Raised in Indiana. Identifies as a Hoosier. Became fascinated with translation in the mid-1960s, while on study abroad in St Brieuc, France. In 1978, after obtaining a PhD in computational linguistics, experienced an intellectual crisis regarding the nature of language, concluding that unambiguous general language would be the ultimate prison, but domain-specific language can and should be unambiguous. In 1979, shifted focus toward tools for human translators. In the 1980s, became an ATA-certified French-to-English translator. In the 1990s, got into philosophy of language and wrote a book about human and machine translation (The possibility of Language) with a philosopher, Terry Warner. In the 21st century, has focused on service to the translation profession, previously serving on the governing boards of ATA (www.antanet.org), then FIT (www.fit-ift.org), and currently (2025) serving as president of LTAC Global, a small non-profit, chair of the FIT North America regional center, and chair of the FIT Standards Committee. In 2014, retired from full-time teaching and became an emeritus full professor. Since 2015, standards work has included translation process and quality evaluation, terminology archiving and exchange, and, more recently, labels on translation output, under ASTM International (www.astm.org) and ISO (www.iso.org).
