William G. Boltz is a professor emeritus at theUniversity of Washington and a scholar of manuscript study, philology, and textual criticism, known for his studies of the origin of theChinese writing system.^[1]

William G. Boltz attended theUniversity of California, Berkeley and obtained his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees in Oriental Languages in 1965, 1969, and 1974, respectively. At Berkeley, he studied Chinese language and linguistics under ProfessorYuen Ren Chao, Chinese philology under ProfessorPeter A. Boodberg, Chinese linguistics from Professor Kun Chang, and Romance philology and linguistics from ProfessorYakov Malkiel. In 1981, He began working as a Professor of Classical Chinese in the Department of Asian Languages and Literature at the University of Washington.^[2]

In 2022,The Seattle Times reported that the University of Washington had investigated Boltz for multiple accusations of sexual harassment of students spanning several decades. Boltz received coaching from the university after several such incidents, as well as suspended merit pay increase for two years. He was permitted to continue teaching at the university. He has been quoted in the Times describing his actions as "poor decisions and wrong choices."^[3] As of 2022, Boltz is no longer teaching at UW.

• Boltz, William G. (1994).The Origin and Early Development of the Chinese Writing System. New Haven, Conn.: American Oriental Society.ISBN 0-940-49018-8

This article about an American educator is astub. You can help Wikipedia byexpanding it.

• v
• t
• e

• Living people
• American sinologists
• University of California, Berkeley alumni
• University of Washington faculty
• American educator stubs

• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Use mdy dates from July 2025
• Articles containing Chinese-language text
• Articles with hCards
• Year of birth missing (living people)
• All stub articles