Professor Torsten Leuschner, StEx (Berlin), Dr phil (FU Berlin)

Profile

A native speaker of German, I completed an M.A.-equivalent degree (Staatsexamen) in English, German and History and later also my Ph.D. at Freie Universität Berlin in my home city. I taught German as a foreign language in Coventry and Antwerp and have been Professor of German Linguistics at Ghent University since 2011. In 2023, I was awarded the title of Visiting Reader at QMUL, where I am associated with the Department of Modern Languages and Cultures at School of the Arts (STA).

My Ph.D. was about the grammaticalization of complex sentences from discourse patterns in the domain of conditionality and concessivity in West Germanic. My research has maintained this focus over the years, while also expanding into new areas including word-formation, language contact, sociolinguistics/language policy and the language/history link, and exploring new theories like construction grammar.

Besides co-editor of the peer-reviewed journal Germanistische Mitteilungen (Heidelberg: Winter) and of the book series Linguistik: Empire und Theorie/Empirical and Theoretical Linguistics (Springer), I am a member of the advisory boards for Journal of Germanic Linguistics (Cambridge: CUP) and the book series Konvergenz und Divergenz: sprachvergleichende Studien zum Deutschen (Berlin/Boston: de Gruyter).

I have been a board member of the Belgian Association of Teachers and Lecturers of German (BGDV) since 2000, successively serving as its Honorary Secretary, as Vice Chair and since 2018 as Chair, being re-elected for my third three-year term in 2024.

Research

Research Interests:

Leuschner is a specialist in the Germanic languages who mostly works in (cognitive-) functional language typology and usage-based construction grammar, applying quantitatively informed qualitative methods, often in a contrastive perspective, with a focus on adverbial relations in the domain of conditionality.

He has published on grammaticalization, especially of complex sentences from discourse patterns, on aspects of word-formation, and on German loanwords in neighbouring languages, focusing on the usage patterns of historical Germanisms and their role in the transmission of historical memory.

He has also worked on language policies affecting German in multilingual settings, especially in the Belgian context, and on the history of language policy and ideology. A semi-fluent speaker of Esperanto, he has recently developed a side interest in interlinguistics and planned languages as well.

More information about his past and current projects, including a full list of publications, can be found here.

Publications

Monographs as author or editor

Leuschner, Torsten/Vajnovszki, Anaïs/Delaby, Gauthier/Barðdal, Jóhanna (eds., 2025): How to Do Things with Corpora: Methodological Issues and Case Studies on Grammar. Berlin: Metzler (511 pages).

De Vogelaer, Gunther/Kosta, Dietha/Leuschner, Torsten (eds., 2020): German and Dutch in Contrast: Synchronic, Diachronic and Psycholinguistic Perspectives. Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter (= Konvergenz und Divergenz: sprachvergleichende Studien zum Deutschen 11; 350 pages).

Leuschner, Torsten (2006): Hypotaxis as Building-Site: The Emergence and Grammaticalization of Concessive Conditionals in English, German and Dutch. Munich: Lincom Europa (= Studies in Germanic Linguistics 24; 192 pages).

Leuschner, Torsten/Mortelmans, Tanja/De Groodt, Sarah (eds., 2005): Grammatikalisierung im Deutschen. Berlin: de Gruyter (= Linguistik – Impulse und Tendenzen 9; 375 pages).

 

Journal articles

Somers, Joren/Leuschner, Torsten/De Cuypere, Ludovic/Barðdal, Jóhanna (2025): "A Corpus-Based Analysis of the Dat-Nom/Nom-Dat Alternation in German." To appear in: Zeitschrift für Sprachwissenschaft 44

Leuschner, Torsten (2024): "Zwischen Gesellschaft und Staat. Die Kategorie 'Ergänzungs-sprache' aus belgischer Sicht." In: German as a Foreign Language 1/2024, 187-213.

Vander Haegen, Flor/Bossuyt, Tom/Leuschner, Torsten (2022): "Emerging into Your Family of Constructions: German [IRR was] 'no matter what'." In: Constructions and Frames 14, 150-180.

Leuschner, Torsten (2020): "Concessive Conditionals as a Family of Constructions." In: Belgian Journal of Linguistics 34, 235-247.

Jaworska, Sylvia/Leuschner, Torsten (2018): "Crossing Languages – Crossing Discourses: a Corpus-Assisted Study of Kulturkampf in German, Polish and English." In: Pragmatics and Society 9, 117-147.

Breitbarth, Anne/Delva, Sara/Leuschner, Torsten (2016): "A (Very) Imperfect Sandwich: English should, German sollte and Dutch mocht/moest as Grammaticalizing Markers of Conditionality." In: Journal of Germanic Linguistics 28, 282-316.

Leuschner, Torsten/Van den Nest, Daan (2015): "Asynchronous Grammaticalization: V1-Conditionals in Present-Day English and German." In: Languages in Contrast 15, 34-64.

Van Bogaert, Julie/Leuschner, Torsten (2015): "Dutch (‘t) schijnt and German scheint(‘)s: On the Grammaticalization of Evidential Particle." In: Studia Linguistica 69, 86-117.               

Schröter, Melani/Leuschner, Torsten (2013): "Historical Germanisms in British Newspapers: a Discourse-Analytic Approach and Four Corpus-Assisted Case Studies." In: Angermion 6, 139-171.

Leuschner, Torsten/Van den Nest, Daan (2012): "Emergent Concessivity: a Qualitative/ Quantitative Approach to German zwar ... aber 'true … but'." In: Belgian Journal of Linguistics 26, 116-142.

Leuschner, Torsten (2011): "The German Drang nach Osten: Linguistic Approaches to Historical Stereotyping." In: German Life and Letters 65, 94-108.

Simon, Ellen/Leuschner, Torsten (2010): "Laryngeal Systems in Dutch, English and German: a Contrastive-Phonological Study on Second and Third Language Acquisition." In: Journal of Germanic Linguistics 22, 403-424.

Leuschner, Torsten/Pfalzgraf, Falco (2006): "Einstellungen zu Fremdwörtern und Anglizis-men. Anmerkungen zu einer Repräsentativerhebung des Instituts für Deutsche Sprache." In: Germanistische Mitteilungen 64, 85-107.

Ascoop, Kristin/Leuschner, Torsten (2006): "Affixoidhungrig? Skitbra! Comparing Affixoids in German and Swedish." In: Sprachtypologie und Universalienforschung (STUF) 59.3, 241-252

Leuschner, Torsten (2005): "Nonspecific Free Relatives and (Anti)grammaticalization in English and German." In: Folia Linguistica Historica 25, 45-69.

Amiridze, Nino/Leuschner, Torsten (2002): "Body-Part Nouns as a Source of Reflexives: Towards a Grammaticalization Account of Georgian tav- 'Head'." In: Sprachtypologie und Universalienforschung (STUF) 55, 259-276.

Leuschner, Torsten (1996): "'Ever' and Universal Quantifiers of Time: Observations from Some Germanic Language." In: Language Sciences 18, 469-484.

 

 

Book chapters

Leuschner, Torsten (2025): "Grammaticalization in Germanic." In: Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Germanic Linguistics (online – PDF: 46 pages)

https://oxfordre.com/linguistics/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780199384655.001.0001/ acrefore-9780199384655-e-959

https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199384655.013.959

 

Leuschner, Torsten (2023): "Die Familie der Irrelevanzkonditionale im Deutschen. Von der funktionalen Sprachtypologie zur gebrauchsbasierten Konstruktionsgrammatik." In: Fabio Mollica/Sören Stumpf (eds.), Konstruktionsgrammatik IX: Konstruktionsfamilien im Deutschen. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 327-351.

Leuschner, Torsten (2023): "Linguistik der Erinnerung – transnational. Das Beispiel lexikalischer Erinnerungsorte." In: Aleksandra Salamurović (ed.), Konzepte der Nation im europäischen Kontext im 21. Jahrhundert. Berlin: Metzler, 137-158.

Leuschner, Torsten (2023): "'This one-man midfield blitzkrieg'. Wortentlehnung als Dekon-textualisierung." In: Trost, Igor (ed.), Remotivierung. Von der Morphologie bis zur Pragmatik. Berlin/ Boston: de Gruyter, 245-268.

Bossuyt, Tom/Leuschner, Torsten (2020): "'WH-ever' in German, Dutch and English: a Contrastive Study Showcasing the ConverGENTiecorpus." In: Enghels, Renata/Defrancq, Bart/Jansegers, Marlies (eds.), New Approaches to Contrastive Linguistics: Empirical and Methodological Challenges. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton, 183-219.

Leuschner, Torsten (2020): "'Verb-First' in Small Forms: a German-Based Contrastive Approach." In: Michalis Georgiafentis/Giannoula Giannoulopoulou/Maria Koliopoulou/Angeliki Tsokoglou (eds.), Theoretical Approaches to Contrastive Linguistics: Morphological and Syntactic Perspectives. London: Bloomsbury, 45-59.

Leuschner, Torsten/Radke, Henning/Küpper, Achim (2019): "Förderung von Deutsch als Fremd- und Amtssprache in den Benelux-Staaten." In: Ulrich Ammon/Shinichi Sambe/Gabriele Schmidt (eds.), Förderung der deutschen Sprache weltweit. Vorschläge, Ansätze und Konzepte. Berlin/Boston: de Gruyter, 615-633.

Bossuyt, Tom/De Cuypere, Ludovic/Leuschner, Torsten (2018): "Emergence Phenomena in W immer/auch-Subordinators." In: Eric Fuß/Marek Konopka/Beata Trawinski/Ulrich Waßner (eds.), Grammar and Corpora 2016. Heidelberg: heiUP, 97-120.

Battefeld, Malte/Leuschner, Torsten/Rawoens, Gudrun (2018): "Evaluative Morphology in German, Dutch and Swedish: Constructional Networks and Loci of Change." In: Evi Coussée/Muriel Norde/Gudrun Vanderbauwhede/Kristel Van Goethem (eds.), Category Change from a Constructional Perspective. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: Benjamins, 229-262.

Leuschner, Torsten (2016): "Fictive Questions in Conditionals? Synchronic and Diachronic Evidence from German and English." In: Esther Pascual/Sergeiy Sandler (eds.), The Conversation Frame: Forms and Functions of Fictive Interaction. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: Benjamins, 193-213.

Leuschner, Torsten (2014): "Drang nach Osten: Towards a Comparative Discourse Analysis with Reference to the German 'Push to the East'." In: Peter Blumenthal/Iva Novakova/Dirk Siepmann (eds.), Les émotions dans le discours. Emotions in discourse. Frankfurt/M. etc.: Lang, 135-146.

Leuschner, Torsten (2008): "From Speech Situation Evocation to Hypotaxis: the Case of Latin quamvis 'although'." In: Maria-José López-Couso/Elena Seoane (eds.), Theoretical and Empirical Issues in Grammaticalization, Amsterdam/Philadelphia: Benjamins, 231-252.

Leuschner, Torsten (2006): "How to Express Indifference in Germanic: Towards a Functional-Typological Research Programme." In: Nicole Delbecque/Johan van der Auwera/Dirk Geeraerts (eds.), Perspectives on Variation: Sociolinguistic, Historical, Comparative. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 291-317.

Leuschner, Torsten (1998): "At the Boundaries of Grammaticalization: What Interrogatives Are Doing in Concessive Conditionals." In: Anna Giacalone Ramat/Paul Hopper (eds.), The Limits of Grammaticalization. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: Benjamins, 159-187.