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B
ORN IN LUNENBURG, Nova Scotia, Emeneau had an unusu-ally long
and productive career as professor of Sanskrit and lin-
guistics at the University of California, Berkeley, where he
wasa founder of the linguistics department and of the Survey of
CaliforniaIndian Languages; he was elected to the APS in 1952. He
died peace-fully at his home in Berkeley on 29 August 2005, aged
101. In his lateryears, he was often asked whether he owed his
longevity to any particu-lar regimen of life; he always answered,
No, just genes. In fact, medi-cal researchers have discovered in
recent years that Emeneaus home-town of Lunenburg produces the
highest percentage of centenarians inNorth America.
Emeneau was rst trained in classics at Dalhousie University,
Hali-fax, and at Oxford University. In 1926 he began the study of
Sanskritand comparative Indo-European at Yale, where he received
his doctor-ate in 1931 with a dissertation on Sanskrit. From then
until 1935, hedid postdoctoral study at Yale under the direction of
the leading an-thropologist and linguist Edward Sapir. From him
Emeneau eagerly ab-sorbed not only the then-new structural
linguistics, but also Sapirsdistinctive approach to what was later
called anthropological linguis-tics. As he wrote in later years, I
was exposed to methods of eld-work on non-literary languages,
including intensive phonetic practice
and analysis of material, but especially to Sapirs approach to
anthro-pological linguistics, in which language is only part of the
total culture,but a most important part, since in it the community
expresses in itsown way, verbies its culture.
With Sapirs help and guidance, and with grants from sources
in-cluding the APS, Emeneau spent the years 193538 doing eldwork
onunwritten Dravidian languages of India, in particular on Toda.
Back inthe U.S., after teaching linguistics at Yale for a year,
Emeneau was hiredin 1940 as assistant professor of Sanskrit and
general linguistics at
Berkeley; he rose rapidly, becoming full professor by 1946, and
laterchair. He was a prolic interdisciplinary writer throughout his
career,in areas ranging from Sanskrit philology to Dravidian
linguistics to cul-tural anthropology, and he constantly urged his
students to begin theirown publication records. In 1971 he retired
to emeritus status, but hecontinued his research, publication, and
participation in academic ac-tivities well into his nineties.
At the time of Emeneaus death, he was unquestionably the
worldsmost outstanding scholar in Dravidian linguistics. Many of
his works
in this eld were published by the APS, including Ritual
Structure andLanguage Structure of the Todas in 1974 and Toda
Grammar and Textsin 1984. His last publication was, in fact, a
letter written to the APSwhen he was 98 years old, acknowledging
the Societys policy of sup-
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port for young scholars and . . . its generous and expert
publicationpolicy (News from Philosophical Hall, March 2003, p. 3).
Still later,
the APS Member Video Project visited him in Berkeley to
videotape hisreminiscences (News, March 2004, p. 3).
Along with his Berkeley colleagues A. L. Kroeber and Mary R.
Haas,Emeneau was instrumental in organizing the Survey of
California In-dian Languages. Since its inception, the Survey
(later renamed the Sur-vey of California and Other Indian
Languages) has become the majorproject of its type in the U.S.,
sending dozens of students to do eld-work. This work produced a
long list of doctoral degrees and wholebookshelves of monographs
published in the series University of Cali-
fornia Publications in Linguistics; Emeneau served on the
editorial boardfor many years.The many honors bestowed on Emeneau
included the presidency of
the Linguistic Society of America and of the American Oriental
Society,four honorary doctorates, and numerous medals and
citations.
Emeneau was a teacher and researcher of amazing erudition and
ofmeticulous habit; his students learned from him the meaning of
profes-sionalism in scholarship. In his younger days, getting to
know him wasnot easy, but later he mellowed quite noticeably.
Throughout his ca-reer, he was distinguished by his generosity and
supportiveness toward
his students. His memory will continue to inspire his academic
children,grandchildren, and still further descendants.
Elected 1952
W B1
Emeritus Professor of Linguistics and Anthropology
University of California, Los Angeles
1Professor Bright estimated while working on this essay that he
was Professor Emeneausoldest living student (and perhaps the only
one who, like Professor Emeneau, studied Ameri-can Indian as well
as Indic languages). He attended Professor Emeneaus 95th and
100thbirthday parties. Professor Bright died on 15 October
2006.
