Lawrence University Linguist Awarded Fulbright Chair in Italy

APPLETON, WIS. -- A Lawrence University historian of linguistics has been recognized with a prestigious lectureship appointment by the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board.

Daniel J. Taylor, the Hiram A. Jones Professor of Classics at Lawrence, has been awarded the Fulbright Distinguished Chair in Linguistics at the University of Trieste in Italy. During the 2002 spring semester, Taylor will teach an advanced seminar on the chronological development of linguistic and grammatical thought in ancient Greece and Rome.

"I'm excited at the prospect of returning to a country which I love and where I have lived for more than three years," said Taylor. "I'm honored to represent my university, country and academic discipline abroad as a Fulbrighter. Intellectually speaking, I can hardly wait to teach a course on Varro and the history of linguistics in classical antiquity, something which I can't do on the undergraduate level. For me this will be an academic adventure of the first order."

A 1963 graduate of Lawrence and a member of its faculty since 1974, Taylor is considered one of the world's leading scholars on Marcus Terentius Varro (116-27 BC), ancient Rome's most prolific and authoritative language scientist.

Taylor has written extensively on Varro and his theoretical approach to language, including his fourth and latest book, "Varro De Lingua Latina X," (1997) which examines Varro's most famous and significant manuscript on linguistic science. He has been awarded two research fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and been cited by the American Philological Association with its National Award for Excellence in Teaching the Classics.

Taylor also has been awarded the Foreign Language Educator of the Year Award by the Wisconsin Association of Foreign Language Teachers and was recognized in 1998 with Lawrence's own Excellence in Teaching Award.

Taylor is the third Lawrence faculty member in the past two years to be awarded a grant by the Fulbright Scholars Program. Lawrence Longley, professor of government, spent the 2000 Fall Term as the Thomas Jefferson Distinguished Chair in the Netherlands and Marcia Bjornerud, associate professor of geology, is currently in Norway conducting field research as part of a year-long study project she began last July.

Established in 1946 and administered by the United States Information Agency, the Fulbright Scholar Program provides grants in a variety of disciplines for teaching and research positions in more than 120 countries. The program aims to increase mutual understanding between people of the United States and people of other countries while fostering friendly and peaceful relations between the United States and other countries.