An internationally recognized linguist, anthropologist and philosopher, Dan Everett has been hailed as “the closest thing we have to a real-life Indiana Jones.” During a distinguished career spanning nearly 50 years — the last 15 of them at Bentley, where the former Dean of Arts and Sciences (2010-2018) is a member of both the Sociology and Global Studies departments — Everett has written 18 books, published 120 scholarly articles and received nearly $6 million in grants and funding. His research has also been the sole focus of a documentary (2012’s “The Grammar of Happiness”), a play (2016’s “Don’t Sleep, There are Snakes,” staged at London’s Park Theatre) and six international conferences (including a day-long symposium hosted by MIT’s Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences in 2023.)

Everett is best known for his work with the Pirahã [pee-dah-HAN], a small community of Indigenous hunter-gatherers living deep in the Amazon rainforest jungle with whom he and his family lived for a total of 10 years. During that time, Everett became fluent in the Pirahã language, a tonal tongue notable for its lack of specific terms for colors and numbers as well as words to convey historic events that predate the speaker’s lived experiences. His analysis of Pirahã grammar revealed a lack of recursion — or “nesting” clauses and phrases within each other to create increasingly complex sentences — that challenged the influential theory of universal grammar advanced by Noam Chomsky.  

Everett’s colleagues commend his commitment to scholarship. “Dan is a scholar at his core; he is driven to discover and to write,” says Jeff Moriarty, Philosophy professor and executive director of Bentley’s Hoffman Center for Business Ethics, who characterizes Everett as “one of Bentley’s most productive and impressive researchers.” Anne Rawls, professor and chair of the Sociology Department, offers similar praise: “Dan’s research and influence — both nationally and internationally — is so exceptional that it is difficult to know where to begin....  There is no other scholar currently at Bentley, or anywhere else nearby, whose work compares.” 

Roy (Chip) Arthur Wiggins III passed away peacefully, with his family by his side, on Aug. 27, 2024, after a hard-fought battle with cancer.  

Wiggins joined the university in 1996 as an assistant professor of Finance. During his nearly three decades at Bentley, he served in increasingly important leadership roles, including chair of the Finance Department, dean of business (2011-2018) and interim co-provost and vice president of Academic Affairs (2017-2018). A staunch advocate for the integration of business with the arts and sciences, Wiggins helped strengthen and expand Bentley’s curricular offerings, introducing several new undergraduate majors — including Actuarial Science, Creative Industries and Professional Sales — and developing the university’s flagship MBA and graduate programs in financial planning and real estate management.  

Wiggins was also founding director of the Bentley Microfinance Initiative, a student-run organization offering loans to small business owners in Massachusetts and Ghana. The initiative grew out of Seminar on Micro-lending (F1 333), a course Wiggins developed “to help students think about how financial decisions translate into actions that benefit society and have a positive and real impact on people,” says colleague Kartik Raman, George and Louis Kane Professor of Finance and associate provost for Academic Affairs. Raman remembers Wiggins as “sincere, selfless and, above all, never afraid to explore new avenues to constantly learn, innovate and mentor other faculty.”  

Wiggins was also known for his commitment to helping students achieve success both in and out of the classroom. “Chip’s selfless dedication to Bentley, unwavering advancement of the university and care for student learning and development was not an accident. It was reflective of his values,” says Michael Mazmanian ’15, MSA ’16. “He taught us to be stewards, how to build relationships, respect, accountability, interpersonal skills and self-management. None of these ‘lessons learned’ are listed in a syllabus or course description, but they are the bedrock of long-term student success after graduation.”