Edith Skinner
{{Short description|Canadian vocal coach (1902–1981)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2017}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Edith Skinner
| birth_name = Edith Warman
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1902|09|22}}
| birth_place = Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada
| death_date = {{Death date and age|1981|07|25|1902|09|22}}
| death_place = Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.
| nationality = Canadian
| occupation = Vocal coach, consultant
| known_for = Speak with Distinction
| education = Leland Powers School for the Spoken Word
| alma_mater = Columbia University (BA, MA)
| employer = Carnegie Mellon University (1937–1974)
| notable_works = Speak with Distinction (1942)
}}
Edith Skinner (née Warman; 22 September 1902 – 25 July 1981) was a Canadian-born vocal coach and a consultant to actors. Her book, Speak With Distinction, has been reprinted several times,{{Cite news| url= https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/08/the-rise-and-fall-of-katharine-hepburns-fake-accent/278505/ |title=The Rise and Fall of Katharine Hepburn's Fake Accent |last= Taylor|first= Trey|date= 8 August 2013 | newspaper= The Atlantic |access-date=18 January 2017}} promoting actors' use of what she called "Good American Speech".
Life
Skinner was born in Moncton, New Brunswick, in eastern Canada, on 22 September 1902, to Herbert Havelock Warman and his wife Agnes Lynn, née Orr. She attended the Leland Powers School for the Spoken Word in Boston, Massachusetts, in the United States, and graduated in 1923. There she met Margaret Prendergast McLean, and through her, William Tilly, whose assistant she became in 1926.{{Cite web|url=http://socialarchive.iath.virginia.edu/ark:/99166/w60p237v|title=Skinner, Edith |publisher= Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities| access-date=18 January 2017}} She studied at Columbia University, where she obtained a bachelor's degree in 1930 and a master's in 1931.{{r|pitt2}}
From 1937 to 1974, Skinner was on the faculty of the Carnegie Institute of Technology (later Carnegie-Mellon University) in Pittsburgh.{{r|iath|nyt}} She also taught at the Juilliard Theater Center in New York, the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco, and at the University of Wisconsin.{{Cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/28/obituaries/edith-skinner.html| title=Edith Skinner|last= [s.n.]|date=28 July 1981| newspaper= The New York Times| access-date=18 January 2017}}
She died in Milwaukee on 25 July 1981.
Writings
Skinner wrote Speak with Distinction: Exercises, which was published in 1942 and has been reprinted several times. Collections of her papers are held by the New York Public Library in New York City,{{r|nypl}} and by the University of Pittsburgh.{{r|pitt}}
References
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Category:Carnegie Mellon University faculty
Category:20th-century Canadian women writers
Category:20th-century Canadian non-fiction writers
Category:Columbia University alumni