Jane J. Robinson facts for kids

Elizabeth Jane Johnson Robinson (born in 1918 – died April 22, 2015) was an American expert in computational linguistics. This field teaches computers to understand and use human language. She even became the president of the Association for Computational Linguistics, a big group for people working in this area.

Her Early Life and Education

Jane Johnson was born in 1918 near Dallas–Fort Worth, Texas. In the 1920s, she moved with her mother to Los Angeles.

In 1938, she finished her studies at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with a degree in history. That same year, she married Edward Charles Robinson, who was also studying history at UCLA. She continued her studies at UCLA with a special scholarship in history. While studying, she also started her family and had four children.

From History to Computers

Jane finished her Ph.D. in 1946. Her main project was about a person named John Lilburne and his early life. After getting her Ph.D., she found that most history jobs at universities were only for men at that time.

So, instead, she became an English teacher at UCLA and California State University, Los Angeles. In the late 1950s, her husband passed away, and Jane became the only person supporting her family. As an English teacher, she started learning about how computers could understand language. She thought this new field, called computational linguistics, could help her teach English to engineers.

Her Career in Computational Linguistics

In the 1950s, Jane began working with David G. Hays at the RAND Corporation. They focused on natural language processing, which is about making computers understand human speech and text.

Later, in the 1960s, she moved to IBM Research and the Thomas J. Watson Research Center. Then, in 1973, she joined SRI International.

Leading the Field

Jane Robinson was a very important person in her field. In 1982, she became the president of the Association for Computational Linguistics. She retired from her work in 1987.

Outside of her amazing career, Jane enjoyed reading poetry and going backpacking. She passed away on April 22, 2015.