Neilson Voyne Smith

Neil was born in Chichester in 1939. He studied Modern and Medieval Languages at Trinity College, Cambridge, going on to do a PhD in linguistics at UCL, undertaking fieldwork-based research on the Nigerian language, Nupe.

From 1964 to 1970, Neil served as Lecturer in West African Languages at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS). While there he secured a Harkness Fellowship that allowed him to spend time at MIT and UCLA. Greatly impressed by the work of Noam Chomsky, his research focus shifted from West African languages to theoretical linguistics.

Neil returned briefly to SOAS and then moved to UCL, where he led the Linguistics section from1972 until his retirement in 2006. He was instrumental in introducing single honours MA and BA courses, building up an internationally renowned department with the theoretical orientation to which he was now committed and nurturing the new field of cognitively grounded pragmatics, spearheaded by his colleague Deirdre Wilson.

Neil made original contributions across the discipline. Notable works include The Acquisition of Phonology (1973) and Acquiring Phonology (2010), diary studies focused on the phonological development of his elder son and elder grandson respectively; a series of papers with Annabel Cormack exploring the correct division of labour between syntax, semantics and pragmatics in explaining modals, negation, coordination and other topics; and two books, The Mind of a Savant (co-authored with Ianthi-Maria Tsimpli, 1995) and The Signs of a Savant (co-authored with Ianthi-Maria Tsimpli, Bencie Woll and Gary Morgan, 2010) investigating the linguistic capabilities of a polyglot savant, Christopher, providing evidence for the domain specificity of language.

Neil felt a strong commitment to promoting the field of linguistics to the general public. Relevant works include Modern Linguistics: The Results of Chomsky’s Revolution (co-authored with Deirdre Wilson, 1979), The Twitter Machine: Reflections on Language (1991), Chomsky: Ideas and Ideals (1999, with a second edition in 2004 and a third, extended edition co-authored with Nicholas Allott in 2016), Language, Bananas and Bonobos (2002) and Language, Frogs and Savants (2005).

Neil took huge pride in the success of his students. He was the primary supervisor of over 35 PhD dissertations and a mentor for numerous postdoctoral researchers.

Neil was a critical figure in the development of the discipline at a national level, serving as President of the Linguistics Association of Great Britain, President of the Association of Heads and Professors of Linguistics, a member of the Council of The Philological Society, a member of the Linguistics panels of the Economic and Social Research Council and the Social Science Research Council and a member of the Leverhulme Advisory Panel. In 1999 he was elected a Fellow of the British Academy, where, with his wife Saras, he endowed the Neil and Saras Smith Medal for Linguistics, the first international prize recognising lifetime achievement in the discipline. In 2000, he was elected an honorary member of the LSA.

Neil is survived by his two sons, Amahl and Ivan, and two grandsons, Zak and Josh.