The LSA is delighted to announce the endowment of two new awards through a major gift made by LSA Life Member Robert Vago (Queens College and The Graduate Center, CUNY). The two new awards will honor pioneering linguists Victoria Fromkin and Morris Halle:

The endowment for the Victoria Fromkin Memorial Prize for Student Excellence in Phonology will be used to defray expenses associated with participation in the LSA’s Annual Meeting. It will be awarded for outstanding scholarship in phonology by a linguistics graduate student, to be decided by a subcommittee of LSA phonologists convened for this purpose.

The endowment for the Morris Halle Memorial Award for Faculty Excellence in Phonology will be used to defray expenses associated with participation in the LSA’s Annual Meeting. It will be awarded for outstanding scholarship in phonology by an early career faculty member in linguistics, to be decided by a subcommittee of LSA phonologists convened for this purpose. Early career = <10 years from earning PhD.

Both awards are intended to honor Fromkin's and Halle's respective roles as mentors for phonology students and faculty at UCLA and MIT.  The awards are endowed with much gratitude by Dr. Vago, who earned his undergraduate degree at UCLA (1970) and his PhD at Harvard (1974).

The first awards will be made in 2022.