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Lyle Campbell is a linguist who is considered to be one of the foremost experts on Native American languages, especially the Mayan and Uto-Aztecan language families, as well as in historical linguistics. In addition to his expertise in Mesoamerican languages, he is also expert on Finno-Ugric languages. He is presently Professor of Linguistics at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, and the director of the University's Center for American Indian Languages (CAIL).

Raised in Oregon, Campbell received his B.A. in Archaeology and Anthropology in 1966 from Brigham Young University, his M.A. in Linguistics from the University of Washington in 1967, and his Ph.D. in Linguistics from UCLA in 1971. Campbell taught at the University of Missouri (1971-1974), the State University of New York at Albany (1974-1989), Louisiana State University (1989-1994), and the University of Canterbury, in Christchurch, New Zealand (1994-2004).

Among the topics on which Campbell is an expert is the history of historical linguistics and its methodology. He is a prominent critic of extreme claims of genetic affiliation of languages such as those of Merritt Ruhlen and Joseph Greenberg.

He is the author of numerous books, two of which (American Indian languages: The historical linguistics of Native America and Historical Syntax in Cross-Linguistic Perspectives, co-written with Alice C. Harris) were awarded the Leonard Bloomfield Book Award by the Linguistic Society of America for the best book in linguistics published in the previous two years.

• Campbell, Lyle & Blair, Robert et al. (1971). Cakchiquel Basic Course. Provo: Peace Corps.
• Campbell, Lyle (1977). Quichean Linguistic Prehistory (University of California Publications in Linguistics, 81). Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Campbell, Lyle et al. (1978). Bibliography of Mayan Languages and Linguistics. Institute for Mesoamerican Studies, Publication 3. SUNY Albany.
• Campbell, Lyle & Mithun, Marianne (Eds.) (1979). The Languages of Native America: An Historical and Comparative Assessment. Austin: University of Texas Press.
• Campbell, Lyle (1980). El Idioma Cacaopera. (Colección Antropología e Historia, 16.) Administración del patrimonio cultural. San Salvador, El Salvador: Ministerio de Educación, Dirección de publicaciones.
• Campbell, Lyle & Justeson, John (Eds.) (1984). Phoneticism in Mayan Hieroglyphic Writing. (Institute for Mesoamerican Studies, Pub. 9.) SUNY Albany/University of Texas Press.
• Campbell, Lyle et al. (1985). The Foreign Impact of Lowland Mayan Languages and Script. (Middle American Research Institute, publication 53.) New Orleans: Tulane University.
• Campbell, Lyle (1985). The Pipil language of El Salvador. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
• Campbell, Lyle (1988). The Linguistics of Southeast Chiapas. (Papers of the New World Archaeological Foundation, 51.) Provo, Utah.
• Campbell, Lyle & E. Migliazza (1988). Panorama General de las Lenguas Indígenas en las Amerícas. Historia General de América, tomo 10. Instituto Panamericano de Geografía e Historia. Caracas, Venezuela.
• Campbell, Lyle & Harris, Alice C. (1995). Historical syntax in cross-linguistic perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Winner of the Leonard Bloomfield Book Award, 1998.]
• Campbell, Lyle; Mistry, P. J. & Hill, Jane (Eds.) (1997). The Life of Language: Papers in Linguistics in Honor of William Bright. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
• Campbell, Lyle (1997). American Indian languages: the historical linguistics of Native America. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-509427-1. [Winner of the Linguistic Society of America’s “Leonard Bloomfield Book Award,” 2000, for the best book in linguistics for the previous two years. Named 1998 Outstanding Academic Book by Choice.]
• Campbell, Lyle (1998). Historical Linguistics: an Introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
• Campbell, Lyle (1999). Historical Linguistics: an Introduction. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. (American rights edition of 1998 Edinburgh University Press book.)
• Campbell, Lyle (Eds.) (2003). Grammaticalization: a critical assessment. (Special issue of Language Sciences, vol. 23, numbers 2-3.)
• Campbell, Lyle et al. (2004). New Zealand English: its Origins and Evolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Campbell, Lyle (2004). Historical Linguistics: an Introduction (2nd edition). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, and Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

• Lyle Campbell's home page