- Uzzi Ornan
Infobox Person
name = Uzzi Ornan
imagesize = 150px
caption =
birth_date =June 7 ,1923
birth_place = Jerusalem
other_names = Uzziel Halperin
known_for = Linguistics, social activism
occupation = Professor
nationality =Israeli Uzzi Ornan ( _he. עוזי אורנן; also "Uzi Ornan") (born June 7, 1923) is an
Israel ilinguist and social activist. Ornan is a member of theAcademy of the Hebrew Language , professor ofnatural language scomputing at theTechnion andprofessor emeritus at theHebrew University of Jerusalem . He is the founder of the League against ReligiousCoercion in Israel and an active supporter of theseparation of church and state . Ornan was a member of the Israeli Canaanite movement, founded by his brotherYonatan Ratosh [ http://www.geocities.com/alabasters_archive/kuzar_intros.html Membership in Canaanite movement.]Biography
Ornan was born in
Jerusalem as "Uzziel Halperin", son of Yechiel Halperin, a Hebrew teacher and supporter ofChaim Weizmann , and Paulia, a member ofPoale Zion . His parents immigrated to Mandate-era Palestine in 1919, as pioneers of theThird Aliyah . In his youth, Ornan was active in the Etzel. In 1944 he was detained by the British authorities. Subsequently he was deported to and imprisoned inEritrea ,Sudan andKenya , where he was held until theIsraeli Declaration of Independence .Linguistic career
In the
internment camp s he taughtHebrew phonology and morphology to other detainees. Back in Israel he published his method as "diqduq ha-pe we-ha-'ozen" (Hebrew for "Grammar of Mouth and Ear"), which became a classic method for acquiring Hebrew grammar skills in high schools. He soon started studying at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where he received his Hebrew Linguistics PhD in 1964. He served his alma mater aslecturer andprofessor until 1987. In his research, he leaned to a formal approach. Throughout the years he became increasingly interested in natural language computing.In 1979 he was elected as a member in the Academy of the Hebrew Language. He headed its committee that set the Hebrew standards for
punctuation .In 1987 he was a
visiting professor at theTechnion - Israel Institute of Technology inHaifa . He managed a laboratory for natural languages computing for its department ofComputer Science . He continues to teach and head a laboratory at the Technion to date.In the nineties he developed a new standard for the
Latin presentation of Hebrew (ISO-259-3), that allows for complete reversibility between the Hebrew and theLatin script . While the standard gained support from theIsrael Standards Institute , the Academy of the Hebrew Language has not yet approved it.ocial activism
In 1950 he founded the League Against Religious Coercion, in which he served as secretary and chairman until 1967. In the 1970s he was chairman of the Israeli Secular Movement. He is an opponent of circumcision. Since the 1990s he has been active in the "I am Israeli" movement, which strives for equality among all Israelis, by dropping the nationality from the formal government registration of each citizen or revising the nationality to include "Israeli" as an option. To this end several appeals were submitted to Israel courts. [ [http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3466379,00.html No 'Israelis' in Israel? Court to debate State's refusal to acknowledge Israeli nationality] ,
Aviram Zino atYnetnews ,November 31 ,2007 ]Published work
Uzzi Ornan has written many articles on
equality ,civil rights , separation of church and state, and language.* "Grammar of Mouth and Ear", 1947
* "Hebrew Syntax", 1963
* "Dictionary of Forgotten Words", 1996
* "The claws ofAsmodai ", 1999
* "The Final Word", 2003References
External links
* [http://www.2all.co.il/Web/Sites/ornan/ Personal website with articles] (mostly in Hebrew)
* [http://www.cs.technion.ac.il/he/people/ornan/ Uzzi Ornan] at theTechnion website
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.