Hans Kurath

Hans Kurath (13 December 1891 – 2 January 1992) was an American linguist of Austrian origin. He was full professor for English and Linguistics at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. The many varieties of regional English he encountered during these trips convinced Kurath of the necessity of completing a systematic study of American English. In 1926 he convinced the Modern Language Association to begin planning for the project and in 1931 a pilot study of the New England region was initiated under his direction. It soon became clear, however, that the undertaking was too complex to be completed by a single team of linguists and the project was expanded to eight additional regional operations. Kurath guided the vision and goals of the regional projects for three decades and oversaw the publication of a series of volumes that are known collectively as the Linguistic Atlas of the United States. He is predominantly known for publishing the first linguistic atlas of the US, the Linguistic Atlas of New England, for which he received the Loubat Prize, and for being the first main editor of the Middle English Dictionary. Together with Raven I. McDavid, Jr. he also published a linguistic atlas of the eastern United States, The Pronunciation of English in the Atlantic States.