Hello and welcome to my website!

I'm a linguist with a passion for sociolinguistics and documentary linguistics, and a long-standing interest in linguistic diversity in Southern Africa. Much of my work involves long-term fieldwork and close collaboration with communities, exploring how languages are used, how they change, and how they are maintained.

I'm based at the University of Hamburg in Germany, where I lead the Botswana project within the DFG Research Unit CODILAC. I'm also a Research Fellow at the University of the Free State in South Africa.
Research interests
  • Language documentation, description, and revitalisation
  • Language maintenance and shift
  • Language contact and multilingualism
  • Language policy and language in education
  • Sociolinguistics and varieties of English and German
​Regional focus
  • Southern Africa (Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa)
Languages I work on
I focus on languages that are underdocumented or at risk of disappearing, as well as communities where language use and maintenance have been less studied. This includes:​
  • Southern African languages: N/uu (South Africa), siPhuthi (Lesotho), !Xun (Namibia), ǂHoan (Botswana)
  • German: Namibia, South Africa
  • English: Botswana
  • Gujarati: Diaspora communities in England, Singapore, South Africa
Featured projects​
Media and outreach
News
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1 April 2025
Our DFG Research Unit CODILAC has officially launched! Over the next four years, we’ll examine the role of English in seven multilingual regions around the world. Click here to read more about CODILAC. 

12 October 2024
Three new DocuAfrica films have been launched! Click here to view them.

11 April 2024
Hot off the press: Our book on the South African German variety, Kroondal German, is out! It is open access and free to download here. Supporting sound files can be accessed here.

For more news, click here.