Ted Pearson (born 1948 in Palo Alto, California) is an American poet. He is often associated with the Language poets. Pearson was born in 1948 in Palo Alto, California. He began studying liturgical music in 1960, instrumental music in 1962 (with Harvey Samuels, Lee Konitz, Modesto Briseno, and others), and began writing poetry in 1964 after Paul Desmond gave him a copy of Robert Creeley's For Love. He subsequently attended VanderCook College of Music (Chicago), Foothill College (Los Altos Hills), and San Francisco State University (BA English, 1971). In 1977, Pearson began his long association with the poets who were then actively involved in creating Language poetry, a new school of innovative writing that emerged in San Francisco, New York, and other places during this period. Among these poets were Rae Armantrout, Steve Benson, Alan Bernheimer, Carla Harryman, Lyn Hejinian, Tom Mandel, Bob Perelman, Kit Robinson, Ron Silliman, and Barrett Watten. In 1988, Pearson left the Bay Area, and has lived in Ithaca (1988-94), Buffalo (1994-97), and Detroit (1997-2006). He now lives in Redlands, California, where he is adjunct faculty in the Departments of English and Race & Ethnic Studies at the University of Redlands.
