Geoffrey Sampson

Geoffrey Sampson

Geoffrey Sampson (1944, Broxbourne, Hertfordshire) is Professor of Natural Language Computing in the Department of Informatics, University of Sussex, England.

He was educated at Bristol Grammar School and graduated in Oriental studies from St John's College, Cambridge, followed by study at Yale University in the Linguistics and Engineering & Applied Science departments. [http://www.grsampson.net/Career.html Biography] , official website]

His academic career has included work in Oriental languages, linguistics and computing, with side interests in philosophy and political and economic thought. He lectured at the London School of Economics, the University of Lancaster and the University of Leeds before moving to Sussex in 1991. *]

He has most recently attracted attention for his academic criticism of the nativist movement in linguistics, represented by academics such as Noam Chomsky, Jerry Fodor and Steven Pinker. Sampson is particularly critical of Pinker's 1994 book "The Language Instinct", which he has subjected to sustained commentary in his book "The 'Language Instinct' Debate", the first edition of which, published in 1997, was entitled "Educating Eve". According to Sampson, Pinker has not publicly addressed these criticisms. [ [http://www.grsampson.net/REmpNat.html Geoffrey Sampson: Empiricism v. Nativism ] ]

Sampson was a Conservative member of Wealden District Council (2001-2). He resigned this position after he was attacked by Labour Party and Liberal Democrat ministers and councillors for publishing on his website an article, "There's Nothing Wrong With Racism (Except the Name)", containing a number of racially sensitive claims. The outcome was subsequently endorsed by Conservative Central Office as "in the best interests of all concerned ...the Conservative party is opposed to all forms of racial discrimination". [ [http://www.guardian.co.uk/race/story/0,,715354,00.html Tory councillor forced to step down after racism row] , Staff and agencies, "The Guardian", May 14, 2002]

He has since left the Conservative Party and in 2006 joined the United Kingdom Independence Party. [ [http://www.grsampson.net/Life.html Life] , official website]

Publications authored

* Sampson, G: "The 'Language Instinct' Debate" (Continuum, 2004, ISBN 0-8264-7385)

References

External links

* [http://www.grsampson.net Official site]


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем написать курсовую

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Sampson (surname) — Sampson is a surname, and may refer to:* Angus Sampson (b. 1975), Australian actor * Anthony Sampson (1926 2004), British journalist and non fiction writer * Chris Sampson (b. 1978), American baseball player * Clay Sampson (b. 1976), Australian… …   Wikipedia

  • Geoffrey Radcliffe — is a fictional character who appears in the science fiction film The Invisible Man Returns . He is played by Vincent Price.Along with his beloved brother, Michael Radcliffe, and their cousin, Richard Cobb, Geoffrey ran a mining company in England …   Wikipedia

  • Geoffrey Edelsten — Born Geoffrey Walter Edelsten 2 May 1943 (1943 05 02) (age 68) Melbourne, Australia …   Wikipedia

  • Geoffrey Clough Ainsworth — Pour les articles homonymes, voir Ainsworth. Geoffrey Clough Ainsworth est un mycologue et un historien des sciences britannique, né le 9 octobre 1905 à Birmingham et mort le 25 octobre 1998 à Derby. Il est le seul fils du révérent Percy Clough… …   Wikipédia en Français

  • writing — /ruy ting/, n. 1. the act of a person or thing that writes. 2. written form: to commit one s thoughts to writing. 3. that which is written; characters or matter written with a pen or the like: His writing is illegible. 4. such characters or… …   Universalium

  • Mesoamerican literature — The traditions of indigenous Mesoamerican literature extend back to the oldest attested forms of early writing in the Mesoamerican region, which date from around the mid 1st millennium BCE. Many of the pre Columbian cultures of Mesoamerica are… …   Wikipedia

  • African American Vernacular English — African American topics History  Atlantic slave trade · Maafa Slavery in the United States Military history of African Americans …   Wikipedia

  • Writing system — Predominant scripts at the national level, with selected regional and minority scripts. Alphabet Latin Cyrillic Latin Greek …   Wikipedia

  • Good–Turing frequency estimation — is a statistical technique for predicting the probability of occurrence of objects belonging to an unknown number of species, given past observations of such objects and their species. (In drawing balls from an urn, the objects would be balls and …   Wikipedia

  • English language spelling reform — For hundreds of years, many groups and individuals have advocated spelling reform for English. Spelling reformers seek to make English spelling more consistent and more phonetic, so that spellings match pronunciations and follow the alphabetic… …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
… Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”