Modality, Semantic Maps and Lithuania: an interview with Johan van der Auwera

Abstract

Johan van der Auwera is Professor of General and English Linguistics at the University of Antwerp. He holds undergraduate degrees in Germanic Philology and in Philosophy (1975). His PhD was on the philosophy of language (1980) and his ‘habilitationʼ was on the structure of the noun phrase (1990). He was/is a member (or chair) of expert committees for national and international research councils, most prominently, the European Research Council (2006–2013), the European Science Foundation (2005– 2010), the Belgian Research Councils (Flemish 2000–2009, French 2010–2015), the French, Swedish, Danish and Norwegian Research Councils (mandates with various lengths), as well as various national research assessment committees. He is a member of the Academia Europaea and was president of the Societas Linguistica Europaea in 2005. He has published 6 monographs and over 200 scholarly articles, most of them in refereed journals or collective volumes, in English, but some also in Dutch, French, German, Croatian, and Russian. He has edited 23 books or theme issues of journals and is on the board of 8 journals and book series, most prominently Linguistics, of which he has been the editor-in-chief since 2005. His Google scholar h-index is 29. His research focuses on grammatical semantics with special reference to conditionals, mood, modality, negation, indefinites, impersonals, and similatives from a synchronic and diachronic as well as an areal perspective, and occasionally from a historiographical point of view. Languages studied are English, including New Englishes and Creoles, Germanic languages, European languages and the totality of the worldʼs languages (typology).