Brief biography of reformat

Alexander Alexandrovich Reformata went down in the history of domestic linguistics, primarily as the author of the repeatedly reprinted textbook for philological universities “Introduction to Linguistics”. But he belongs to a number of other works that left a noticeable mark in the science of the language. In the memory of contemporaries, his colleagues and students, he remained as an unusually colorful and peculiar personality, as a person who made a vivid impression on his interlocutors not only with his appearance and manner of behavior, but also his speech.

Reformatsky was born on October 16 in Moscow, in the family of the famous chemistry professor A. Mother Alexander Alexandrovich, Ekaterina Adrianovna nearest Golovacheva, had a humanitarian education, taught Russian language and literature, and most likely reformatsky inherited interest and love of language. After graduating from the Historical and Philology Faculty of Moscow University, Alexander Alexandrovich goes to graduate school, where Dmitry Nikolaevich Ushakov, the future editor of the famous “Ushakovsky” explanatory dictionary, becomes its supervisor.

Scientific communication with D. Ushakov had a great influence on Reformat, and various episodes associated with this communication, Alexander Alexandrovich recalled with pleasure and gratitude many years later, when he already had dozens of students.

In years, Reformatsky works in various Moscow publishing houses, later teaches at Moscow universities - at Moscow State University, the Moscow City Pedagogical Institute, at the Literary Institute. C to gg. In the year, he was awarded without a protection procedure the degree of Doctor of Philology and awarded the title of professor. Toponymy commissions, sections of machine translation of the Council on Cybernetics and others.

To this dry list of life milestones and scientists, regalia must be added that Alexander Alexandrovich himself never strove for ranks or fame, had no high awards and did not expect honors from this world. The most important matter of his life was the service of the science of language. Reformata - one of the founders along with R. Avvanesov, P. Kuznetsov, V. Sidorov, A. Sukhotin of the Moscow phonological school.

His pen belongs to such well -known works as “from the history of domestic phonology”, “phonological sketches”, “essays on phonology, morphonology and morphology”, “linguistics and poetics”, etc. His earliest scientific works were articles on poetics: “The plot structure of L. Tolstoy”, “Experience in the analysis of the novelistic composition”. Among the works of reformatsky, the novelty of the scientific approach, the depth and originality of the thoughts expressed in them, research on phonology and phonetics, as well as on the theoretical issues of grammar, on orthoepia and spelling, toponymy and onomastics, and on the linguistic foundations of terminance studies, are especially distinguished.

The accuracy of scientific analysis in his writings is based on a comprehensive knowledge of linguistic phenomena, living speech in all its diversity. Such a breadth of professional interests of Reformed did not mean scientific scattering. He considered different problems relating to the language at the angle of a certain linguistic concept - the concept of the Moscow phonological school, whose principles and views he firmly adhered throughout his scientific activity.

This allowed him to see the system to see the system in the seemingly disparate and incomparable facts of the language, whether this system was manifested in phonetics, in morphology or in vocabulary. Consistently defending his linguistic credo, A. Reformatsky at the same time deeply respected scientific opponents, and with some of them many years of friendship connected him as, for example, with the St.

Petersburg professor L. as a scientist A. Reformed, did not allow the slightest eclecticism, and as a person was unusually wider and tolerant, and one of many attractive features of it was fulfilled in this. rich nature. He was completely immersed in science and wrote about his “love in linguistics” and even ... to the phoneme. In his works, a high level of scientific abstraction, the constructive accuracy of the analysis is organically combined with attention to language reality - to a separate word, to the sound, to the shade of sound.

The style of the scientific works of Alexander Alexandrovich, both free and strict, is remarkable. Verification, dryness of formulations - and the emotionality of comments on them; Special, often foreign, terminology - and the wealth of intonations of Russian conversational speech. He wrote about phonemes, morphemes and other scientific abstractions as living people. He could compare the special area of ​​linguistic knowledge with the department of piece goods in the store: it is, in his opinion, morphonology - although it is not alien to systematicity, its facts concern the norm more, how it is customary to speak and write in this language, and not what the language system “resolves”.

In all that he did - and in his scientific research in the first place - Reformata put his soul.And in his soul there was a place for a joke, and an unexpected comparison, and a pun, and a memory of things, seemingly very far from linguistics. By the way, the hobbies of Alexander Alexandrovich with these “distant things” - music, chess, hunting, tennis, poetry, he was a master of poetic impromptu, parodies, a friendly message and a dozen more poetic genres in the main thing of his life - in the study of the language.

Listening to the opera arias, he suddenly noticed a specific pronunciation or unusual form of the word that the reader would find such explanations in his article “Speech and music in singing”; From the theory of the chess game, he borrowed the principle of excessive protection and used it when studying the structure of written text - as the principle of excess information, an example of redundancy of this kind - a point at the end of the sentence and a capital letter at the beginning of the next; cm.

Reformed "Technical editorial office of the book"; Reflections on hunting terms helped him in understanding the linguistic essence of terminology in general his work “What is the term and terminology? Reformatsky was fluent in several foreign languages, perfectly oriented himself in theoretical concepts of various linguistic directions, schools, individual scientists, easily and with knowledge of the matter using examples from mathematics, musicology, history, philosophy and a number of other sciences.

It was not just a versatile talented, but also an encyclopedically educated, deeply intelligent person. And in all his appearance, in his character, in his attitude to life and to people there were a lot of indigenous Russian. He loved and knew well the life and customs of the Russian people, its history, proceeded and traveled to many places in Russia. Alexander Alexandrovich was a wonderful lecturer who knew how to captivate the audience with the subject of his lectures, his temperament, a living and juicy word.

In his lectures, to even more than in printed works, a scientific abstraction, a heavily term, a colloquial word, a paradoxical clash of facts, an excursion into the area far from the mental fire, permeated with the sincere passion, which did not leave the place of indifference, were harmoniously intertwined. It is especially necessary to say about the reformat’s love for the language game, to the reinvention, to the punish -shaped distortion of words, including personal names.

This is also found in scientific works, for example, objecting to the opponent, he could say that in this matter they did not disagree, but the disgrace, but the genuine elements of the verbal game was oral speech for him, conversations with students and friends, playful letters to them. In the memoirs of Reformed, such examples of his linguistic jokes are given: Maojedunia about a familiar woman named Dunya, who was carried away by the ideas of modern Chinese philosophy; Naturally, he decomposed the word into "eat, father -in -law, wine"; Nudes called nude fans of nude nature, preference turned into a screenshots, and Gakalea into a bull-alley.

In a lecture, he could use the words of Othedov and from here and not understanding the joking tone of his speech, he explained: "I am mischievous." And one more feature of the reformist as a scientist and man should be noted: he always rejoiced at everything new that appeared in science, whether it was the talented work of any of his students or a whole scientific direction. An example of this is a machine translation.

When in the middle of the x in our country the rapid development of this direction of science began, A. Reformatsky not only welcomed it, but was also among its initiators: in collaboration with P. Kuznetsov and mathematician A. Lyapunov, he wrote and published the program article “The main problems of machine translation” of linguistics. Whether Alexander Alexandrovich wrote a reformal article, whether he spoke from the department, talked with friends or simply put on his permanent cap - a bright personality, individuality and originality of his nature manifested in everything.

He lived a large, full -blooded life, and it seems that in this life everything he wanted to do, sacredly serving the scientific truth and without doing anything moral purity.