Norbert CYFFER

Department of African Studies
University of Vienna

Tel: +43 (0)1 4277 43202
norbert.cyffer(at)univie.ac.at

 

Academic Career
 

1974 Dr. phil. African linguistics, University of Hamburg (‚Syntax des Kanuri‘)
1974 - 1977 

 Research Fellow, Centre for the Study of Nigerian Language, Ahmadu Bello University Zaria/Kano, Nigeria

1977 - 1981 

 Senior Lecturer, Department of Languages and Linguistics, University of Maiduguri, Nigeria

1982 - 1994   

Professor, Department of Ethnology and African Studies, University of Mainz, Germany

1994 - date   
 

 Professor, Department of African Studies, University of Vienna, Austria,
Visiting Professorships: Maiduguri, Nice, Prague


Research

1990 - 1996 
 

 Coordinator of the project Change and Continuity of Language, Literature and Music in the Lake Chad Region. Sub-project of the Sonderforschungsbereich 268 (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft)

2002 - 2005  

 Coordinator of the project Linguistic Innovation and Conceptual Change in West Africa. (Austrian Science Fund)

1968 - date   

 Fieldwork in northeastern Nigeria and Chad

 

Project related recent publications
2000.
 		 Maiduguri and the Kanuri language. Rupert Kawka (ed.) From Bulamari to Yerwa to Metropolitan Maiduguri. Interdisciplinary Studies on the Capital of Borno State, Nigeria. Westafrikanische Studien 24. Köln. Rüdiger Köppe: 117-125.
2000. 
 		 Areale Merkmale im TAM-System und in der Syntax der saharanischen Sprachen. R. Voßen, A. Mietzner & A. Meißner (Hg.) „Mehr als nur Worte....“. Afrikanistische Beiträge zum 65. Geburtstag von Franz Rottland. Köln: Rüdiger Köppe. 159-182.

2000. 
 

 Linguistic properties of the Saharan languages. Petr Zima (ed.) Areal and Genetic. Factors in Language Classification and Description: Africa South of the Sahara. Lincom Studies in African Linguistics 47. München. Lincom Europa: 30-59.
2002.
 		 The Lake Chad: a new Sprachbund boundary? R. Nicolai & P. Zima (Ed.) Lexical and Structural Diffusion. Corpus. Les Cahiers 1. Nice: 27-43.
2005.
 

Die Sprachen Afrikas - eine permanente Herausforderung an die Linguistik. W.R. Baier & Chr. Zinko (Hgg.) Die Sprache Ist Die Seele Eines Volkes - Die Großen Sprachfamilien. Graz: Leykam. 116 - 133.

2006.
 

 Kanuri and its neighbours: When Saharan and Chadic languages meet.  P. Newman & L.M. Hyman (eds.) West African Linguistics: Papers in Honor of Rusell G. Schuh. Studies in African Linguistics, Supplement 11. Ohio State University: 33 - 55.

2006.
 

 Perceptions of time and their conceptualisation in Saharan languages. Bernard Caron & Petr Zima (eds.) Sprachbund in the West African Sahel. Selaf no 432. Peeters: Louvain - Paris.113 - 128.

2007.  

 Kanuri morphology. In: Alan S. Kaye (ed.), Morphologies of Africa and Asia. Eisenbrauns. pp.

2007.  
 

 Negation patterns in Kanuri. In: Negation patterns in West Africa. Norbert Cyffer, Erwin Ebermann & Georg Ziegelmeyer (eds.) (in press).