Claim: Noam Chomsky is credited in the creation of the Chomsky hierarchy.

In the formal languages of computer science and linguistics , the Chomsky hierarchy -LRB- occasionally referred to as Chomsky -- Schützenberger hierarchy -RRB- is a containment hierarchy of classes of formal grammars .  This hierarchy of grammars was described by Noam Chomsky in 1956 . It is also named after Marcel-Paul Schützenberger , who played a crucial role in the development of the theory of formal languages .