Martin Orwin

Martin Orwin
Occupation	linguist, scholar, writer
Nationality	British
Alma mater	School of Oriental and African Studies

Martin Orwin (born in 1963) is a British linguist, scholar and writer, specializing in the languages and cultures of the Horn of Africa.

Biography

Orwin studied Arabic and Amharic and has a Ph.D. in the phonology of the Somali language. Since 1992, he has been a lecturer in Somali and Amharic at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London, England, where he teaches both Afro-Asiatic languages.

He has also published articles on Somali language and poetry and has conducted field research in the Horn of Africa.

Orwin's ongoing research interests include language use in poetry, particularly in the metrics of Somali verse. In addition, he has translated a number of Somali poems, two of which were published in the Modern Poetry in Translation (No.17 Mother Tongues Special Edition 2001) compendium.

Orwin has worked closely with a number of Somali poets, including Gaarriye and Hadraawi, and is very involved with the Poetry Translation Centre based in London.

He is also the author of Colloquial Somali, a popular book & CD instruction course on the Somali language.

Major works

• Orwin, Martin, Colloquial Somali: A Complete Language Course, (Routledge: 1995). ISBN 0415452694 ISBN 978-0415452694
• Orwin, Martin and Awde, N and Xaaji, Cabdulqaadir, Somali-English, English-Somali Dictionary and Phrasebook, (Hippocrene Books: 1999). ISBN 0781806216 ISBN 978-0781806213

See also

• Somali Studies
• Ethiopian Studies

References

• Martin Orwin's homepage at SOAS
• Martin Orwin's biography at Poetry Translation Centre

External links

• Interview with Martin Orwin
• Complete list of Martin Orwin's publications
• Martin Orwin's personal website

Persondata
Name	Orwin, Martin
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1963
Place of birth
Date of death
Place of death