Hermann Collitz

Hermann Collitz was a German and American historical linguist and Indo-Europeanist. He emigrated from Germany to the United States in 1886, taking a position at the newly founded Bryn Mawr College, where he stayed for 20 years. In 1907 he left for the Johns Hopkins University, where he taught until his retirement in 1927. His career interests covered the historical phonology and morphology of Indo-European languages. An advocate for American linguistics to his European colleagues, Collitz was among the 27 signers of the call to form the Linguistic Society of America, and was elected its first president. That same year he was elected president of the Modern Language Association, serving in both roles simultaneously.