Dell Hymes

Dell Hathaway Hymes ( born June 7, 1927 in Portland, Oregon, † November 13, 2009 in Charlottesville, Virginia) was an American linguist and anthropologist.

Life

Hymes studied until 1950 at David H. French. Before the start of the Korean War Hymes worked for the Army as a decoder in Korea, which was his interest in linguistics. Hymes 1955 received his doctorate from Indiana University with a thesis on the language of Kathlamet. In his work he was referring to research by Franz Boas. After working at Harvard University Hymes moved in 1960 to the Berkeley University and from there, after five years at the University of Pennsylvania. From 1987 he taught as a professor at the University of Virginia, where he became Professor Emeritus.

Publications

• Pidginization and creolization of Languages ​​. Cambridge University Press 1971, ISBN 9780521078337
• Sociolinguistics. For the ethnography of communication. Translated by Florian Coulmas. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main 1979, ISBN 3-518-07899-2