Elin McCready
Born1973 or 1974 (age 49–50)[1]
NationalityAmerican
Academic background
Alma materUniversity of Texas at Austin
Doctoral advisorNicholas Asher
Academic work
DisciplineLinguistics
Sub-disciplineSemantics, Pragmatics
WebsitePersonal website

Elin McCready is an American linguist and professor in the Department of English Language and Literature at Aoyama Gakuin University. She researches semantics, pragmatics, and philosophy of language, focusing in particular on such phenomena as evidentials, honorifics, and slurs. She is also co-director of Aoyama Gakuin University's Singularity Research Institute.[2][3]

Academic career

McCready earned a PhD at the University of Texas-Austin in 2005, with a dissertation entitled, "The dynamics of particles."[4]

McCready has written widely cited articles published in prestigious journals including Natural Language and Linguistic Theory, Linguistic Inquiry, Linguistics and Philosophy, Semantics and Pragmatics, and Journal of Cognitive Science.[5] She has written two books, Reliability in Pragmatics, and The Semantics and Pragmatics of Honorification: Register and Social Meaning, and has (co-)edited numerous volumes, including Formal Approaches to Semantics and Pragmatics: Japanese and Beyond.

In 2021, she received a Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in Germany, which supports researchers who "are expected to produce cutting-edge activities."[6]

Gender recognition in Japan

McCready is a trans woman.[7] After transitioning in the US, McCready filed to update her permanent residence card in Japan, where she lives with her wife and three children. The Japanese government refused to recognize her transition, as doing so would require them to effectively recognize same-sex marriage (which Japan currently does not) or to unilaterally annul the couple's marriage.[7][8] As a result, McCready and her wife have filed suit against the Japanese government.[1][9] A documentary, It's Just Our Family, has been produced about the couple's struggles with this treatment.[10]

In 2019 McCready organised a trans inclusive club night, called WAIFU, after being refused entry to an existing women's club night.[11]

Selected publications

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Osumi, Magdalena (21 June 2021). "Couple sues Japanese government for not recognizing gender transition". The Japan Times. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
  2. ^ The Semantics and Pragmatics of Honorification: Register and Social Meaning: About the Author. Oxford Studies in Semantics and Pragmatics. Oxford University Press. 22 October 2019. ISBN 978-0-19-882137-3.
  3. ^ "研究所概要 | Aoyama Gakuin University Singularity Institute". agusi.iro.aoyama.ac.jp. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
  4. ^ a b McCready, E. (2005). The dynamics of particles (Thesis thesis).
  5. ^ "Elin McCready". scholar.google.com.
  6. ^ "Professor Elin McCready (College of Literature, Department of English) received the Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award (Alexander von Humboldt Stiftung/Foundation, Germany). | Aoyama Gakuin University" (in Japanese). Retrieved 2022-03-13.
  7. ^ a b "After gender change, a bureaucratic brick wall in Japan". France 24. 19 February 2019. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
  8. ^ "Why Won't Japan Allow This Trans Woman's Marriage? Metropolis Japan". Metropolis Japan. 18 June 2021. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
  9. ^ "Transgender American and her wife sue over gender registry | The Asahi Shimbun: Breaking News, Japan News and Analysis". The Asahi Shimbun. Retrieved 2022-03-13.
  10. ^ "Event Report: Evolving Love". WomEnpowered International. 18 March 2021. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
  11. ^ "Trans woman refused entry to Tokyo's biggest women-only night". May 31, 2019.
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