David E. Johnson is an American linguist

Linguistics

Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....

. He is the co-inventor of arc pair grammar

Arc pair grammar

In linguistics, Arc Pair grammar is a syntactic theory developed by David E. Johnson and Paul Postal which is a formalized continuation of relational grammar developed by David M. Perlmutter and Paul M...

.

Work

Johnson is best known for his work on relational grammar

Relational grammar

In linguistics, Relational Grammar is a syntactic theory which argues that primitive grammatical relations provide the ideal means to state syntactic rules in universal terms. Relational grammar began as an alternative to transformational grammar....

, especially the development with Paul Postal

Paul Postal

Paul Martin Postal is an American linguist and member of the faculty of New York University.Postal received his PhD from Yale University in 1963 and taught at MIT until 1965. That year, he moved to the City University of New York...

 in 1977 of arc pair grammar

Arc pair grammar

In linguistics, Arc Pair grammar is a syntactic theory developed by David E. Johnson and Paul Postal which is a formalized continuation of relational grammar developed by David M. Perlmutter and Paul M...

.

In the late 1990s, Johnson and Shalom Lappin published the first detailed critiques of Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky

Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and Professor in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at MIT, where he has worked for over 50 years. Chomsky has been described as the "father of modern linguistics" and...

's Minimalist program

Minimalist program

In linguistics, the Minimalist Program is a major line of inquiry that has been developing inside generative grammar since the early nineties. It started with a 1993 paper by Noam Chomsky....

. This work was followed by a lively debate with proponents of minimalism on the scientific status of the program

Johnson has an Erdős number

Erdos number

The Erdős number describes the "collaborative distance" between a person and mathematician Paul Erdős, as measured by authorship of mathematical papers.The same principle has been proposed for other eminent persons in other fields.- Overview :...

of 4.

Sources

• Johnson, David E. (1974/1979). Toward a Theory of Relationally-based Grammar. Outstanding Dissertations in Linguistics Series, ed. Jorge Hankamer. NY: Garland Publishing, Inc. ISBN 978-0824096823
• Newmeyer, Frederick (1980). Linguistics in America. New York: Academic Press. ISBN 978-9027712905