John Baugh

John Baugh is an American linguist best known for his research on African American English and his pioneering work on linguistic profiling. His studies have demonstrated how speech patterns can trigger discrimination in housing and employment contexts.

Linguistic profiling, a concept extensively researched by John Baugh, refers to the practice of making discriminatory judgments about individuals based on their speech patterns. Baugh's work has shown how housing discrimination can occur over the telephone when callers are identified by racial or ethnic markers in their voice.

John Baugh has held faculty positions at institutions including Stanford University and Washington University in St. Louis. His academic career has centered on the study of African American English and the social consequences of linguistic profiling.

John Baugh conducted experiments in which he made telephone inquiries about housing using different speech styles associated with different racial or ethnic groups. His findings demonstrated that callers could be denied housing opportunities based solely on the sound of their voice, a phenomenon he documented as linguistic profiling.