The Linguist's Calendar: January 19

Victoria Fromkin

January 19   

1939: The first session of what became known as “the Monster Study” is held by Mary Tudor of the University of Iowa. The experiment aims at making orphan children stutter in order to test a theory that stuttering is caused by people in the environment.

1999: At its 656th meeting, the European Union Committee of Ministers decides to officially proclaim 2001 the “European year of languages”.

2000: American linguist Victoria Fromkin draws her last breath.