Orrin "Rob" Robinson

I returned to the Farm after getting my Ph.D. in 1972 and teaching in the Berkeley German department for a year. I have conducted research in a number of different areas in general and also in Germanic linguistics, with works on theoretical phonology (the formal structure of sound systems), the history and dialectology of various of the Germanic languages, and Old High German syntax. In addition, more recent interests include the question of exactly what data count as data when one is describing the language known as Modern "Standard" German, and, farther afield, those linguistic aspects of the Grimms' fairy tales which aided in the establishment of what was arguably a new genre. Among my publications are the books Old English and Its Closest Relatives (Stanford University Press, 1992), Clause Subordination and Verb Placement in the Old High German Isidor Translation (C. Winter,1997), Whose German?: The ach/ich alternation and related phenomena in standard and colloquial (Benjamins, 2001) and Grimm Language: Grammar, Gender and Genuineness in the Fairy Tales (Benjamins, 2010).