K. A. Jayaseelan

Karattuparambil Achuthan Jayaseelan (born 27 July 1940) is an Indian linguist, essayist and a poet of Malayalam literature. He is known for his poems characterized by philosophical thoughts and his contributions to the linguistics of South Indian languages. Jayaseelan was born on 27 July 1940 to K. R. Achuthan, a lawyer and Umbooli, a school teacher and the eldest daughter of Mithavaadi Krishnan. His early education was at Basel Mission School and the Government Ganapat School, Feroke after which he did his college education at Farook College and Madras Christian College to earn an MA (1960) and MLitt (1963) in English literature. Subsequently, he secured a doctoral degree in English literature from Visva-Bharati University in 1970. His career as an English teacher spanned across several institutions such as Madras Christian College, PSG College of Arts and Science, Coimbatore, St. Thomas College, Thrissur and Regional college of Education, Bhopal, till he settled at the Central Institute of English Foreign Languages as a lecturer in 1970 and by the time he retired from service, it had been upgraded as the present-day English and Foreign Languages University. In between, he earned a master's degree in linguistics from Lancaster University in 1973 and a doctoral degree from Simon Fraser University in 1980. He continues his association past his superannuation as an adjunct faculty of linguistics. Jayaseelan is married to Amritavalli, an academic, co-author of one of his books and his colleague and the couple have two children, Annapoorna and Maitreyi.