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William Labov
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{{Short description|American linguist; father of sociolinguistics (1927β2024)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=April 2019}} {{Use American English|date=April 2019}} {{Infobox academic | name = William Labov | birth_date = {{birth date|1927|12|04}} | birth_place = [[Passaic, New Jersey]], U.S. | death_date = {{death date and age|2024|12|17|1927|12|04}} | death_place = [[Philadelphia]], Pennsylvania, U.S. | education = [[Harvard University]] ([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]])<br/>{{nobr|[[Columbia University]] ([[Master of Arts|MA]], [[Doctor of Philosophy|PhD]])}} | doctoral_advisor = [[Uriel Weinreich]] | occupation = {{ubl|[[Chemical industry|Industrial chemist]] (1949β60)|[[professor|Professor of]] [[linguistics]] (1964{{nbnd}}2014)}} | discipline = [[Linguistics|Linguist]] | workplaces = [[Columbia University]]<br>[[University of Pennsylvania]] | known_for = [[Variationist sociolinguistics]] | notable_works = <!-- produces label "Notable work"; may be overridden by |credits=, which produces label "Notable credit(s)"; or by |works=, which produces label "Works" --> | spouse = {{Plainlist| * Teresa Gnasso * {{marriage|[[Gillian Sankoff]]|1993}} }} | footnotes = Labov's [http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~wlabov/WLVITA.pdf curriculum vitae] | children = 7, including [[Alice Goffman]] }} '''William David Labov''' ({{IPAc-en|l|Ι|Λ|b|oΚ|v}} {{respell|lΙ|BOHV|'}};<ref>{{cite journal| first=Matthew J.| last=Gordon| doi=10.1177/0075424206294308| title=Interview with William Labov| journal=Journal of English Linguistics| volume=34|year=2006|pages=332β51|issue=4| s2cid=144459634}}</ref><ref name="Avril_2012">{{cite news|title=Penn linguist Labov wins Franklin Institute award| author=Tom Avril|url=http://www.philly.com/philly/health/20121022_Penn_linguist_Labov_wins_Franklin_Institute_award.html|newspaper=The Philadelphia Inquirer|date=October 22, 2012|access-date=October 23, 2012}}</ref> December{{nbsp}}4, 1927{{snd}}December{{nbsp}}17, 2024) was an American linguist widely regarded as the founder of the discipline of variationist [[sociolinguistics]].<ref name="AAAS"/><ref>E.g., in the opening chapter of ''The Handbook of Language Variation and Change'' (ed. Chambers et al., Blackwell 2002), J.K. Chambers writes that "variationist sociolinguistics had its effective beginnings only in 1963, the year in which William Labov presented the first sociolinguistic research report"; the dedication page of the ''Handbook'' says that Labov's "ideas imbue every page".</ref> He has been described as "an enormously original and influential figure who has created much of the methodology" of sociolinguistics,<ref>{{cite book| last=Trask|first=R.L.|title=A Student's Dictionary of Language and Linguistics|publisher=Arnold|isbn=0-340-65266-7|location=London|page=124|year=1997}}</ref> and "one of the most influential linguists of the 20th and 21st centuries".<ref name="ll">{{Cite web |last1=McLemore |first1=Cynthia |last2=Liberman |first2=Mark |date=2024-12-17 |title=Bill Labov |url=https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=67399 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241218065043/https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=67399 |archive-date=2024-12-18 |access-date=2024-12-18 |website=[[Language Log]]}}</ref> Labov was a professor in the [[linguistics]] department of the [[University of Pennsylvania]] in [[Philadelphia]] and pursued research in sociolinguistics, language change, and [[dialectology]]. He retired in 2015 but continued to publish research until his death in 2024.<ref name="Chambers">{{cite journal |last1=Chambers |first1=Jack |title=William Labov: An Appreciation |journal=Annual Review of Linguistics |date=14 January 2017 |volume=3 |issue=1 |pages=1β23 |doi=10.1146/annurev-linguistics-051216-040225 |s2cid=151373995 |language=en |issn=2333-9683 |doi-access=free}}</ref>
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