, Annita | ||
| 303 | Kush, Dave | NTNU | Associate Professor |
| 304 | Lai, Catherine | University of Edinburgh | |
| 305 | Lalonde, Codie | Carleton University | PhD Candidate |
| 306 | Lang, Benjamin | New York University Abu Dhabi | |
| 307 | Laparle, Schuyler | UC Berkeley | PhD Candidate |
| 308 | Laperle, Samuel | ||
| 309 | Lassahn-Worrell, Price | ||
| 310 | Laturnus, Rebecca | ||
| 311 | Lau-Preechathammarach, Raksit | UC Berkeley | Graduate Student |
| 312 | Laurentine, Kyle | ||
| 313 | Lawson, Alexandra | University at Buffalo, SUNY | Graduate Student |
| 314 | Le Mené, Marine | University of Strasbourg | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 315 | Lee-Goldman, Russell | ||
| 316 | Lee, Naomi | New York University | PhD student |
| 317 | Lee, Rebecca | University of Colorado Boulder | PhD student |
| 318 | Lee, Si Kai | UConn | PhD Student |
| 319 | Leonard, Wesley | University of California, Riverside | Associate Professor |
| 320 | Lesho, Marivic | ||
| 321 | Lesk, Katharina | University of Vienna | student |
| 322 | Levi, Susannah | NYU | |
| 323 | Levinson, Lisa | University of Michigan | Lecturer |
| 324 | Lewis, Rebecca | University of Connecticut | PhD Student |
| 325 | Lewis, Tom | Georgia Southern University | Visiting Instructor |
| 326 | Li, Neh Gnetnemt | Jinggangshan University 井冈山大学 | Research Scientist |
| 327 | Li, Noriyasu | ||
| 328 | Lilley, Kevin | The Ohio State University | PhD Student |
| 329 | Lindsey, Kate | Boston University | |
| 330 | Liter, Adam | University of Maryland | Graduate student |
| 331 | Litovsky, Celia | Johns Hopkins University | PhD candidate |
| 332 | Love-Nichols, Jessica | Macalester College | Visiting Assistant Professor |
| 333 | Lowry, Cass | The Graduate Center, City University of New York | PhD student |
| 334 | Lu, Deedee | ||
| 335 | Lu, Jiayi | Stanford University | PhD student |
| 336 | Lucek, Stephen | University College Dublin | Postdoctoral Fellow |
| 337 | Lukyanenko, Cynthia | George Mason University | Term Assistant Professor |
| 338 | Lund, Gunnar | Harvard | PhD candidate |
| 339 | MacGregor, Caiden | La Trobe University | Graduate student |
| 340 | MacKenzie, Jordan | Georgetown University | PhD Candidate |
| 341 | MacKenzie, Laurel | New York University | Assistant Professor |
| 342 | Macknick, Anna | Princeton University | Undergraduate student |
| 343 | Mahan, Heather | UCSC | MA Linguistics graduate |
| 344 | Maier, Erik Hans | UC Berkeley | PhD Candidate |
| 345 | Mailhot, Frederic | Dialpad, Inc. | Computational Linguist |
| 346 | Malamud, Sophia A. | Brandeis University | Associate Professor |
| 347 | Maldonado, Mora | University of Edinburgh | Postdoctoral researcher |
| 348 | Manetta, Emily | University of Vermont | Professor and Chair, Department of Anthropology |
| 349 | Mangold, Ina Runa | University of Edinburgh | Postgraduate Student |
| 350 | Manke, Christine | California State University, Northridge | Alumna |
| 351 | Manning, Emma | Georgetown University | PhD Student |
| 352 | Mansfield, Courtney | University of Washington | PhD Candidate |
| 353 | Mantenuto, Iara | University of California, Los Angeles | PhD Candidate |
| 354 | Marino, D. | McGill University | Grad Student |
| 355 | Martí, Luisa | Queen Mary University of London | Senior Lecturer |
| 356 | Martin, Fabienne | Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin | |
| 357 | Martin, Katie | MIT | Graduate student |
| 358 | Martin, Tyree | University of Arizona | Ph.D. Student |
| 359 | Martinez del Rio, Aurora | University of Chicago | Graduate Student |
| 360 | Martinez, Randi | Yale University | |
| 361 | Matsubara, Julie | University of Chicago, English Language Institute | Director |
| 362 | Mauk, Claude | University of Pittsburgh | Senior Lecturer |
| 363 | McBride, Justin T. | Northeastern State University | Assistant Professor |
| 364 | McCabe, Samantha | ||
| 365 | McClay, E. K. | Simon Fraser University | research staff |
| 366 | McCoy, Tom | Johns Hopkins University | Graduate student |
| 367 | McCready, Elin | Aoyama Gakuin University | Professor |
| 368 | McFadden, Thomas | Leibniz-Zentrum Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft | |
| 369 | McGowan, Kevin | University of Kentucky | Assistant Professor |
| 370 | McKay, Isabel | University of Arizona | |
| 371 | McPherson, Laura | Dartmouth College | Associate Professor |
| 372 | McVeigh, Joe | University of Jyväskylä | University teacher |
| 373 | Meadows, Tom | Queen Mary University of London | PhD Candidate |
| 374 | Medina, Jennifer | ||
| 375 | Merryweather, Marina | ||
| 376 | Mesh, Kate | Lund University | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 377 | Meyer, Cherry | University of Michigan | |
| 378 | Midgley, Daniel | Because Language | Co-presenter |
| 379 | Mieczkowski, Hannah | Stanford University | PhD candidate, Communication |
| 380 | Miller, Taylor | SUNY Oswego | Visiting Assistant Professor |
| 381 | Minnick, Lisa C. | Western Michigan University | Associate Professor |
| 382 | Mirea, Nicole | Northwestern University | PhD student |
| 383 | Molina, Malia | Carleton College | |
| 384 | Monette, James | Data Scientist | |
| 385 | Mooney, Kate | New York University | |
| 386 | Moraski, Kendall | University of British Columbia | Alum |
| 387 | Morgan, Adam | NYU | Postdoc |
| 388 | Morikawa, Nora | ||
| 389 | Mufwene, Salikoko S. | University of Chicago | Professor of Linguistics |
| 390 | Munson, Benjamin | University of Minnesota | Professor and Chair |
| 391 | Murphy, AJ | University of South Carolina | PhD Student |
| 392 | Murray, Sarah | Cornell University | Associate Professor |
| 393 | Musica, Anne | Georgetown University | Alum |
| 394 | Musil, Jakub | The University of Edinburgh | PhD candidate |
| 395 | Nakamura, Megan | University of Florida | |
| 396 | Namboodiripad, Savithry | University of Michigan | Assistant Professor |
| 397 | Narayan, Chandan | York University Linguistics | Assoc Professor |
| 398 | Nederveen, Sander | Simon Fraser University/University of British Columbia | MA/PhD student |
| 399 | Nelson, Brett | University of Calgary | PhD Candidate |
| 400 | Nelson, Scott | Stony Brook University | |
| 401 | Nesbitt, Monica | Dartmouth College | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 402 | Newell, Heather | UQAM | Professor |
| 403 | Ng, Sara | University of Washington | PhD student |
| 404 | Nguyen, Chieu | Google Japan | Computational Linguist |
| 405 | Nguyen, Emma | University of Connecticut | PhD student |
| 406 | Niedzielski, Nancy | Rice University | Associate Professor |
| 407 | Nielsen, Kuniko | Oakland University | Associate Professor |
| 408 | Nölle, Jonas | University of Edinburgh | PhD Candidate |
| 409 | Noonan, Máire | Université de Montréal & Université du Québec à Montréal, | course lecturer |
| 410 | Norris, Mark | ||
| 411 | Nowlan, Melody | ||
| 412 | Nycz, Jennifer | Georgetown University | Associate Professor |
| 413 | O’Gorman, Tim | University of Massachusetts Amherst | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 414 | O’Hara, Charlie | University of Southern California | |
| 415 | O’Meara, Carolyn | Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México | Associate Research Professor |
| 416 | O’Neill, Brittney | York University | PhD student |
| 417 | Orfitelli, Robyn | University of Sheffield | Lecturer |
| 418 | Ostrove, Jason | UC Santa Cruz | Lecturer |
| 419 | Overfelt, Carly | ||
| 420 | Pabst, Katharina | University of Toronto | Ph.D. Candidate |
| 421 | Palma, Pauline | McGill University | PhD student |
| 422 | Papillon, Maxime | University of Maryand | |
| 423 | Parrish, Alicia | New York University | Grad student |
| 424 | Parrott, Jeffrey Keith | Department of English and American Studies, Palacký University in Olomouc | Assistant Professor of Linguistics |
| 425 | Pasquinelli, Renni | Johns Hopkins University | PhD Student |
| 426 | Pasternak, Robert | Leibniz-Center for General Linguistics | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 427 | Pater, Joe | University of Massachusetts Amherst | Professor |
| 428 | Patton, Colleen | University of Arizona | PhD Candidate |
| 429 | Paul, Ileana | University of Western Ontario | Associate Professor |
| 430 | Paullada, Amandalynne | University of Washington | PhD Candidate, Linguistics |
| 431 | Payne, Amanda | ||
| 432 | Payne, Elena | University of Cambridge | Student |
| 433 | Payne, Elinor | University of Oxford | Associate Professor |
| 434 | Pearce, Jo | University of Glasgow | PhD Student |
| 435 | Pearson, Hazel | Queen Mary University of London | Senior Lecturer |
| 436 | Perez Borbon, Luz | University of Massachusetts Boston | PhD student |
| 437 | Perfors, Amy | University of Melbourne | Associate Professor |
| 438 | Perleberg, Ellen | University of Washington | Undergraduate |
| 439 | Peters, Andrew | University of Toronto | PhD Candidate |
| 440 | Pham, Mike | ||
| 441 | Piggott, Glyne | McGill University | Emeritus Professor |
| 442 | Pillion, Betsy | University of Chicago | PhD Candidate |
| 443 | Pinzin, Francesco | Goethe Universität Frankfurt | Postdoctoral researcher |
| 444 | Plumb, May Helena | University of Texas at Austin | PhD Candidate |
| 445 | Pollio-Barbee, Harper | Brandeis University | Undergraduate Student |
| 446 | Potter, David | Morehead State University | Post-doc |
| 447 | Potvin, Gabrielle | ||
| 448 | Pratt, Teresa | San Francisco State University | Assistant Professor |
| 449 | Preminger, Omer | University of Maryland | Associate Professor |
| 450 | Prichard, Hilary | Linguistics PhD | |
| 451 | Prickett, Brandon | ||
| 452 | Puderbaugh, Rebekka | University of Edinburgh | Teaching Fellow |
| 453 | Punske, Jeffrey | Southern Illinois University Carbondale | Associate Professor & Director of Undergraduate Studies |
| 454 | Purse, Ruaridh | University of Pennsylvania | PhD Candidate |
| 455 | Raclaw, Joshua | West Chester University | Assistant Professor |
| 456 | Rademacher, Tess | Former LSA Intern | |
| 457 | Rasin, Ezer | Leipzig University | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 458 | Rawlins, Kyle | Johns Hopkins University | Associate Professor |
| 459 | Reed, Paul E. | University of Alabama | Assistant professor |
| 460 | Rees, Alice | University of Edinburgh | Research Fellow |
| 461 | Rehrig, G. | UC Davis | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 462 | Reiss, Charles | Concordia University, Montreal | Professor |
| 463 | Remirez, Emily | UC Berkeley | PhD Candidate |
| 464 | Rett, Jessica | UCLA | Professor and Director of Graduate Studies |
| 465 | Richardson-Todd, Aurore | PhD student | |
| 466 | Richie, Russell | University of Pennsylvania | Postdoctoral Fellow |
| 467 | Ritch, Joseph | University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa | MA Student |
| 468 | Roberts, Brice | University of California, Los Angeles | PhD Candidate |
| 469 | Roberts, Julie | University of Vermont | Professor and Director |
| 470 | Robinson, Mary | NYU | PhD student |
| 471 | Robles, Jessica S. | Loughborough University | Lecturer |
| 472 | Rodriguez, Alejandro | UC San Diego | PhD Student |
| 473 | Ronkos, Danielle | The Graduate Center, CUNY | Ph.D. Candidate |
| 474 | Rosa, Jonathan | Stanford University | Associate Professor |
| 475 | Rosen, Nicole | University of Manitoba | Professor |
| 476 | Rosenau, Sara | CU Boulder | Graduate Student |
| 477 | Rouvier, Ruth | University of California, Berkeley | PhD Candidate |
| 478 | Rouvinen, Alina | Student | |
| 479 | Rowe, Margaret Anne | Georgetown University | Alum |
| 480 | Royer, Adam | UCLA Linguistics | PhD Candidate |
| 481 | Royer, Justin | McGill University | PhD Student |
| 482 | Sampson, Tory | University of California, San Diego | PhD Student |
| 483 | Sanchez, Roger | Universidade Federal de Belo Horizonte, Brazil | PhD |
| 484 | Sandoval, Starr | graduate student | |
| 485 | Sandy, Abu El Adas | NYU | PhD student/worker |
| 486 | Sayeed, Asad | University of Gothenburg | Assistant Professor |
| 487 | Scarpace, Daniel | University of Texas at Arlington | Assistant Professor of Instruction |
| 488 | Scheffler, Tatjana | University of Potsdam | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 489 | Schlegl, Lisa | Univeristy of Toronto | PhD Student |
| 490 | Schneier, Joel | University of Central Florida | Lecturer |
| 491 | Seals, Corinne | Victoria University of Wellington | Senior Lecturer |
| 492 | Sears, Cheyenne | Ohio University | Alum |
| 493 | Semushina, Nina | UCSD | PhD candidate |
| 494 | Seong, Jihye | The State University of New York at Buffalo | Ph.D. Student |
| 495 | Shames, Kayla Matthea | Cornell University | Undergraduate Student |
| 496 | Shan, Chung-chieh | Indiana University | Associate Professor |
| 497 | Shapiro, Mary | Truman State University | Professor of Linguistics |
| 498 | Shenkar, Julia | George Mason University | Alum |
| 499 | Sherley-Appel, Clara | UCSC, UVA | Linguistics MA |
| 500 | Showers-Curtis, Katka | University of Wisconsin – Madison | Graduate Student |
| 501 | Shukla, Mohinish | ||
| 502 | Shulist, Sarah | Queen’s University | Associate Professor |
| 503 | Sichel, Ivy | UC Santa Cruz | Associate Professor |
| 504 | Sicoli, Mark A | University of Virginia | Assistant Professor |
| 505 | Simpson, Erin | UCL Institute of Education | PhD student |
| 506 | Sims, Nandi | Ohio State University | PhD Candidate |
| 507 | Singerman, Adam | Department of Linguistics, University of Chicago | Postdoctoral Teaching Fellow |
| 508 | Sirna, Sarah | Michigan State University | |
| 509 | Skilton, Amalia | University of Texas at Austin | Postdoctoral Researcher |
| 510 | Slayton, Aliya | University of Hawai’i at Mānoa | PhD student |
| 511 | Slobe, Tyanna | University of California Los Angeles | PhD Candidate |
| 512 | Smith, Alexander D. | University of North Texas | |
| 513 | Smith, Barry | University at Buffalo | Professor & Chair |
| 514 | Smith, James | ||
| 515 | Smith, Kaylin | Michigan State University | PhD candidate |
| 516 | Sneller, Betsy | Michigan State University | Assistant Professor |
| 517 | Snider, Todd | Postdoctoral Research Fellow | |
| 518 | Soldaini, Luca | Amazon | Applied Scientist |
| 519 | Sommerlot, Carly J. | University of Texas at Arlington | Ph.D. Candidate |
| 520 | Sprenger, Anna-Marie | UChicago | graduate student |
| 521 | Staicov, Adina | Hiroshima University | Assistant Professor |
| 522 | Stalley, Sean | ||
| 523 | Stephens, Heather | University of Toronto | PhD Candidate |
| 524 | Stickles, Elise | University of British Columbia | Assistant Professor |
| 525 | Stromdahl, Lars | University of Delaware | PhD Student |
| 526 | Strother-Garcia, Kristina | Bloomsburg University | Assistant Professor |
| 527 | Subtirelu, Nicholas | Georgetown University | Assistant Professor |
| 528 | Sullivant, Ryan | University of Texas at Austin | |
| 529 | Sundaresan, Sandhya | ||
| 530 | Sunil Arvindam, Vishal | ||
| 531 | Surbatovich, Amy | Editor | |
| 532 | Sutherland, Paul | American Philosophical Society | Archivist, Linguist |
| 533 | Szabó, Ildikó Emese | New York University | PhD candidate |
| 534 | Tabachnick, Guy | New York University | graduate student |
| 535 | Talmina, Natalia | Johns Hopkins University | PhD student |
| 536 | Taniguchi, Ai | University of Toronto Mississauga | Assistant Professor |
| 537 | Taylor, Katherine | The Ohio State University | Alum |
| 538 | Thomas, Airica | Northwestern University | PhD Student |
| 539 | Thomas, Jenelle | University of Oxford | |
| 540 | Thomas, William | The Ohio State University | PhD Student |
| 541 | Thompson, Anie | H5/University of California Santa Cruz | Consulting Linguist and PhD alum |
| 542 | Thompson, Ellen | Florida International University | Professor |
| 543 | Thompson, Katrina | University of Wisconsin-Madison | Professor |
| 544 | Thoms, Gary | New York University | Assistant Professor |
| 545 | Tomlin, Nicholas | UC Berkeley | PhD Student |
| 546 | Torbert, Benjamin | University of Missouri-St Louis | Associate professor |
| 547 | Torgersen, Henrik | University of Oslo | MA student |
| 548 | Tran, Marcellin | University of Toronto | Student |
| 549 | Travis, Lisa | McGill University | Professor Emeritus |
| 550 | Tulsyan, Purnima | ||
| 551 | Turnbull, Rory | Newcastle University | Lecturer |
| 552 | Turner, Gerry | York University | PhD Candidate |
| 553 | Turner, Robin | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign | PhD student |
| 554 | Twiner, Nicholas | Stanford University | Graduate Student |
| 555 | Tyler, Matthew | Yale University | PhD candidate |
| 556 | Tyrone, Martha | Long Island University | Associate Professor |
| 557 | Ulfsbjorninn, Shanti | University of Deusto, Bilbao. | Associate Professor |
| 558 | Umbal, Pocholo | University of Toronto | PhD Candidate |
| 559 | Usta, Betül Seda | University of Stirling | PhD student |
| 560 | Valentinsson, Mary-Caitlyn | Appalachian State University | Visiting Assistant Professor |
| 561 | van den Akker, M. | Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands | Undergraduate |
| 562 | VanderStouwe, Chris | Boise State University | Lecturer |
| 563 | Vaughan, Alfie | University of Cambridge | Undergraduate |
| 564 | Vihman, Marilyn | University of York | Professor |
| 565 | Vihman, Virve | University of Tartu | Associate Professor |
| 566 | Villanueva, Mercedes Eileen | ||
| 567 | Vittalbabu, Chandru | Sunnyvale School District | Speech-Language Pathologist and Linguistics graduate |
| 568 | Vu, Mai Ha | University of Delaware | Alum |
| 569 | Walkden, George | University of Konstanz | Professor of Linguistics |
| 570 | Warner, Natasha | University of Arizona | Professor and Head |
| 571 | Warren, Isaac | Georgetown University | MS Student |
| 572 | Wassink, Alicia | University of Washington | |
| 573 | Weinberg, Miranda | Swarthmore College | Visiting Assistant Professor, Linguistics |
| 574 | Wells, Alexus | Georgetown University | |
| 575 | Whitcomb, Kathleen | ||
| 576 | Williams, Adina | Research Scientist | |
| 577 | Wilson, Brianna | University of Chicago | PhD Student |
| 578 | Wilson, Fiona | University of Toronto | Graduate Student |
| 579 | Wilson, Scott Keohookalani | Pukyong National University | Lecturer |
| 580 | Wing, Dakota | York University | PhD Candidate |
| 581 | Wingett, Hannah | Georgetown University | Alum, BA Linguistics + MS Theoretical Linguistics |
| 582 | Winterstein, Grégoire | UQAM | Professor |
| 583 | Wolf, Simon | Unaffiliated | Independent Researcher and Consultant |
| 584 | Wood, Skye | Virginia Tech | Alum |
| 585 | Wright, Kelly Elizabeth | University of Michigan | PhD Candidate |
| 586 | Yeaton, Jeremy | UC Irvine | PhD student in Language Science |
| 587 | Yoshida Nuttall, Kelly | Boise State University | |
| 588 | Young, Eris | Writer | |
| 589 | Yuan, Michelle | University of California, San Diego | Assistant Professor |
| 590 | Zaitsu, Anissa | Stanford University | PhD student |
| 591 | Zimman, Lal | UC Santa Barbara | Associate Professor of Linguistics |
| 592 | Zompi, Stanislao | ||
| 593 | Zweig, Eytan | University of York | Lecturer |
Yet, Steven Pinker signed the Harper Letter. It is a letter against the weakening of the norms of debate and toleration. However, that letter makes it clear to me that such toleration should not be offered to those talking favorably about issues from the right and Donald Trump, The reason for the letter was to prevent (from the letter) the “forces of illiberalism … Who “have a powerful ally in Donald Trump” In other words lets protect our speech but not the speech of those that disagree.
Yet, Steven Pinker signed the Harper Letter. It is a letter against a weakening of the norms of debate and toleration. However, that letter makes it clear to me that such toleration should not be offered to those talking favorably about issues from the right and Donald Trump, The reason for the letter was to prevent (from the letter) the “forces of illiberalism … Who “have a powerful ally in Donald Trump” In other words lets protect our speech but not the speech of those that disagree.
Signing a letter dictating whose speech should be free doesn’t demonstrate the characteristics stated by Professor Turley: “someone who believes in robust intellectual discourse and free thought and speech.” I think the university setting is destroying fine minds by thinking only within a predescribed box and that Pofessor Truley is not immune from such thoughts.
“But don’t be distracted by the explosions – this letter wasn’t really about Pinker at all. In fact, it has a very specific function – to dissuade lesser-known academics and students from questioning the ideological consensus. The letter says, in not so few words: ‘It doesn’t matter if you’re Steven f***ing Pinker. If you don’t agree with our ideological prescriptions, you don’t belong here.’
The letter is really directed towards you – the unknown academic, the young linguist, the graduate student. And in this particular goal of dissuading dissent, it will undoubtedly be successful. Although the letter has been widely criticised, you are not Steven Pinker, and Noam Chomksy and others probably aren’t going to come to your defence when you get sanctioned for expressing the wrong opinion.”
https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/07/09/steven-pinker-wont-be-cancelled-but-you-could-be/
When MotherJones.com has become the voice of reason, that’s really all the proof any needs that the world has gone mad.
The fourth objection is that Pinker claimed that it was “statistically obtuse” to claim that the killings of a deranged California student was proof of a pattern of violence against women. His point appears to be a classic correlation versus causation critique.
It isn’t. He’s pointing out you live in a big country and sh!t happens. Doesn’t say a whole lot about everyday life.
Professor Turley — in the mid 1960’s UC Berkeley had the Free Speech Movement while China devoured its own with its Cultural Revolution. Years of campuses being dominated by liberals who turned students into intolerant snowflakes sowed the seeds of the cancel culture revolution of today. History and non- adherents to this new orthodoxy will be destroyed in the name of smothering all views other than the “right” ones. First they came to silence the deplorable conservatives and today for the liberals who disagree with their only acceptable views, thoughts and speech.
What goes around now comes around as those who planted the seeds reap what they have sown. Prepare yourselves for the “re-education”camps coming soon.
Couldn’t happen to a more deserving group.
NB, the Linguistics Society of America has fewer than 4,000 members. About 15% of them signed this. Now let’s see how many sign a counter petitioni.
He has however suggested that the level of police shootings may be the result of poor training and the excessive use of force generally by police in the United States. He is not alone in raising that issue.
Pinker’s a neuroscientist. He doesn’t know anything about the mechanics of policing. Neither do his detractors.
Excellent point. Policing is one of the most heavily scrutinized professions in the US. All kinds of internal and external review boards from the local up to the federal level. If there is systematic racism, there is even a bigger conspiracy to hide it.
Kimberley Strassel (@KimStrassel) Tweeted:
A study of fatal police shootings reached conclusions at odds with the political consensus. Now the authors are retracting their research simply because I cited it, writes @HMDatMI https://t.co/xuwN2t4pPn
https://twitter.com/KimStrassel/status/1281012521738973184?s=20
HMDatMI is Heather Mac Donald
Pinker has been vocal in his opposition to the level of police shootings in our society and has recognized their devastating impact on the African American community. H
Police shootings are not common (usually 1 or 2 a year in a metropolitan region of ordinary size); black criminals are, if anything, less likely to be shot than white criminals; and very few cases are demonstrable manifestations of police misconduct. You know that because the poster-child cases are so doubtful; that’s because they don’t have better cases to illustrate their theses. Right now, two police officers are facing murder charges in Atlanta because they killed a man who resisted arrest, stole a taser, and fired on them. In Minneapolis, four police officers are facing a menu of charges (including murder) because they arrested a man who had ingested a lethal quantum of fentanyl and he died from it while under arrest. Police shootings are not ‘devastating’ to the black population or even mildly injurious to it.
We know very well why this is an issue, and it has nothing to do with any palpable injury to blacks. It has to do with the complaint that people of lower status (cops) impose community standards on people of higher status (black hoodlums). The black chauvinists are upset because they fancy they’re kangz and the gentry liberals are upset because they fancy they assign status and these deplorables are disrespecting the pampered pets of said gentry liberals.
As for the Linguistic Society buffoons, their objection is that knowledgeable social researchers state what they know to be true, and that’s intolerable to the cluster-b-personality-disorder caucus among faculty and graduate students. Here’s an interesting question: why are junior faculty and graduate students such a bunch of train-wrecks? Your ‘colleagues’ cause this problem, and they exacerbate it by giving the worst what they want. Stop generating perverse incentives.
Interesting times, JT. I share your concern about issues of free speech.
Bug:
Yeah, just in the opposite way.
You’re probably right. But you never know.
Naw we do.
Buglife you share concerns about free speech but when it is offered such as we see on this blog you run away from your own free speech and what you posted in the past by changing your alias. That demonstrates how much you care about your own free speech much less how much you care about the free speech of others.
Huh, a lot of foreign names. If they did not grow up in the US, then they could be from countries where the notion of free speech does not exist. Also perhaps many are here on special visas, and that could have been used as leverage to force signatures.
I see professor Pinker’s points clearly. However his attempts at broaching his views are ill timed. He may be an accomplished intellectual as has the credibility to back it up. But this doesn’t mean that Pinker himself is a good judge of timing. He proposed his views when sensitivities are raw and fresh. If he didn’t see the backlash coming then clearly he wasn’t paying close attention.
His academic observations may be well balanced and nuanced, but those who actually see the problems on the ground and real time can point out that things aren’t that nuanced. The racism and poor training may be much more serious problems than they are currently perceived. This will pass. Professor Pinker shouldn’t be worried. Especially if he is smart enough to recognize that expressing his views may have been a bit premature.
I didn’t realize that speaking the truth required good timing. I guess we all need permission from our masters to speak the truth at the designated time of their choosing.
And this isn’t just a story about whether or not Pinker should be worried about his job.
This is a story, once again, about how people are threatened and silenced for expressing their opinions. If you don’t think that is a fundamental problem, I have no idea why you would be on a blog about free speech.
LorenzoValla,
I agree with you overall.
“I didn’t realize that speaking the truth required good timing.”
Sometimes the person(s) that you want to hear you are so mad that they won’t hear what you have to say. They are so mad that whatever good or reasonable thing you say will go in one ear and out the other or, worse, be twisted into something you didn’t say or mean. Waiting a bit for them to cool off can help the message be heard.
That said, sometimes Truths just need to be said because there may not be a ‘good time’ no matter what.
Right, and it’s not like he lit up Twitter in the immediate aftermath of George Floyd dying.
Agreed.
“I didn’t realize that speaking the truth required good timing.”
That is the problem with Svelaz and others on the blog. They believe in ‘free speech for me but not for thee’.
I didn’t realize that speaking the truth required good timing. ‘.
Allan, mentioning timing has nothing to do with being against free speech. Free speech is also about recognizing the responsibility that comes with it. I’ll timed opinions even if we’ll intended can backfire badly. Which bring consequences that are part of that decision.
If you didn’t realize speaking the truth required good timing then you admit you don’t understand the responsibilities that come with free speech.
For example when gun violence and school shootings take place first thing being said of those advocating for gun control is that “now is not the time to discuss gun control”. Is that denying free speech to gun control advocates?
Obviously timing IS important.
But it’s not an issue here, now is it? Pinker’s tweets go back for a few years.
Your argument is bad timing and a distraction.
Now, please check with us first before saying anything else on the matter.
There is an enormous difference between saying “now is not a good time to discuss x” and “let’s get this fired/removed for saying x.”
Svelaz, you made the comment about timing and some of the complaints came from comments years old. You don’t know what you are talking about. In that manner you are just like Paint Chips.
Svelaz:
“The racism and poor training may be much more serious problems than they are currently perceived.”
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Cite every – nay any instance — in modern times where this was proven. You won’t find any. Even in ex-con George Floyd’s death there is no proof of racism or poor training. You’ve got under a dozen criminal cases pending now against cops and no suggestion of racism or poor training. Quit lying.
Oh by the way, timing your expressions is the same thing as self-censorship you authoritarian troll.
Exactly. There is no systematic evidence for systematic racism in American police forces.
But people continually make these unsupported assertions. It’s obviously an industry unto itself right now, and an absolutely critical premise for the survival of the Democratic party. So it will continue.
Mespo,
“Oh by the way, timing your expressions is the same thing as self-censorship”
I disagree. Self-censorship is not always a bad thing.
‘Better to remain silent and thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.”
Abraham Lincoln
“Remember not only to say the right thing in the right place, but far more difficult still, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.”
Benjamin Franklin
PR:
That’s an internal dynamic contemplated in the quotes. We’re talking about an external one that forces self-censorship on you.
Mespo,
I agree that external dynamics should be opposed.
I read the issue of timing/self-censorship as one controlled primarily by the individual.
Mespo, really? You ask for citations when you can find it anywhere? Just yesterday AG himself pointed out there IS a problem with systemic racism.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/police-bias-in-dealing-with-african-americans-a-widespread-phenomenon-ag-barr-says/ar-BB16vbKN
AG Barr did not cite anything. He’s just saying what everyone is saying.
Lorenzo, he’s acknowledging the fact that it IS a problem, one that everyone recognized long before George Floyd was murdered. Before he would simply state a generic reason. Now it’s a recognized problem specifically mentioning race as an issue.
No, that would be circular logic. If there is a problem of systematic racism we need to see systematic evidence that it actually exists. A bunch of people saying it’s real is not evidence.
Furthermore, without this systematic evidence, we would have no way to solve the problem. That’s why we are left with these notions of ‘white privilege’ and other vague assertions that can’t be directly acted upon.
Lorenzo, systemic racism exists and those saying it are the ones experiencing it first hand. You don’t see it because you are never subjected to it.
There is plenty of proof.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.businessinsider.com/us-systemic-racism-in-charts-graphs-data-2020-6%3famp
https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=55798
Are you serious?
The first link has charts showing how blacks are doing more poorly than others in a variety of measurable ways. That does not prove the cause is racism, only that there is a racial disparity.
The second link is from 1978. The counter to that more than 2 generations old document are studies done within the last 5 years or so that show not only is there no systematic evidence for systematic racism, but that white perpetrators are more likely to be shot by cops than black ones.
Svelaz– I think systemic racism does exist. I think it is perpetuated by government programs such as affirmative action which are built on the belief that black students are inferior to white or Asian students and so they must be given special help if they are to make it. The systemic racism flows from the way in which these programs perpetuate the low expectations that democrat politicians always have had for blacks. As Joe Biden says, if any black persons think for themselves and decide to vote for anyone other than him, they aren’t black enough!
Sevvy:
Still awaiting your cites.
Mespo, anything I will cite you will immediately ignore or label as fake. I’ve played that stupid game before and it’s a waste of time when you will not take citations seriously. You’re just asking for them and willfully ignoring them. I’m sure you’re smart enough to find the information you seek on your own. That way you don’t waste anyone’s time and effort when you dismiss the proof you seek before you finish reading the headline.
“Mespo, anything I will cite you will immediately ignore or label as fake.”
You certainly slithered out of that trap. Congrats. You’re almost ready to be an Ivy League academic.
The expression “systemic racism” is about as sloppy and malleable as anything to be found in contemporary discourse. Like Lewis Carroll’s snark, it is whatever the person using the term thinks it is. Also, like the snark, it is most at home in non-sense literature.
Jay, would institutional racism work better for you?
https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=55798
Where did Barr even talk about systemic racism. Is Paint chips helping you write your responses in the nail salon?
These demonstrations and rioting have nothing to do with race. These people are nothing but a bunch of Marxist. They are using police brutality as a ruse.
Of course you’re right. He has every right to express the truth as he knows it — and, as you claim, you know it — but he should modulate his views to the whims of the moment. I agree: freedom of speech should be absolute, but not too absolute.
Or not, which is the only way an undesirable moment will ever change. BY SPEAKING UP. When did we become such noodle-spined cowards? Momentum is not garnered by sitting still, as idiot radicals have proved these past weeks. These notions of ‘timing’ are tantamount to, ‘Take your beating like we told you to.’, and it is the height of irony and hypocrisy given the events of past weeks. In its most rudimentary terms, the totalitarians among us are saying, ‘Shut up and let us trample you, already.’. My answer to that is, ‘No.’. You will not subvert our equal rights.
Since all these people are digging up dirt on everyone, going back to the days the person was born, your point about the timing isn’t relevant.
Well, I just sent an email in defense of Dr. Pinker to LSA.
Of the 2020 total of 337 shot and killed in Chicago, 3 involved police. Of the 2020 total of 1539 shot and wounded in Chicago, 4 have involved the police.
https://heyjackass.com/
Pinker is susceptible for hypercritical scrutiny at this time as he is a specialist who is pointing out discrepancies in one area of a much larger picture. More Black/police encounters points to a larger and more invasive racial inequality problem in the US and not only to a select set of statistics. Herein lies the rub. The anger and frustration emanating from racial inequality in the US, include police brutality. Police brutality is an issue. Racial profiling is an issue. These come together as the spark that lites a much larger condition. Taken by itself and mitigated with other select statistics this can be explained in various ways. In essence what this all comes down to is designing an opinion through selective amassing of data. Example, the high rate of obesity and diabetes among Blacks is linked to their excessive consumption of food stuffs that lead to these conditions. Alone, it is all on the Blacks. However, taken in overall context, many other aspects of racial inequality come into play. Trump repealed a condition put in place by Obama where neighborhood grocery stores had to stock a specific amount of fruit and vegetables to be eligible to trade in food stamps. Trump is responsible for increased Twinkie consumption and reduced fruit and vegetable consumption. Education, availability, political leadership, and many more issues/statistics can be seen as causing higher rates of diabetes among Blacks. Or, it could all be just the Twinkie statistics.
Pinker is a specialist. You can go to a specialist in the medical field and be treated for a problem that is perhaps but not necessarily connected to the treatment. Tunnel vision is an extreme example of this. One must see all the specialists.
This problem exists in every aspect of society. In order to identify this selective use of statistics in various explanations, they must be included in the general discussion. Pinker must be mitigated, not silenced. Pinker’s use of statistics isolates issues so does not completely address the larger condition. Academia and the general public must be exposed to the parts and the whole. Harvard does America a great disservice in shutting this specialist out. A lot of that going on. Politicians do this, perhaps, to the most extreme.
I haven’t seen the Twinkie defense since Harvey Milk was assassinated by Dan White.
Shameless.
Pinker is a specialist in linguistics but with a generalists abilities and focus. I recommend “enlightenment Now” or even the discussion he has with Yuval Harrai in my other post on this thread.
One is free to say what one wishes, but one is likewise free to ignore a petson’s speech. The question is whose rights trumps the other. Lies are not to be tolerated. Your admonition that the cure for bad speech is good speech rests upon the theoretical presumption that there is an opportunity and willingness to entertain both sides. While this may obtain in the University, it does not exist in the real world. People come home from a hard day at work and throw on a feedbag and plop in front of the tube. People, generally speaking, are not inclined to think for themselves which requires effort; rather, they are lazy and would prefer to be told what to think. The good speech will not enter their news bubble. As a practical matter the entire premise of your faith in free speech does not exist in the real world.
Pinker is another twittering loon getting eaten by the monster he and his ivy-headed Leftist brethren help create. Police shootings are justified in all but a few isolated cases as grand juries and petit juries prove all the time. They are properly trained – lawyers do it — and to suggest otherwise fuels the Left’s hate. Let the professor see what oppression feels like as cops do all the time. It’ll be good for him to come back down to planet Earth. Our society is ill-served by almost our our intellectuals. Let ‘em eat the same cake our cops do.
I agree with you. There are faculty members who are sympathetic figures (John McAdams is one). Pinker isn’t one of them.
I’m curious why you think he’s a loon? I’ve followed his work for a while and he seems like one of the only academics that openly goes after the dogma of the left.
He’s not a loon. He’s arrogant, opinionated, and verbose. Common type among faculty members.
Of the 3. he’s verbose, but words are what he deals in and what we want from him.
He’s a loon for the absolute falsity he claim sin my previous comment.
Professor Stephen Pinker is indeed well-known and highly regarded.
Professor Stephen Pinker is indeed well-known and highly regarded.
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So are the Bigoted Lynch Mob leaders. What’s your point? Ad populum, maybe? Starry-eyed groupie?
Hey and where are Paul’s cites?
For the most part, they’re not. These are junior faculty and graduate students. The trouble is, that sh!t’s in the pipeline.
It’s a shame they put their name to the letter……will they now be denounced for being Dunces?
Pinker is the author of “Enlightenment Now” a hugely influential book which demonstrates the level of human success to date – and much to the surprise of most of us, left and right – and it’s flourishing under the principles of the western enlightenment, humanism, and it’s main accomplishment, science.
As Paul noted, most signees are minor league players of grad assistants and students.
If one would like to hear him discuss some important issues with Yuval Harrari, author Sapiens, this is a delight:
Bookless in Gainesville;
“Hugely influential”? How could it be? Gates loves it and he’s another globalist tyrant.
Oh and Amazon ranks this “monumental work” as #3,202 in Books. Like Tyndale’s Bible, I see.
Does lying come natural or do you work at it like Benson through a haze of misinformation?
Influential in that it was thoroughly covered by every serious journal, newspaper, magazine, and intellectual media throughout the world and anyone who keeps up with contemporary thought is familiar with it.
You probably wouldn’t hear about it in People.
Bookless in Gainesville:
You love it for this valentine to the book from the Marxist NYT:
“He later adds that he could have ended every chapter by saying, “But all this progress is threatened if Donald Trump gets his way.” Trumpism risks knocking the world backward in almost every department of life, especially by trying to undo the international structures that have made progress possible: peace and trade agreements, health care, climate change accords and the general understanding that nuclear weapons should never be used. All this is now in question. Pinker is particularly sharp on the dangers of ignoring or overriding the systems that make nuclear war unlikely.”
The rest of the reviews acknowledge he doesn’t have anything new to say just says ita tad more eloquently. The very definition of a poser. The best review I could find for this oft-ignored book was from Stanford University historian Jessica Riskin who summarizes the book as “a knot of Orwellian contradictions”. Indeed it’s the exact kind of hodgepodge of lies, pop psychology and obfuscations that fascinates mush-minds like yours. Carry on in your stupor.
I think Mespo will especially enjoy this retort to the reviewer he cited as a slap down to Pinker:
“Jessica Riskin should have read
@sapinker
response to critics:
https://quillette.com/2019/01/14/enlightenment-wars-some-reflections-on-enlightenment-now-one-year-later/
before writing this scurrilous “review”
https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/pinkers-pollyannish-philosophy-and-its-perfidious-politics/
I hate to say it but I think some academics are actually disappointed that poverty & suffering is in decline without their help.”
The beginning of Pinker’s “reflections” a year later:
“You wouldn’t think that a defense of reason, science, and humanism would be particularly controversial in an era in which those ideals would seem to need all the help they can get. But in the words of a colleague, “You’ve made people’s heads explode!” Many people who have written to me about my 2018 book Enlightenment Now say they’ve been taken aback by the irate attacks from critics on both the right and the left. Far from embracing the beleaguered ideals of the Enlightenment, critics have blamed it for racism, imperialism, existential threats, and epidemics of loneliness, depression, and suicide. They have insisted that human progress can only be an illusion of cherry-picked data. They have proclaimed, with barely concealed schadenfreude, that the Enlightenment is an idea whose time has passed, soon to be killed off by authoritarian populism, social media, or artificial intelligence.”
No thanks. Pop psychology isn’t my thing.
Over your head, huh? Well, then enjoy the end of the critical review you cited which was actually a defense of progressive intellectuals from Pinker’s criticism.
“Pinker rejects but that his Enlightenment heroes embraced, whatever their differences of opinion on other matters: skepticism, and an attendant spirit of informed criticism. Skepticism is kryptonite to the sort of demagogue who brandishes something — a cross, a flag, a MAGA hat … or a graph — and calls anyone who questions it a delusional know-nothing. Pinker’s story is Manichaean, good versus evil, and the bad guys are intellectuals, progressives, and the misleading news media. Any of this sounding familiar? With friends like these, the Enlightenment doesn’t need enemies.”
Under it. Oh and never said she wasn’t a Commie (its Stanford) just that her assessment had a few nuggets. Sales have plummeted of this “great work” to a Barnes & Noble ranking of 16,974 in 2019. Eggheads are fickle it seems when deciding greatness.
We own it already. People like you pretend to intellectualism but look through the pages for Trump’s name before buying.
Bookfree in Gainesville:
I’m guessing you’ve never read a book over 15 pages.
It seems like it is getting to the point where there are a lot of well qualified professors out there looking for employment after being being wrongly terminated. It also seem like there would be an opportunity to gather these professors and start a new college where people can speak freely. Maybe call it First Amendment University?
Hillsdale could start a branch campus perhaps. Or, Heterodox Academy could become Heterodox University.
Name and shame!!!!!! BTW, looking at the signatures, it looks like they found anything that drew breath to sign this. Not a lot of star power.
Prof. Turley, you are a lighthouse guarding the shores of free expression and academic integrity from the storms of intolerance and ignorance.
It’s all in the last paragraph. I’ll translate: In this letter, we are not doing what it looks like we just did. Don’t call it “cancelling” although most of us really want to do exactly that …
This reveals the immature, spoiled dishonesty of the writers, signers and those infected with this brand of lazy intellectual fear. As Prof. Turley points out, they didn’t have the courage to stand up and debate the topics with Dr. Pinker, person to person.
They couldn’t even stand up and declare, without qualification or with any clarity, who they are and what they are doing.