A student of Edward Sapir at the Univerity of Chicago, the linguist Fanggui (Fang-Kuei) Li was a pioneer in studying the Canadian and Pacific Coast Athapascan languages. After completing a Master's thesis on the Sarcee verb-stem in 1927, Li was advised by Sapir to continue on to other Athapascan languages, and with funding provided in part by the American Council of Learned Societies Committee on Native American Languages, he spent the summer of 1927 getting an introduction to field research by working under Sapir on the Hupa reservation in California. Much of Li's effort that summer was spent on the language of the coastal Mattole, which had received virtually no previous attention, and to a lesser degree on Wailaki.
In the following year, Li arranged for two months of fieldwork at Fort Chipewyan, Alberta, where he studied the Chipewyan language with François Mandeville, a "half-breed from Fort Resolution." Arriving on June 28, 1928, Li worked intensively with Mandeville, whom he considered "very intelligent," although his dialect differed from that recorded by Père LeGoff in his Grammaire de la Langue Montagnaise (Montreal, 1889). Li had selected Chipewyan on the belief that it contained more "archaic features" than other Athapascan languages, and believed that it would therefore provide insight into the linguistic evolution of the family. During this field trip, he also collected material on Hare at Fort Smith and some Slavey. Later in his career, he did important work on determining the relationships between Eyak and other Athapascan languages.
Although Li retained an interest in Athapascan languages, by 1937 he became almost completely absorbed in classifying the major languages and dialects of China, the work for which he is best remembered. Li reconginized seven major branches, Mandarin (or Northern), Wu, Xiang, Gan, Kejia (or Hakka), Yue (or Cantonese), and Min.
Associated with the Institute of History and Philology from the 1920s on, Li held appointments in the Departments of Linguistics and Anthropology at the University of Washington until the 1970s, moving to the University of Hawaii.
From the guide to the Fanggui Li Collection, 1928-1982, (American Philosophical Society)
