Hortense Berman

Hortense Behr BERMAN: Linguist, Editor, Teacher, was born in New York City in 1911 she died August 15, 2007. Hortense earned degrees at New York University, Columbia University and the Universite de Strasbourg in eastern France. After teaching French in New York City high schools, she married Alex Berman in 1943 and followed him in his Army Air Force service during World War II until his release in 1946. Several years followed at universities in Madison, Ann Arbor and Austin, Texas where Professor Alex Berman taught until he was appointed to the University of Cincinnati in 1968. A year spent in Lausanne, Switzerland, when Professor Berman was a Guggenheim Fellow, was one of several stays in Europe. Mrs. Berman was exposed to foreign languages in early childhood since her Alsatian parents spoke their native French and German in the home. She went on to major in languages in college, specializing in the Romance languages of Western Europe, based on a strong foundation in Latin. She particularly enjoyed her freelance work editing scholarly books and articles.