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    The Homeland   Connecting the Dots   LAMP
    accentual mobility   inflectional morphology   Danish sound system
    teaching (in Danish)   IWoBA II   uaria
 
  Thomas Olander
Born 19 April 1974 in Copenhagen, Denmark
 
  Presentation
I am a historical linguist dealing with Indo-European languages. My research has a primary focus on Slavic, but I have a general interest in all ancient and some modern Indo-European languages, and in the reconstruction of the Indo-European proto-language. I am also working with the relationship between Slavic and Baltic and with the phylogenetics of the Indo-European language family in general. Another interest of mine is Danish and general phonology and morphology.

In my 2009 book Balto-Slavic accentual mobility I compared the so-called mobile accent paradigms of Baltic and Slavic (e.g. Russian nominative singular golová, accusative gólovu, genitive golový etc.), concluding that they have arisen as the result of an accent loss in final syllables with a certain structure. The main conclusion of the book may be expressed with the formula μ[+H] > [-H] / _C₀#.

My 2015 book Proto-Slavic inflectional morphology: A comparative handbook (based on my habilitation thesis, also from 2015) contains a reconstruction of the inflectional endings of Proto-Slavic and an analysis of their historical relationship with the corresponding endings of Baltic and the remaining Indo-European languages.

Currently I am the leader of the research project Connecting the Dots: Reconfiguring the Indo-European family tree (2019–2022), financed by the Independent Research Fund Denmark. The purpose of the project is to examine the relationship between the Indo-European language branches, in particular the ramification after the separation of Anatolian and Tocharian. The project also examines to what extent the linguistic family tree can be correlated with the archaeological evidence.

I am also a core member of the project Languages and Myths of Prehistory (LAMP): Unravelling the speech and beliefs of the unwritten past (2020–2025), financed by the Swedish Riksbankens Jubileumsfond. The LAMP project aims to combine our linguistic knowledge of prehistoric stages of the Indo-European language family with archaeology and mythology.
 
  Degrees
11/2015 Doctor of Philosophy (Danish dr.phil.) in Indo-European Studies at the Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, University of Copenhagen, with the habilitation thesis Proto-Slavic inflectional morphology: A comparative handbook
06/2011 Learning and Teaching in Higher Education programme at the Faculty of Humanities, University of Copenhagen (September 2010 – June 2011) · poster on teaching over Skype to a class at Vilnius University
05/2006 PhD in Slavic and Baltic historical linguistics at the Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies, University of Copenhagen, with the dissertation Accentual mobility: the prehistory of the Balto-Slavic mobile accent paradigms
10/2002
MA (Danish Magister, mag.art.) in Indo-European Studies, University of Copenhagen
Subjects: Greek and Italic, Indo-Iranian, Germanic, Albanian, Balto-Slavic, Armenian, Paper 1 (“Den mobile accent i baltoslavisk” [“The mobile accent in Balto-Slavic”]), Paper 2 (“Om den slaviske neoakut og Dybos og Stangs love” [“On the Slavic neoacute and the laws of Dybo and Stang”])
05/2002 Gold medal for the prize dissertation Det baltoslaviske problem: accentologien [The Balto-Slavic problem: accentology] in Indo-European Studies, University of Copenhagen 2001
06/1999
BA in Indo-European Studies and Bulgarian, University of Copenhagen
Subjects: Introduction to Indo-European Linguistics, Introduction to Linguistics, Introduction to Phonetics, Gothic, Proto-Indo-European Morphology, General and Danish Phonology, Sanskrit, Laryngeal Theory, Historical Linguistics, Indo-European Ablaut, Latin, Greek, Vedic, Language Typology and Language Classification; Bulgarian phonetics, Written Translation Bulgarian-Danish, Bulgarian Grammar; Polish Propaedeutics, Polish Phonetics
6/1994 Graduated from Østre Borgerdydskole (passing the Studentereksamen), Copenhagen, with Greek, Latin, and German as advanced-level subjects
 
  Positions
09/2019 – Associate professor of Indo-European Studies, Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, University of Copenhagen
02/2019 – 08/2019 External lecturer in Indo-European Studies, Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, University of Copenhagen
01/2019 Academic officer, Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, University of Copenhagen
09/2015 – 12/2018 Associate professor of Indo-European Studies, Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, University of Copenhagen
02/2014 – 08/2015 External lecturer in Indo-European Studies, Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, University of Copenhagen
10/2012 – 12/2013 Associate professor of Indo-European Studies at Roots of Europe, Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, University of Copenhagen · project homepage
10/2008 – 10/2012
Postdoc at Roots of Europe, Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, University of Copenhagen (parental leaves: 7–20 November 2008 and 4 July to 25 September 2009; 6–19 April 2010 and 1 January to 22 March 2011)
10/2006 – 09/2008 Danish lecturer at Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski” · various courses on Danish language, see teaching section
02/2003 – 03/2006
PhD scholar at the Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies, University of Copenhagen · project title: “The Balto-Slavic mobile accent paradigms”
09/2002 – 01/2003
Teaching assistant at the Department of General and Applied Linguistics, University of Copenhagen
 
  Stays abroad
11/2016 Guest researcher at Gothenburg University, Sweden
10/2006 – 09/2008 Danish lecturer at Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski” (passed test in “Bulgarian as a Foreign Language” at level C1)
04/2005 – 06/2005 Research at Humboldt University, Berlin
09/2000 – 07/2001 Studies in Russian, History of the Polish Language, and History of the Czech Language at Saint Petersburg State University, Russia (passed test in “Russian as a Foreign Language” at level 3 (out of 4) in the testing system of the Russian Ministery of Education)
08/1998 Summer course in Slovak for Foreigners (“Studia Academica Slovaca”), elementary level, at the University of Bratislava, Slovakia
08/1997 Summer course in Polish for Foreigners (“Polonicum”), intermediate level, at the University of Warsaw, Poland
02/1997 – 07/1997 Studies in Modern Bulgarian and Old Bulgarian at Sofia University “Kliment Ohridski”, Bulgaria
09/1991 – 06/1992 Italian 3rd grade at the “Liceo Scientifico Statale ‘Piero Gobetti’”, Florence, Italy
08/1990 – 06/1991 German 10th grade at the “Hildegard-Wegscheider Oberschule” in Wilmersdorf, West Berlin, West Germany
 
  Organisation of scientific meetings
Sept. 2017 Co-organiser, The Split: Reconstructing Early Indo-European Language and Culture (international conference), University of Copenhagen
Feb. 2017 Organiser, The Indo-European Family Tree (international workshop), University of Copenhagen
July–Aug. 2016 Co-organiser, Roots of Europe Summer School 2016, University of Copenhagen (main organiser: Benedicte Nielsen Whitehead)
July–Aug. 2015 Co-organiser, Roots of Europe Summer School 2015, University of Copenhagen (main organiser: Benedicte Nielsen Whitehead)
2008 – 2015 Co-organiser of lectures and block seminars at the Roots of Europe project, University of Copenhagen
Oct. 2013 Co-organiser, Indo-European Rules (international seminar), University of Copenhagen
Dec. 2012 Co-organiser, Tracing the Indo-Europeans (international conference), University of Copenhagen
Oct. 2012 Co-organiser, Indo-European Words That Matter (international seminar), University of Copenhagen
Sept. 2012 Co-organiser, Etymology and the European Lexicon (international conference), University of Copenhagen
Nov. 2011 Co-organiser, Indo-European Matters Even More (international seminar), University of Copenhagen
April 2011 Co-organiser, Anatolian Spring (international seminar), University of Copenhagen
Oct. 2010 Co-organiser, Indo-European Still Matters (international seminar), University of Copenhagen
Oct. 2009 Co-organiser, Indo-European Matters (international seminar), University of Copenhagen
April 2009 Co-organiser, The Sound of Indo-European: Phonetics, Phonemics, and Morphophonemics (international conference), University of Copenhagen
Sept. 2006 Co-organiser, Second International Workshop on Balto-Slavic Accentology, University of Copenhagen
 
  Miscellaneous
2016–present Editor, Scando-Slavica
2016–present Editor, Mål & Mæle
2006–2019 Assistant editor, Tocharian and Indo-European Studies
2014–present Series editor, Copenhagen Studies in Indo-European
2015–present Chairman, Danish Association of Slavists
2009–2015 Vice chairman, Danish Association of Slavists
2012–present Member, Indogermanische Gesellschaft
2008/2009 & 2009/2010 Winner of Danish championship in outdoor field hockey with Copenhagen Hockey Club
2006/2007 & 2007/2008 Winner of Bulgarian championship in outdoor field hockey with Nacionalna Sportna Akademija