Also see Prof. Jackendoff's personal page.

Ray Jackendoff grew up in Chicago and Philadelphia. He majored in mathematics at Swarthmore College, where he discovered he was not cut out to be a mathematician and, taking a big chance, applied to graduate schools in linguistics. He ended up going to MIT, where he studied under Noam Chomsky and Morris Halle, and was a reluctant participant in the "Linguistics Wars" of the late 1960s. He taught at Brandeis from 1971 to 2005, and joined the Tufts faculty in 2005 as Co-Director of the Center for Cognitive Studies.

His central research is on the semantics of natural language, how it relates to human conceptualization, and how it is expressed linguistically. In the course of working out the foundations for this enterprise, he has been drawn into research on visual cognition, music cognition, social cognition, consciousness, and the evolution of the language capacity, as well as more traditional issues for linguists such as syntax and the lexicon.

In another of his lives, Jackendoff is a classical clarinetist, having performed as soloist with the Boston Pops and several other Boston area orchestras. He has appeared frequently in recital and chamber music programs, and was for 20 years principal clarinet of the Civic Symphony Orchestra of Boston. With pianist Valentina Sandu-Dediu, he has recorded a CD, Romanian Music for Clarinet and Piano.

ray.jackendoff@tufts.edu
Phone: 617-627-4348
Fax: 617-484-0164
Miner 111
OHs: By appointment only (please send an e-mail)