The New York Times Magazine has named a successor to the late language columnist William Safire.

Benjamin Zimmer will take over from the controversial "language maven," who died in 2009 after 30 years writing the On Language column.

Zimmer is Executive Producer of VisualThesaurus.com and Vocabulary.com, and a consultant for the Oxford English Dictionary.

Safire, a political speechwriter and journalist, founded On Language in 1979, and became known for his controversial – and often pedantic – pronouncements on the correct use of English.

He was frequently criticized by academics for his prescriptive approach to language. Nevertheless, Zimmer wrote on his passing that "despite his occasional prescriptivist predilections, [he] showed a willingness to heed the work of descriptive linguists."

Zimmer, who was already a guest contributor to the column under his friend Safire, will take over as of Sunday, March 21.

"It's an honor and a privilege to be welcomed in the space that William Safire called home for thirty years," Zimmer said. "I look forward to continuing this fine tradition with my own take on how language shapes our past, present and future."

Gerald Marzorati, Editor of New York Times Magazine, said that "Ben brings both an academic's deep knowledge and a maven's eye, ear and passion to his commentary on the way Americans write and speak now. We welcome him to our roster and know our readers and ‘On Language' devotees will greatly enjoy his columns."

The column will appear bi-weekly. Benjamin Zimmer is also a regular contributor to Language Log, one of the world's leading linguistic websites.

14 March 2010