Salem Chaker is an Algerian Berberologist. He's a specialist in Berber linguistics. He is recognized as the "dean" of modern Berber studies.
Biography
Salem Chaker was born in 1950 in Nevers, France. In a family from Ait Iraten tribe of Kabylia. He studied at the University of Provence, then in Paris Descartes University where he received his Doctorat de troisième cycle in 1973 and a Doctorat d'Etat in 1978. After an early career in the Faculty of Letters of Algiers and CRAPE from 1973 to 1981, he joins University of Provence serving as an associate professor of Berber Language from 1981 to 1983, and CNRS from 1984 to 1989 where he continued his research activities in the laboratory LAPMO founded and directed by Gabriel Camps. From 1989 to 2008, he worked as a Berber Language Professor at Institut national des langues et civilisations orientales in Paris, where he created in 1990 Centre de Recherche Berbère he directed until the end of 2009. He is currently Professor of Berber language at the Aix-Marseille University where he is also a research associate at Iremam.
His involvement in the Encyclopédie berbère dates back to the launching phase of the project by Gabriel Camps in 1970, when he was still a student at the University of Provence. The founding team comprising only pre-historians and ethnologists, Gabriel asked him to invest in the linguistic field. Thus appeared his first contribution to the Encyclopedie, in Fascicle 1, dated 1970, of the provisional edition with restricted diffusion. It was also his first scientific text, while he was still studying linguistics. He started publishing regularly entries in the provisional edition, then in the final edition from 1984. At the launch of the final edition, he officially became a scientific advisor for linguistics. When Camps retired in 1992, he asked him to ensure the succession of the Encyclopédie berbère in case of default. Salem Chaker has been in charge of the Encyclopédie since the death of G. Camps in September 2002.
