FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Jan. 9, 2007

Kathleen McPartland
530-898-4260

Graham Thurgood Is Named Outstanding Professor

The Faculty Recognition and Support Committee of California State University, Chico has named linguist Graham Thurgood Outstanding Professor for 2006-2007. Outstanding Professor is the premier award at the University, given for both scholarship and outstanding teaching.

Thurgood, a member of the English department since 1999, received his PhD in linguistics from UC Berkeley. He came to Chico after a long career at CSU, Fresno. President Paul Zingg said, "Dr. Thurgood epitomizes an outstanding professor: exemplary teaching, scholarship and service."

Thurgood is a distinguished and prolific scholar in his field of Southeast Asian linguistics. He is the author of four books, including "The Sino-Tibetan Languages," which he co-edited with Randy LaPolla (Routledge Language Family Series, London and New York). This volume is now a standard reference for scholars of those languages and will be published as a paperback in the spring.

He is currently reviewing several manuscripts for the journal "Language" and proposals for the National Science Foundation, and is preparing to go to Aceh to set up a program of scholarly research focusing on the unique role of Aceh and Acehnese in Southeast Asian history. He also is the co-author of two books slated to come out within the next year.

"Graham Thurgood is one of the best teachers I've had the pleasure of attending classes with," said student Kate Phelps. "He is a top-notch linguist with actual experience in many areas that interest his students, especially the linguistics majors, and we feel that it is a privilege to receive instruction from a professional who uses real-life examples from his own research in class."

"Graham demands the best from his students and works tirelessly to help and guide them in developing their own critical thinking abilities," said Frank Li, a CSU, Chico professor of linguistics who was once a graduate student under Thurgood. "He is one of the very few scholars in the world who can claim to be the founder of not only a refereed journal, but two national conference organizations that have been flourishing and gained international recognition and prestige."

Among his other prizes and awards, Thurgood claims three National Science Foundation Awards (most recently "Documentation of Three Endangered Languages in China"), two Fulbright Scholar awards and two meritorious performance awards from CSU, Fresno.

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