University of California, Santa Barbara. Photo: Coolcaesar, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:UCSB_University_Center_and_Storke_Tower.jpg)
Gallery of Steven Fischer
California State University, Long Beach. Photo: Alan Ray, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Carpenter_Performing_Arts_Center_(Long_Beach,_California,_March_2008).jpg)
Gallery of Steven Fischer
University of California, Los Angeles. Photo: CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Royce_Hall,_University_of_California,_Los_Angeles_(23-09-2003).jpg)
Career
Gallery of Steven Fischer
University of Canterbury. Photo: Photograph by Greg O'Beirne, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:UC_CentralLibrary01_gobeirne.jpg)
University of California, Santa Barbara. Photo: Coolcaesar, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:UCSB_University_Center_and_Storke_Tower.jpg)
California State University, Long Beach. Photo: Alan Ray, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Carpenter_Performing_Arts_Center_(Long_Beach,_California,_March_2008).jpg)
University of California, Los Angeles. Photo: CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Royce_Hall,_University_of_California,_Los_Angeles_(23-09-2003).jpg)
University of Canterbury. Photo: Photograph by Greg O'Beirne, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:UC_CentralLibrary01_gobeirne.jpg)
Steven Roger Fischer is a New Zealand linguist, philologist, historian, and author known for research on Polynesian languages, Easter Island’s rongorongo script, writing, reading, and the history of language. He directed Auckland’s Institute of Polynesian Languages and Literatures from 1995 to 2015 and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand in 2010.
Background
Steven Roger Fischer was born on September 8, 1947, in Los Angeles, California, to Dick Marvin Fischer and Wanda Noreen Graham Fischer. His childhood included periods in California, Washington, and Okinawa, reflected in his attendance at Kentwood, Custer, Kadena, Meadowpark, and South High School.
His early education took place across several communities connected with American military and civilian life in the Pacific and on the West Coast. He later developed a professional identity centered on languages, writing systems, philology, and the history of reading.
Education
Fischer attended elementary schools in Westchester and Lakewood, California, Kadena in Okinawa, Meadowpark in Torrance, and South High School in Torrance. South High School, established in 1957, served the rapidly expanding South Bay communities of Los Angeles County during the postwar period.
He studied at the University of California, Santa Barbara, California State University at Long Beach, and the University of Heidelberg in Germany before completing doctoral work at the University of California, Los Angeles. UCLA was a major American research university whose humanities and language studies developed within the large public-university system of postwar California; Heidelberg, founded in 1386, represented one of Europe's oldest traditions of scholarly philology and historical language study.
Fischer began his academic career as a teaching associate at the University of California, Los Angeles, from 1970 to 1973 while completing his doctoral studies. He then joined the University of Canterbury as a postdoctoral fellow from 1975 to 1976 and as a tutor and lecturer from 1976 to 1979. The University of Canterbury, founded in 1873, was New Zealand's first university and had an established tradition in humanities, languages, and Pacific-focused scholarship.
From 1980 to 1995 Fischer worked as a researcher and writer. His research addressed historical linguistics, philology, Polynesian languages, ancient writing systems, and the intellectual history of language. He became editor of Rongorongo Studies from 1991 to 2004; the periodical provided a specialist forum for Polynesian philology and published work in several scholarly languages.
Fischer directed the Institute of Polynesian Languages and Literatures in Auckland from 1995 to 2015. The institute supported research and publication concerning Polynesian languages and literatures, placing his work within New Zealand's wider academic engagement with the Pacific. His books include studies of rongorongo, language, writing, reading, the Pacific Islands, Easter Island, medieval dreams, and the history of islands.
His research on the Phaistos Disk and Easter Island's rongorongo script made him a prominent and sometimes controversial figure in the study of undeciphered or disputed writing systems. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand in 2010 for distinction in research and advancement of knowledge. In later public and health-related activity, he served as national chairman of the New Zealand Essential Tremor Support Group.
Fischer published substantial research on the Phaistos Disk of Crete and Easter Island's rongorongo script, presenting interpretations that brought both writing systems to wider scholarly and public attention.
He developed a major body of work on the history of language, writing, and reading, connecting philology with broader cultural and intellectual history.
He founded and edited Rongorongo Studies, a specialist periodical devoted to Polynesian philology, and directed the Institute of Polynesian Languages and Literatures in Auckland from 1995 to 2015.
(A comprehensive study of Easter Island's rongorongo scrip...)
1997
Evidence for Hellenic Dialect in the Phaistos Disk
(A study presenting Fischer's argument for evidence of a H...)
1987
Religion
Fischer is Anglican. Anglicanism developed from the English Reformation and became a worldwide communion whose religious life combines Protestant theology, episcopal organization, public worship, and the Book of Common Prayer tradition.
His documented religious affiliation belongs to the broad Christian setting in which Anglican churches emphasize scripture, communal worship, sacramental practice, and ethical responsibility while accommodating diverse theological positions.
Views
Fischer's published reflections connect language, writing, reading, history, and human understanding. His statements emphasize reading as an intellectual practice, the relationship between knowledge and wisdom, kindness, and the importance of examining historical narratives critically.
His scholarly and literary work repeatedly treats writing systems and languages as records of human memory and cultural change. His broader outlook is humanistic, presenting language and history as means of studying how people preserve experience, interpret the past, and communicate across time.
Quotations:
“What music is to the spirit, reading is to the mind.”
“Writing freezes the moment, Reading is forever.”
“True power lies in kindness.”
“Humanity has no sides.”
“History is humankind’s most convenient myth.”
“Learning new words Is making new friends.”
Membership
Fischer was a fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand, a national academy that recognizes distinction in research and the advancement of science, technology, and the humanities. He was also vice-president of the Easter Island Foundation, an organization concerned with the preservation and study of Easter Island's cultural heritage, and chaired the New Zealand Essential Tremor Support Group.
These memberships connected his scholarly work on Polynesia with cultural preservation and public advocacy related to essential tremor.
Elected Fellow.
Royal Society of New Zealand
,
New Zealand
2010 - present
Vice-president.
Easter Island Foundation
,
United States
1990 - 2000
National Chairman.
New Zealand Essential Tremor Support Group
,
New Zealand
2013 - present
Interests
Painting.
Sport & Clubs
Bicycling and hiking.
Music & Bands
Classical guitar.
Connections
Fischer is the son of Dick Marvin Fischer and Wanda Noreen Graham Fischer. He married Dagmar Sieglinde Ehrke on January 24, 1969.
University of Chicago Press author page: Steven Roger Fischer
Provides an institutional author profile, identifies Fischer as former director of the Institute of Polynesian Languages and Literatures, and lists major books including A History of Language, A History of Writing, A History of Reading, and Island at the End of the World.
Rongorongo Studies: A Forum for Polynesian Philology
Documents Fischer's editorship of Rongorongo Studies, its 1991–2004 publication period, and its association with the Institute of Polynesian Languages and Literatures.
