(Joan) Hazel Carter

Joan Hazel Carter (22 February 1928 – 3 August 2016) was a British-American Linguist, known in particular for her work on the Bantu languages, Shona, Kongo and Tonga.

Born on 22 February 1928 to parents Charles and Constance Wilkinson, Hazel graduated from the County Grammar School for Girls in Beckenham, Kent, England in 1947 and received a full scholarship to Oxford University, Oxford, England where she was a member of St. Hugh’s College from 1947 – 1950.

In 1952 Hazel conducted fieldwork in Shona (in present-day Zimbabwe) and in Tonga from 1957 to 1960 (in present-day Zambia). A post-graduate scholar at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London, Hazel then became a lecturer in Bantu Languages at SOAS in 1954, with a promotion to Reader in Bantu Languages (1971 – 1983). In 1971 she received her doctorate with her dissertation, “Syntactic Tone Phrases in Kongo,” published in 1973 under the title, “Syntax and Tone in Kikongo.”

After one year as a visiting professor at the Department of African Languages & Literature at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1980-1981, Hazel retired from SOAS in London and moved permanently to the United States. First an Honorary Research Fellow, then a Visiting Professor, Hazel became a Full Professor at the University of Wisconsin in 1986. She retired in June 1995 and was appointed Professor Emerita.

In 2001 she received the Distinguished Services Award from the African Language Teachers Association.

Her full obituary can be found here.