Yaron Matras
{{short description|British linguist (born 1963)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=August 2019}}
Yaron Matras (born 24 October 1963) is a linguist at the University of Manchester specializing in Romani, Kurdish, and other languages of the Middle East. He is one of the most prominent English-language Romani linguists and the author of several pioneering studies, including a book on Romani: A Linguistic Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 2002) and on Romani in Britain: The afterlife of a language (Edinburgh University Press, 2010), and A Grammar of Domari (De Gruyter Mouton, 2012). Matras organized the First International Conference on Romani Linguistics in 1993, and has served as Editor of the cross-disciplinary journal Romani Studies since 1999. He has coordinated the Romani Project at the University of Manchester since 1999,{{Cite web |title=ROMANI Project - Manchester |url=http://romani.humanities.manchester.ac.uk/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230506062108/https://romani.humanities.manchester.ac.uk/ |archive-date=6 May 2023 |access-date=2025-04-02 |website=romani.humanities.manchester.ac.uk |url-status=dead }} and in 2010 he launched the Multilingual Manchester project.{{Cite web |title=Multilingual Manchester |url=http://mlm.humanities.manchester.ac.uk/ |access-date=2025-04-02 |website=Multilingual Manchester |language=en-GB}} His publications include a book on Language Contact (Cambridge University Press, 2009) and a co-edited trilogy on Mixed Languages, Linguistic Areas, and Grammatical Borrowing.{{Cite web |title=Yaron Matras |url=https://londonantisemitism.com/team/yaron-matras/ |access-date=2025-04-02 |website=London Centre for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism |language=en-GB}}
In 2012 Yaron Matras was awarded the Senior Fellowship of the Zukunftskolleg at the University of Konstanz.{{cite web | title=University of Konstanz | website=Zukunftskolleg | date=2021-02-25 | url=https://www.zukunftskolleg.uni-konstanz.de/people/personen-details/matras-yaron-1304/6338/13775/ | access-date=2021-04-23}}
Notable works
Matras wrote I Met Lucky People: The Story of the Romani Gypsies, published in 2014. The book gives an overview of Romani history and culture aimed at a general readership.{{Cite journal |last=Friedman |first=Victor A |date=2015-09-29 |title=I Met Lucky People: The Story of the Romani Gypsies. By Yaron Matras. London: Allen Lane, Penguin Books, 2014, 276 pp.; ISBN 978-1-846-14481-3. |url=https://www.cogitatiopress.com/socialinclusion/article/view/302 |journal=Social Inclusion |volume=3 |issue=5 |pages=161–166 |doi=10.17645/si.v3i5.302 |doi-access=free |issn=2183-2803}}{{Cite journal |last=Rosenhaft |first=Eve |date=2015 |title=I met lucky people: The story of the Romani Gypsies by Yaron Matras, and: The Romani Gypsies by Yaron Matras (review) |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/604280 |journal=Romani Studies |volume=25 |issue=2 |pages=220–224 |issn=1757-2274}} Writing in The Observer, journalist Peter Stanford wrote that "Matras's immaculately researched, warm and comprehensive study is a challenge belatedly to make a start [of understanding the Romani]."{{Cite news |last=Stanford |first=Peter |date=2014-02-23 |title=I Met Lucky People: The Story of the Romani Gypsies by Yaron Matras – review |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/feb/23/i-met-lucky-people-yaron-matras-review |access-date=2024-10-21 |work=The Observer |language=en-GB |issn=0029-7712}} Linguist Victor Friedman praised the book for its scholarship while being able to be read by both an academic and general audience, also writing that the book "...fills an important gap in the literature on the Romani people." Historian Eve Rosenhaft complimented the book's "lively style, colourful anecdote and measured and conscientious approach to presenting and assessing evidence" and recommended it to "both scholarly and popular readerships, and this is important because it is meant to find a wide audience and deserves to do so."
In 2015, The Romani Gypsies was published by Harvard University Press. The book contains the same text as I Met Lucky People but with an expanded bibliography, footnotes, revised index, and additional text on Romani identity.
Bibliography
- Romani: A Linguistic Introduction. Cambridge University Press, 2002. {{ISBN|9781139433242}}.
- Romani in Britain: The Afterlife of a Language. Edinburgh University Press, 2010. {{ISBN|9780748643691}}.
- A Grammar of Domari. Walter de Gruyter, 2012. {{ISBN|9783110291421}}.
- I Met Lucky People: The Story of the Romani Gypsies. Penguin Books, 2014. {{ISBN|9780241954706}}.
- The Romani Gypsies. Harvard University Press, 2015. {{ISBN|9780674368385}}.
- Language Contact. Cambridge University Press, second edition. 2020. {{ISBN|9781108425117}}.
References
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External links
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20221005150120/https://www.research.manchester.ac.uk/portal/en/researchers/yaron-matras(c951a0f4-1162-414c-a7ee-5d5f9fd605b1).html Bio. from The University of Manchester.]
- [https://yaronmatras.org/ Yaron Matras' personal website]
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Category:Romani studies scholars
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