Leonard Bloomfield

Not to be confused with the English naturalist Leonard Blomefield (1800–1893)Leonard Bloomfield (April 1, 1887 – April 18, 1949) was an American linguist who led the development of structural linguistics in the United States during the 1930s and the 1940s. His influential textbook Language, published in 1933, presented a comprehensive description of American structural linguistics. He made significant contributions to Indo-European historical linguistics, the description of Austronesian languages, and description of languages of the Algonquian family.Bloomfield's approach to linguistics was characterized by its emphasis on the scientific basis of linguistics, adherence to behaviorism especially in his later work, and emphasis on formal procedures for the analysis of linguistic data. The influence of Bloomfieldian structural linguistics declined in the late 1950s and 1960s as the theory of Generative Grammar developed by Noam Chomsky came to predominate.

Personal facts

Birth date	April 01, 1887
Birth place	Chicago , Illinois
Date of death	April 18, 1949
Place of death	New Haven Connecticut
Education	University of Chicago University of Göttingen Harvard College Leipzig University University of Wisconsin–Madison

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