Birgit Anette Rasmussen (Olsen)

Birgit Anette Rasmussen (Olsen)

Professor

Member of:

Current research

Following the Velux project Individual, kin and family in prehistoric Europe - what words can tell (2013-16), my primary research field at present is the interface between language and culture where I am particularly occupied with the Indo-European social structure as reflected in the vocabulary.

I am also working on a monograph on Indo-European word formation, and contiously I write articles on Indo-European linguistics, most lately on Greek and Latin historical morphology and on Armenian phonology.

Primary fields of research

While I take a broad interest in Indo-European language and culture in general, the following areas are particularly important in my previous and current research:

  • Indo-European morphology, especially nominal word formation
  • Indo-European morphophonemics and phonemics, especially the laryngeal theory and consonantal alternations
  • Indo-European lexicon and palaeolinguistics, e.g. with respect to kinship terms and social institutions
  • Classical Armenian phonology, morphology and etymology

Teaching

Through the years I have taught a variety of subjects within Indo-European studies:

  • Historical linguistics
  • Introduction to Indo-European studies
  • Introduction to linguistics - historical part
  • Indo-European and the Indo-Europeans
  • Indo-European phonology
  • Indo-European morphology
  • Indo-European word formation
  • Indo-European vocabulary
  • Laryngeal theory
  • Seminars on recent literature
  • Roots of Europe
  • Indo-Iranian, Sanskrit, Vedic, Avestan and Old Persian
  • Greek
  • Latin and Italic
  • Gothic and panorama of ancient Germanic languages
  • Old Irish
  • Armenian
  • Anatolian

Additionally, I have taught propaedeutic Greek and Latin and ancient literature.

Most recent courses:

Supervision

I am happy to supervise all subjects within Indo-European language and culture: phonology, morphophonemics, morphology, lexicon and archaeolinguistics. Moreover, subjects dealing with specific branches, with particular pleasure within Armenian, Indo-Iranian, Greek and Italic.

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