Current projects
Fall of the jers: A multi-factorial analysis of the sound change progression in the Old Novgorodian birchbark texts
The graphics of the birch bark texts produced in Novgorod from the 11th to the 13th centuries show effects of the fall of the jers in the weak position, in that the jers in word-initial and word-medial syllables of word forms are rendered inconsistently, or not at all (Janin/Zaliznjak 1993; Zaliznjak 2004). This project investigates the progression of this process in the birch bark texts as a function of structural and usage-based factors. The data are coded and analysed with respect to the following variables: (estimated) time of text creation; jer position in the phonological word; length of the phonological word (in syllables); morpheme type; alternation of the target form with inflectional forms having strong jers in the word paradigm; degree of novelty of the resulting consonant clusters and its frequency. The data are explored statistically by using logistic regression analysis.
Variable syllable structure: An experimental study of Croatian and Russian
Funded by the Internal Project Funding (FNK) of the University of Bamberg
Grant period: February 2022 – November 2023
The aim of the project is to determine patterns of syllabification of Croatian and Russian items containing intervocalic two-consonant clusters in adults and preliterate children. The intervocalic clusters in the test items differ from each other in terms of sonority sequencing, frequency and stress position. The influence of these factors as well as the effect of literacy is evaluated by comparing the segmental behavior of 5-year-old preliterate children and adults by using a pause insertion task (cf. Goslin & Floccia, 2007; Côté & Kharlamov, 2011).
Completed projects
The syllable structure of the Old Novgorod dialect
Funded by the DAAD German Academic Exchange Service
Grant period: June 2020 – October 2020
Vernacular Kildin Saami as a fused lect (in collaboration with Michael Rießler, University of Eastern Finland)
Bilingual speech across three generations of speakers in the diaspora: Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian-German code-mixing in Western Austria
Funded by a University of Innsbruck young researcher grant 2018 (Nachwuchsförderungsprogramm der Universität Innsbruck 2018)
Grant period: August 2018 – Februar 2019
Explaining Russian-German code-mixing: A usage-based approach
PhD project conducted within and funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) research training group 1624 Frequency effects in language, Univeristy of Freiburg
Grant period: November 2010 – October 2013