Gumperz was born Hans-Josef Gumperz in Hattingen, Germany.[1] A Jew, he fled Nazi Germany and settled first in Italy, then the Netherlands, and finally in the United States in 1939.[3] Originally interested in chemistry, he became fascinated by language. At the University of Michigan he wrote a dissertation entitled The Swabian Dialect of Washtenaw County, Michigan under the direction of Herbert Penzl and earned a Ph.D. in 1954.[4] In 1956 Gumperz joined the faculty at the University of California, Berkeley.