28 Facts About Manuel Alvar

Manuel Alvar was a Spanish linguist, historian, and university professor who specialized in the study of dialectology and philology of the Spanish language.

Manuel Alvar served as Director of the Real Academia Espanola for four years and was a member of language academies throughout Europe and Latin America.

Manuel Alvar was born on July 8,1923, in Benicarlo, Castellon de la Plana, Spain.

Manuel Alvar began his studies at the Universidad de Zaragoza, where he was a student of Jose Manuel Blecua, a renowned Spanish philologist.

Manuel Alvar transferred to the Universidad de Salamanca and graduated from there in 1945 with the highest honors, with a degree in Philosophy and Spanish Literature.

Just three years later, Manuel Alvar received his doctorate from the Universidad de Madrid.

Manuel Alvar's primary teaching position was at the Universidad Autonoma de Madrid.

Manuel Alvar lost his battle to lung cancer in August 2001, at the age of 78.

Manuel Alvar is buried in Chinchon, a small town southeast of Madrid.

Manuel Alvar's research provides sociohistorical context of Spanish dialect diversification, outlined in his Manual de dialectologia hispanica.

Manuel Alvar's studies cover Spanish dialect variants in his native country, as well as Spanish dialects in the United States, South and Central America.

Manuel Alvar used a similar method to elicit data from people living in the Canary Islands and published a linguistic atlas of this dialect in 1975.

Manuel Alvar has been criticized for using overly traditional field methods in his dialectology studies, for example focusing on forms in isolation rather than in context, or leaving out morphosyntactic variables.

Manuel Alvar began his teaching career in 1947 at the University of Salamanca as an adjunct professor.

Manuel Alvar taught at the Autonomous University of Madrid and Universidad Complutense, securing chair positions at both universities in 1968 and 1971, respectively.

In 1966, Manuel Alvar developed an advanced Spanish philology course at the Spanish National Research Council, leading it until 1997.

Manuel Alvar served as a visiting professor at universities in his native Spain as well as many foreign universities, and was nominated for awards at several universities in North and South America, as well as Europe.

Manuel Alvar served as a member of several prestigious language academies.

Manuel Alvar served as Director of the Real Academia Espanola from 1988 until 1991.

Manuel Alvar was a member of several historical and cultural academies, including the Real Academia de la Historia, appointed to serve as director in 1999.

Manuel Alvar was the principal investigator along with the University of Wisconsin in developing the Spanish Medieval Dictionary in 1978.

In dialectology Manuel Alvar wrote, directed, or coordinated the development of many linguistic atlases and Spanish-language research published in Spain and Latin America during the second half of the 20th century, including the Atlas Linguistico y Etnografico de Andalucia, the Atlas Linguistico de Espana y Portugal, the Atlas Linguistico de Castilla y Leon, and the Linguistic and Ethnographical Atlas of Argentina.

Manuel Alvar served as a member of the Executive Committee of the Atlas Linguarum Europae in Holland in 1971, a linguistic atlas supported by UNESCO which includes Altaic languages, Basque, Indo-European languages, Ibero-Caucasian languages, Semitic languages and Uralic languages.

Manuel Alvar has been criticized by his contemporaries for an overly nationalistic and colonialist viewpoint on the Spanish language.

Manuel Alvar received many prestigious awards during his life, and after his death has been honored with awards given in his name.

Manuel Alvar lectured throughout the world, and received numerous degrees honoris causa.

Manuel Alvar won the coveted Premio Nacional de Literatura in 1976 for his work in sociolinguistics and linguistic geography, and presided over the Fifth International Congress of Linguistic Studies in the Mediterranean.

Manuel Alvar published works in more than 170 books and 600 scientific articles throughout his lifetime, below are listed some of his most-cited works.