Elisabet Britt Engdahl (born 1949 in

Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...

) is a

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

linguist and professor emerita (see:

Emeritus ''Emeritus'' (; female: ''emerita'') is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor, or other person who has been "permitted to retain as an honorary title ...

) of Swedish at the

University of Gothenburg The University of Gothenburg ( sv, Göteborgs universitet) is a university in Sweden's second largest city, Gothenburg. Founded in 1891, the university is the third-oldest of the current Swedish universities and with 37,000 students and 6000 st ...

. She was the first linguist to investigate parasitic gaps in detail.

Education

After having completed an MA at

Uppsala University Uppsala University ( sv, Uppsala universitet) is a public university, public research university in Uppsala, Sweden. Founded in 1477, it is the List of universities in Sweden, oldest university in Sweden and the Nordic countries still in opera ...

, she was awarded a studentship from the Sweden-America Foundation and pursued graduate studies in general linguistics at the

University of Massachusetts-Amherst The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, i ...

. She received her PhD in 1980 for her dissertation on the Syntax and Semantics of Questions in Swedish, supervised by

Barbara Partee Barbara Hall Partee (born June 23, 1940) is a Distinguished University Professor Emerita of Linguistics and Philosophy at the University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass). Biography Born in Englewood, New Jersey, Partee grew up in the Baltimore ...

Career and research

She was a Sloan

postdoctoral A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). The ultimate goal of a postdoctoral research position is to p ...

fellow A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

in Cognitive Science at

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

, a research fellow at the

Max-Planck-Institute The Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science (german: Max-Planck-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Wissenschaften e. V.; abbreviated MPG) is a formally independent non-governmental and non-profit association of Germany, German research ins ...

for psycholinguistics at Nijmegen and at

Lund University , motto = Ad utrumque , mottoeng = Prepared for both , established = , type = Public research university , budget = SEK 9 billion University of Wisconsin–Madison A university () is an educational institution, institution of higher education, higher (or Tertiary education, tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. Universities ty ...

. Between 1986 and 1995, she served as a reader at the Centre for Cognitive Science (now part of the School of Informatics) and the Human Communication Research Centre at the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 15 ...

. In 1995, she took up a position at the University of Gothenburg and in 2004 she became professor of Swedish. She retired in 2014 and currently lives in

Mölndal Mölndal () is the seat and administrative centre of Mölndal Municipality, located just south of Gothenburg on the west-coast of Sweden. About 40,000 of the municipality's 60,000 inhabitants live in Mölndal proper. Geography Mölndal is located ...

. Engdahl has been a member of the

Swedish Research Council The Swedish Research Council ( sv, Vetenskapsrådet) is a Government agency in Sweden established in 2001, with the responsibility to support and develop basic scientific research. Its objective is for Sweden to be a leading nation in scienti ...

since 2000, and she still serves as a member on the Council for Research Infrastructures. She is a member of the scientific board for CASTL (Center for Advanced Study in Theoretical Linguistics) at the

University of Tromsø The University of Tromsø – The Arctic University of Norway (Norwegian: ''Universitetet i Tromsø – Norges arktiske universitet''; Northern Sami: ''Romssa universitehta – Norgga árktalaš universitehta'') is a state university in Norway an ...

, and she is involved in th
Scandinavian Dialect Syntax Network.
The ScanDiaSyn network works on Scandinavian dialect syntax. In 2008, she was elected to the

Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities The Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities also called simply the Royal Academy of Letters or Vitterhetsakademin abbreviated KVHAA ( sv, Kungl. Vitterhetsakademien Historie och Antikvitets Akademien or or ) is the Swedish royal ...

, and in 2010, to the

Royal Society of Arts and Sciences in Gothenburg The Royal Society of Arts and Sciences in Gothenburg ( sv, Kungliga Vetenskaps- och Vitterhets-Samhället i Göteborg, abbreviated KVVS and often known simply as ''Samhället'') is a Swedish Royal Academy. Its predecessor was founded in Gothenburg ...

. She received an

honorary doctorate An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or ''ad hon ...

in 2012, awarded by Lund University. Engdahl’s main research interests are in the area of syntax and semantics, in particular in the

Scandinavian languages The North Germanic languages make up one of the three branches of the Germanic languages—a sub-family of the Indo-European languages—along with the West Germanic languages and the extinct East Germanic languages. The language group is also r ...

. She is involved in the ScanDiaSyn network, which works on Scandinavian dialect syntax. Despite her retirement, Engdahl continues to research and publish, focusing on syntax, semantics, pragmatics, and information structure.

Publications

* ''The syntax and semantics of questions in Swedish'', 1980 * ''Implicational universals : parametric variation in GB and GPSG'', 1988 * ''Constituent questions : the syntax and semantics of questions with special reference to Swedish'', 1985 * ''Argument roles and anaphora'', 1990 * ''Interaktion och kontext : nio studier av svenska samtal'', 2007

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Engdahl, Elisabet 1949 births Living people Linguists from Sweden Academic staff of the University of Gothenburg University of Wisconsin–Madison faculty Scientists from Stockholm Swedish women academics Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities Members of the Royal Society of Sciences and Letters in Gothenburg Women linguists University of Massachusetts Amherst College of Humanities and Fine Arts alumni