In 1930, Frederic graduated from Oberlin College with a Bachelor of Arts degree. Then, Cassidy continued his studies at the same college and earned his Master of Arts degree in 1932.
Gallery of Frederic Cassidy
500 S State St, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, United States
In 1938, Frederic got a Doctor of Philosophy degree from the University of Michigan.
Career
Gallery of Frederic Cassidy
1965
Madison, Wisconsin, United States
"Dictionary of American Regional English" chief editor Frederic G. Cassidy (right) with fieldworkers Reino Maki (left) and Ben Crane in front of a "Word Wagon" in Madison, Wisconsin, 1965. Photo courtesy of the University of Wisconsin–Madison Archives.
"Dictionary of American Regional English" chief editor Frederic G. Cassidy (right) with fieldworkers Reino Maki (left) and Ben Crane in front of a "Word Wagon" in Madison, Wisconsin, 1965. Photo courtesy of the University of Wisconsin–Madison Archives.
In 1930, Frederic graduated from Oberlin College with a Bachelor of Arts degree. Then, Cassidy continued his studies at the same college and earned his Master of Arts degree in 1932.
Jamaica Talk: Three Hundred Years of the English Language in Jamaica
(First published in 1961, "Jamaica Talk" is a thorough stu...)
First published in 1961, "Jamaica Talk" is a thorough study of the English, spoken in Jamaica, and, although intended for the general educated reader rather than the linguistic specialist, has a foundation of sound scholarship.
Dictionary of American Regional English: Volume I: Introduction and A-C
(How do Americans really talk ― what are their hometown, e...)
How do Americans really talk ― what are their hometown, everyday expressions in the many regions and sections of this huge country? The "Dictionary of American Regional English", twenty years in preparation, answers these questions. It gives visible proof of the diversity ― and the vitality ― of American folk language, past and present.
Dictionary of American Regional English: Volume III: I-O
(Dip into the "Dictionary of American Regional English: Vo...)
Dip into the "Dictionary of American Regional English: Volume III: I-O" and enter the rich, endlessly entertaining, ever-changing world of American speech. Learn what a Minnesota grandma is making, when she fixes lefse, what a counterman in a Buffalo deli means by kimmelweck or a Hawaiian baker puts into a malassada.
Frederic Gomes Cassidy was a Jamaican-born American linguist, educator, lexicographer and author. He devoted his life to uncovering and writing about the nuances and mysteries of English word usage. However, he was mostly known as a founder of the Dictionary of American Regional English, of which he was also a chief editor. Moreover, Frederic was an advocate for the Jamaican language and a pioneer of autonomous orthographies for creole languages.
Background
Ethnicity:
Frederic's father was a Canadian and his mother was a Jamaican.
Frederic Gomes Cassidy was born on October 10, 1907, in Kingston, Jamaica. He was a son of Walter C. Cassidy and Camilla (Gomes-Casseres) Cassidy.
Education
Frederic attended a high school in Akron, Ohio, where he had settled down with his family in 1918. In 1930, he graduated from Oberlin College with a Bachelor of Arts degree. Then, Cassidy continued his studies at the same college and earned his Master of Arts degree in 1932. Later, in 1938, Frederic got a Doctor of Philosophy degree from the University of Michigan.
During his lifetime, Cassidy received many honorary Doctor of Literature degrees from different educational establishments, including Memorial University of Newfoundland (1982), Indiana State University (1983), University of Würzburg (1984), University of Michigan (1986) and others.
From 1930 to 1939, Cassidy was part of the editorial staff of the "Early Modern English Dictionary". During the 1930's and 1940's, he served as a field worker for the "Linguistic Atlas of the United States and Canada".
In 1939, Frederic began working as a teacher of English language and Literature at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He taught linguistics, history of the English language and archaic literary classics like ''The Canterbury Tales'' and ''Beowulf''. From 1939 till his retirement in 1978 from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Cassidy moved rapidly through the ranks of an instructor, assistant professor and associate professor and was finally made a full professor in 1950, a post he held till his retirement.
Despite his work as an educator, Frederic's passion, however, resided in the spoken word, and he spent most of his career researching and writing books, such as his 1947's "Place Names of Dane County, Wisconsin". Frederic also collaborated with Albert H. Marckwardt to produce the second edition of the "Scribner Handbook of English", which was published in 1954. His "Jamaica Talk" was published in 1961.
From 1965 until his death in 2000, Cassidy served as a director of the Dictionary of American Regional English project, of which he was also a chief editor from 1962. This is a multi-volume work, intended to document the use of words unique to regions across the United States.
During his career, Cassidy also pioneered an orthography, initially proposed in 1961 and known as the Cassidy System, developed specifically for Jamaican, that uses a phonemic system, that closely reproduces the sound of the language. The system was later adopted and modified by the Jamaican Language Unit (JLU) at the University of the West Indies.
Frederic was a member of the American Dialect Society (of which he also was a president), Society for Caribbean Linguistics and American Name Society. Between 1972 and 1976, he was a president of the Society for Caribbean Linguistics and held the same post at the American Name Society in 1980.
American Name Society
,
United States
1980
Society for Caribbean Linguistics
1972 - 1976
Personality
One of Cassidy's favorite words was jerk, a word with a long history and many meanings. He devoted three pages of his dictionary to it.
Connections
Frederic married Hélène Lucile (Monod) Cassidy on December 26, 1931. Their marriage produced four children - Frederic Monod, Victor Monod, Claire Monod and Michael Monod. Hélène died in 1980.