29.1813, Support: General Linguistics; Historical Linguistics; Typology: PhD, University of Zurich

[The LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List: Vol-29-1813. Fri Apr 27 2018. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 29.1813, Support: General Linguistics; Historical Linguistics; Typology: PhD, University of Zurich

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Date: Fri, 27 Apr 2018 15:41:46
From: Agnes Kolmer [agnes.kolmer at uzh.ch]
Subject: General Linguistics; Historical Linguistics; Typology: PhD, University of Zurich, Switzerland

 Institution/Organization: University of Zurich 
Department: URPP Language and Space 

Level: PhD 

Duties: Research,Project Work
 
Specialty Areas: General Linguistics; Historical Linguistics; Typology 
GIScience 

Description:

The University Research Priority Program (URPP) “Language and Space” is
inviting applications for a funded PhD position within the research group
“Areal Morphology” (cf.
http://www.spur.uzh.ch/en/research/arealmorphology.html).

Project description:

The Ancient Near East is a cultural, political, and economical hotspot and
melting pot with more than 4000 years of uninterrupted documentation of
linguistic history. Up until the mid first millennium CE, various languages
belonging to the Afro-Asiatic, Hurro-Urartian, and Indo-European language
families are known to have coexisted with at least four language isolates
contributing to the mixture. This unique configuration is an ideal testbed for
tracing the distribution and spread of linguistic features within and across
families and is of particular interest for estimating the impact language
isolates can have on the typological profile of languages from larger
families.

In cooperation with the supervisors, the GIS Group of the UZH URPP “Language
and Space”, and the wider interdisciplinary community in the language sciences
at Zurich the successful applicant will carry out research on the
spatiotemporal diffusion of morphological patterns in the Ancient Near East.
The main goal is to specify the role of contact in trait diffusion by using
extralinguistic information as a proxy, in particular information relating to
geopolitical and socio-economical history (economic system, ruling system,
migrations, displacements), physical geography (obstacles, affordance, trade
routes), and population genetics. It is planned to correlate linguistic and
extralinguistic data in order to specify their effect on the diffusion of
feature specification in space and over time.

Funding and expected outcomes:

Funding for the position is limited to three years, salary is according to the
Swiss National Science Foundation pay scale for PhD employees. The successful
applicant is expected to complete his/her PhD dissertation at the University
of Zurich within this timeframe. The PhD will preferrably be cumulative,
consisting of four papers. The exact topics of the papers will be determined
in accordance with the applicant's background and preferences, and papers may
be co-authored with the supervisors and other researchers, but they must
reflect original and independent work by the PhD candidate.

Requirements:

The candidate must hold a Master’s degree in linguistics received at the
latest by the time he/she takes up his/her position. Top candidates will have
excellent results from their Master's degree courses/thesis, a focus on or
interest in typology and historical linguistics, and a firm command of
quantitative methods in linguistics. Knowledge of GIScience is an asset.

Start date: September 1, 2018

Applications with the usual documents (cover letter, CV, transcript of BA/MA
studies) should be sent as a single PDF document to Balthasar Bickel
(balthasar.bickel at uzh.ch) and Paul Widmer (paul.widmer at uzh.ch)  by June 15,
2018. Two letters of reference should be sent directly by independent referees
to the same e-mail addresses. For more details, please contact
balthasar.bickel at uzh.ch or paul.widmer at uzh.ch.
 

Application Deadline: 15-Jun-2018 

Mailing Address for Applications:
	Attn: Prof. Balthasar Bickel 
	balthasar.bickel at uzh.ch
	
	Paul Widmer
	paul.widmer at uzh.ch 
	
Contact Information: 
	Prof. Paul Widmer 
	paul.widmer at uzh.ch  


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