Englishes in Context
Prof. Dr. Axel Bohmann
Contact
Englisches Seminar I
Universität zu Köln
Albertus Magnus Platz 1
50923 Köln
Office: Philosophikum R 1.214
Phone: 0221 / 470-3709
E-Mail: axel.bohmann(at)uni-koeln(dot)de
Office Hours:
| During the lecture periods | In between lecture periods |
|---|---|
| Thursdays 10-12 via Zoom | book an online appointment via the scheduler |
Recent Teaching
Winter 2025/26
- Language and Pop Culture. (seminar)
- In Others' Words: The Linguistics of Quotation. (seminar)
- English around the World. (lecture)
- Prüfungskolloquium. (colloquium)
Summer 2025
- Metapragmatics. (advanced seminar)
- Language and Identity. (seminar)
- Variation in Present-Day English: Corpus Explorations. (seminar)
- Empirical Research in Linguistics: An Overview. (lecture)
Winter 2024/25
- In Others' Words: The Linguistics of Quotation. (seminar)
- The Linguistic Individual. (seminar)
- English Corpus Linguistics: A Guided Tour. (lecture)
Research Interests
- World Englishes
- Language variation and change
- Corpus linguistics
- Sociolinguistics of globalization
- Digital linguistics
- Anthropology of linguistics
Most Recent Publications
2025
- Axel Bohmann, Mirka Honkanen. [accepted]. Writing Nigerian Pidgin on the web: Dynamic developments on a diasporic forum. In H. Paulasto, L. Meriläinen, S. Kaislaniemi, M. Laitinen (eds.), English Language Contacts and Change in the Digital Age. Brill.
- Axel Bohmann, Fatlum Sadiku, Panagiota Papavasileiou. [accepted]. A dynamic perspective on diasporic social media communication. In J. Leimgruber, S. Leukert, S. Rüdiger (eds.), World Englishes and Social Media. Bloomsbury.
- Axel Bohmann. [2025] . English among West-African Migrants in Germany: A Reflexive Approach (Varieties of English Around the World). John Benjamins.
- Axel Bohmann. [2025]. ‘Jamaica is not the only Jamaica’: Language ad place on Youtube. In H. Paulasto, L. Meriläinen, S. Kaislaniemi, M. Laitinen (eds.), English Language Contacts and Change in the Digital Age. Brill.
- Axel Bohmann, Lotte Sommerer. [2025]. Quantitative methods in historical linguistics. In R. Hickey, M. Kyt., E. Smitterberg (eds.), New Cambridge History of the English Language, Vol II. Documentation, Sources of Data and Modelling. Cambridge University Press.
- Axel Bohmann, Julia Müller, Mirka Honkanen, Miriam Neuhausen. [2025]. Linguistic Data Science and the English Passive: Modelling Diachronic Developments and Regional Variation (Language, Data Science, and Digital Humanities). Bloomsbury.
- Axel Bohmann. [2025]. Codeswitching in the Caribbean. In K. Bolton (ed.), The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopaedia of World Englishes. Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119518297.eowe00281
- Thomas Messerli, Daria Dayter, Sven Leuckert, Aatu Liimatta, Hanna Mahler, Axel Bohmann, Gustavo Kozma, Rafaela Tosin. [2025]. Digital debating cultures: Communicative practices on Reddit. Digital Scholarship in the Humanities 40(1), 227-240. https://doi.org/10.1093/llc/fqaf005
2024
- Axel Bohmann. 2024. Future-time reference in World Englishes. World Englishes 43(1), 2-22. https://doi.org/10.1111/weng.12634
- Axel Bohmann. 2024. Towards ‘large and tidy’: Establishing internal structure in mega-corpora. in S. Costas, V. Laippla (eds.), Linguistics across Disciplinary Borders: The March of Data. Bloomsbury, 175-185.
2023
- Axel Bohmann. 2023. Diatopic variation in digital space: A multidimensional analysis of Texas English Twitter data. Scandinavian Studies in Language 14(2), 73-103. https://doi.org/10.7146/sss.v14i2.142539
Upcoming Talks
*presentations in the making*
Recent Talks
- The passive alternation in spoken North American English. ISLE 8, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela (Spain), 03.09.2025.
- Bipartite collexeme graphs for the diachronic analysis of constructional competition. ICAME 46, University of Vilnius (Lithuania), 20.06.2025.
- Quoted and constructed speech across six varieties of English. IAWE 26, Justus-Liebig-Universität Giessen (Germany), 27.07.2025.
- Language ideologies in global English: The case of West-African asylum seekers in Germany. BICLCE 10, Universitat d'Alicant, Alicante (Spain), 28.09.2024.
- Because XYZ: How many non-canonical because-constructions are there? 10th International Conference of the German Cognitive Linguistics Association, University of Osnabrück (Germany), 05.09.2024.
Additional Information
Academic Career
| Period | Position |
|---|---|
| since 10/2024 | Full Professor (W3) for English Linguistics with a focus on “Englishes in Context”, English Seminar I, University Cologne (Germany) |
| 04/2024 - 09/2024 | Acting Full Professor, Chair of English Linguistics II (Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Bernd Kortmann), English Seminar, University of Freiburg (Germany) |
| 04/2017 - 03/2024 | Assistant Professor (Akademischer Rat), Chair of English Linguistics II (Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Christian Mair), English Seminar, University of Freiburg (Germany) |
| 04/2016 - 06/2016 | Visiting Lecturer, Institut for English and American Studies, University Osnabrück (Germany) |
| 08/2015 - 01/2016 | Assistant Instructor, The Department of Rhetoric and Writing, The University of Texas at Austin (USA) |
| 10/2014 - 03/2015 | Visting Lecturer, English and American Studies, University Augsburg (Germany) |
| 08/2012 - 05/2014 | Assistant Instructor, The Department of Rhetoric and Writing, The University of Texas at Austin (USA) |
University Education
| Year | Degree | Thesis Title |
|---|---|---|
| 2024 | Habilitation in English Philology, University of Freiburg (Germany) | Communicative repertoires of West African migrants in Germany: A reflexive approach to World Englishes |
| 2017 | Ph.D. in English, The University of Texas at Austin (USA) | Variation in English world-wide; Varieties and Genre in a Quantitative Perspective |
| 2012 | M.A. in English, The University of Texas at Austin (USA) | ‘Nobody Canna Cross It’: Entextualization, Ideology, and the Construction of Mock Registers in the Jamaican Speech Community |
| 2010 | State Board Exam in English and German for secondary school service (Lehramt), University of Freiburg (Germany) | Adapting Hip Hop Style: Language Contact in Recent German Youth Culture |
Awards / Grants
Awards
| Year | Award |
|---|---|
| 07/2025 | Erasmus Prize for the Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Freiburg (Germany) Project: Communicative Repertoires of West African Migrants in Germany: A reflexive Approach to World Englishes (in press) |
| 06/2013 | Richard M. Hogg Prize, International Society for the Linguistics of English Project: ‘Nobody Canna Cross It’: An Interactional Perspeactive on Discourse in Motion |
Grants
| Period | Project |
|---|---|
| 10/2025 - 10/2028 | “Pioneer Research”, VolkswagenStiftung Idiolinguistics - Grounding Language Study in the Individual |
| 04/2024 | Programm zur Unterstützung von Studium und Lehre 2023, University of Freiburg (Germany) |
| 04/2019 - 09/2021 | "Original, isn't it?" / Originalitätsverdacht?", VolkswagenStiftung Language as a complex adaptive system: Insights from physical modelling In cooperation with: Lars Hinrichs (Austin, TX, USA), Martin Bohmann (Vienna, AU) |
| 08/2016 - 01/2017 | Excellence Fellowship, The Department of English, The University of Texas at Austin (USA) |
| 02/2016 - 07/2016 | Continuing Fellowship, The Department of English, The University of Texas at Austin (USA) |
| 08/2014 | Fellowship for Academic Excellence, The Department of English, The University of Texas at Austin (USA) |
Conference Talks
- Language ideologies in global English: The case of West-African asylum seekers in Germany.BICLCE 10, Universitat d’Alacant, Alicante (Spain), 28.09.2024.
- Because XYZ: How many non-canonical because-constructions are there? 10th International Conference of the German Cognitive Linguistics Association, University of Osnabrück (Germany), 05.09.2024.
- Large and tidy? A method for finding structure in mega-corpora.ICAME 45, Universida de Vigo, Vigo (Spain), 19.06.2024.
- The grammar of gender: Verb phrases with gendered subjects across 200 years of American English.Cultural Data Analytics Conference 2023, Tallinn University, Tallinn (Estonia), 16.12.2023.
- The discursive construction of gender: Verb phrases with SHE/HE subjects in different varieties of English. ISLE 7, The University of Queensland, Brisbane (Australia), 19.06.2023.
- Linguistic dynamics in dynamically developing virtual communities - A corpuslinguistic perspective(with Mirka Honkanen). New Englishes, New Methods: Corpora in New Englishes Research, Ruhr-Universität Bochum (Germany), 25.03.2022.
- Register variation in Reddit comments - A multidimensional analysis (poster presentation with Kyla McConnell, Hanna Mahler, Gustavo Maccori Kozma and Rafaela Tosin). CMC-Corpora 2021, Radboud-University Nijmegen (Netherlands), 25.10.2021.
- Texas English on Twitter: Beyond lexical-geographic variation. NWAV 49, Austin, Texas (USA), 23.10.2021.
- Initiation of the low-back-merger shift in Texas English: Testing mechanistic accounts (poster presentation with Lars Hinrichs). NWAV 49, Austin, Texas (USA), 21.10.2021.
- ’Jamaica is not the only Jamaica’ - Language and place on YouTube. ISLE 6, University of Eastern Finland, Joensuu (Finland), 02.06.2021.
- A large-scale diachronic analysis of the English passive alternation (with Julia Müller, Mirka Honkanen and Miriam Neuhausen). ICAME 41, Heidelberg (Germany), 20.-23.05.2020.
- Varieties of English worldwide: A word-vector perspective. ICAME 41, Heidelberg (Germany), 20.-23.05.2020.
- A diachronic look at the English passive: Distributional semantics of BE vs GET (poster presentation with Julia Müller, Miriam Neuhausen and Mirka Honkanen). IRG 2020, Fribourg (Switzerland), 06.-08.02.2020.
- Like finding that one tree in a forest: Markers of stance in narration(poster presentation with Wiebke Ahlers). NWAV 48, Eugene, Oregon (USA), 11.10.2019.
- ICE corpora, register, and omitted variable bias: A multidimensional perspective.BICLCE 8, Bamberg (Germany), 28.09.2019.
- ’Like she says like I -like’: Markers of stance in narration. (with Wiebke Ahlers). SLE 52, Leipzig (Germany), 21.08.2019.
- Asylum seekers’ discursive construction of communicative breakdowns. iMean6, Wellington (New Zealand), 17.04.2019.
- Dimensions of variation in World Englishes. ISLE 5, London (UK), 18.07.2018.
- Orienting towards German with English linguistic resources: Observations on the communicative repertoires of English-speaking asylum seekers in Germany. ISLE 5, London (UK), 17.07.2018.
- Global system, local langscape: The interplay of emergent norms and perduring indexical relations in asylum seekers’ ELF communication. ELF 11, London (UK), 07.07.2018.
- When communication fails: Asylum seekers’ discursive construction of communicative breakdowns. Zurich Conference on Colonial and Postcolonial Language Studies - Changes and Challenges, Zürich (Switzerland), 05.06.2018.
- Geographic and register variation in World Englishes: Methodological issues. Workshop Statistical standards for scientific discovery in linguistics: a practical introduction, Zürich (Switzerland), 05.10.2017.
- Investigating geographic and register variation in World Englishes. ICLaVE 9, Málaga (Spain), 06.06.2017.
- A cross-varietal study of (ing) in written computer-mediated discourse. Sociolinguistics Symposium 21, Murcia (Spain), 17.06.2016.
- Mapping the social meanings of /str/-palatalization in Texas English (poster presentation with Lars Hinrichs, Wiebke Ahlers, Alexander Bergs, Erica Brozovsky, Kirsten Meemann and Patrick Schultz). Sociolinguistics Symposium 21, Murcia (Spain), 17.06.2016.
- Sibilants and ethnic diversity: A sociophonetic study of palatalized /s/ in STR clusters among Hispanic, White, and African-American speakers of Texas and Pittsburgh English(mit Lars Hinrichs, Alexander Bergs, Erica Brozovsky, Brian Hodge, Kirsten Meemann and Patrick Schultz). NWAV 44, University of Toronto (Canada), 23.10.2015.
- Enquoting voices on Twitter: A multi-local study of quotative BE + like in computer-mediated discourse. BICLCE 6, University of Wisconsin-Madison (USA), 20.08.2015.
- ’Nobody canna cross it’: Ideological aspects of hyper-correct speech in Jamaica.GAPS 2015, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster (Germany), 16.05.2015.
- Which-hunting and the Standard English relative clause(with Lars Hinrichs and Benedikt Szmrecsanyi). iMean 4, University of Warwick (UK), 11.04.2015.
- Enquoting voices on Twitter: A multi-local analysis of BE + like in computermediated discourse. ISLE 3, Universität Zürich (Switzerland), 26.08.2014.
- The interactional dynamics of speaky spoky. ICLCE 5, The University of Texas at Austin (USA), 27.09.2013.
- Unusually strong impact of prescriptive rules on language use: The case of objectfunction restrictive relativizers in written Standard English(with Lars Hinrichs and Benedikt Szmrecsanyi). The Fourth Conference on Prescriptivism, Universiteit Leiden (Netherlands), 12.06.2013.
- Discourse in motion: A mixed-methods case study from Jamaica. ISLE (Post-) Doctoral Spring School, University of Freiburg (Germany), 15.04.2013.
- Dialect leveling in Texas English: A mixed-methods approach to real-time change in the GOOSE vowel (with Lars Hinrichs). SALSA 21, The University of Texas at Austin (USA), 13.04.2013.
- Degree of fronting and F2 trajectory type in the Central Texas GOOSE vowel (with Lars Hinrichs). NWAV 41, Indiana University Bloomington (USA), 27.10.2012.
- The contested role of African American English in German rap discourse. Hip Hop Literacies, Ohio State University, Columbus (USA), 10.05.2012.
- Local appropriations of global English: The case of German hip hop culture.ICLCE IV, Universität Osnabrück (Germany), 21.07.2011.
- Sacred that and wicked which: Prescriptivism and change in the use of relativizers.SALSA 19, The University of Texas at Austin (USA), 16.04.2011.
Invited Talks
- World Englishes: Models, corpora, contexts. Invited talk at the University of Regensburg (Germany), 10.01.2024.
- Word dissemination along the S-curve of linguistic change. Konstanz Linguistics Research Colloquium, Universität Konstanz (Germany), 30.06.2022.
- Diatopic variation in digital space: What Twitter can tell us about Texas dialect areas(mit Alex Rosenfeld and Lars Hinrichs). Linguistic Variation in European Languages - New Perspectives on Diasystematic Variation at the Occasion of the Centenary of Coseriu’s Birth (1921-2021), Copenhagen (Denmark), 25.11.2021.
- The promise of nine decades’ worth of interviews: Building the Digital Archive of Texas English Speech. (with Lars Hinrichs). DIGI Colloquium, University of Georgia (USA), 22.01.2021.
- The sloth, the ant, and the invisible hand: Linguists looking to physicists for help. Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Ursin Group Retreat (Austria), 09.10.2020.
- Researching New Englishes with Twitter. New Englishes, New Methods, New Modes: Researching New Englishes online. Workshop of the ’New Englishes, New Methods’ research network. Online. 19.06.2020.
- Language and the Nobel Prize in Physics.Geisteswissenschaften in den 2020ern / Humanities in the 2020s. Workshop at Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (FRIAS), University of Freiburg (Germany), 19.02.2020.
- English on Twitter worldwide. Invited talk in ”Language and the media” (Instructor: Lars Hinrichs). The University of Texas at Austin (USA), 19.03.2018.
- ’Nobody canna cross it’: Jamaican sociolinguistics, language ideologies, and speaky spoky. Lecture series Critical Issues in Linguistics, Westf.lische Wilhelms- Universität Münster (Germany), 19.04.2016.
- ’Nobody canna cross it’: Styling hyper-correct speech in Jamaica. Invited talk in ”English-based Pidgins and Creoles around the World” (Instructor: Danae Perez), Universität Zürich (Switzerland), 24.11.2014.
- Language change because Internet? A variationist examination of because on Twitter. Invited talk in ”British English and American English: Corpus-Based Comparisons” (Instructor: Lars Hinrichs), Universität Augsburg (Germany), 03.06.2014.
- Language ideological dimensions of hyper-correct speech in Jamaica. Colloquium at the Department of Culture and Identity, Roskilde Universitet (Denmark), 14.05.2013.
Academic Affiliations
- Language and the Human-Machine Eras (LITHME) COST Action Network
- The International Society for the Linguistics of English (ISLE)
- The International Association for World Englishes (IAWE)
- Societas Linguistics Europea (SLE)
- New Englishes, New Methods Research Network (NENM)
- Hermann Paul School of Linguistics (HPSL)
- Texas English Linguistics Lab (TELL)