The Joseph Greenberg Award recognizes and honours the best piece of typological research embodied in a doctoral dissertation or equivalent in the award period. It was named to remember Joseph Greenberg’s (1915-2001) fundamental contributions to typology and the interest he showed in encouraging young researchers. Between 1998 and 2006, it was known as the “ALT Junior Award”. It is one of two ALT awards aimed at PhD dissertations, the others being the Pāṇini Award and the Georg von der Gabelentz Award.
Calls for submissions are regularly announced via the ALT newsletters.
Award Recipients and Honourable Mentions
Please note that the affiliations listed for the Award Recipients are the institutions where they submitted their dissertations.
12th: 2026
Omri Amiraz (Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
Inverse scope in all . . . not constructions: A cross-linguistic and diachronic investigation
Honourable Mention
Satu Keinänen (University of Helsinki)
Functional extensions of evidentials. A cross-linguistic study
For more information about the committee’s decision and review of the selected submissions, see newsletter 68.
11th: 2024
Anna Sjöberg (Stockhold University, Sweden)
Knowledge predication: A semantic typology
Honourable Mention
Maria Bardaji i Farre (University of Köln, Germany)
Nominalization in Totoli and other western Austronesian languages
Honourable Mention
Rémi Anselme (Laboratoire Dynamique du Langage, CNRS, France)
La représentation du trill en typologie a l’inventaire phonemique
For more information about the committee’s decision and review of the selected submissions, see newsletter 65.
10th: 2022
Stephanie Evers (State University of New York at Buffalo, USA)
To ‘the’ or not to ‘the’: Cross-linguistic correlations between existing morpho-syntax and the emergence of definite articles
Honourable Mention
Klaas Seinhorst (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands)
The complexity and learnability of phonological patterns: simulations, experiments, typology
For more information about the committee’s decision and review of the selected submissions, see newsletter 61.
9th: 2019
Shelece Easterday (University of New Mexico, Albuquerue, USA)
Highly Complex Syllable Structure: A Typological Study of its Phonological Characteristics and Diachronic Development
Honourable Mention
Dana Louagie (KU Leuwen)
A Typological Study of Noun Phrase Structures in Australian Languages
Honourable Mention
Raina Heaton (University of Hawai’i at Manoa, USA)
A Typology of Antipassives, With Special Reference to Mayan
For more information about the committee’s decision and review of the selected submissions, see newsletter 56.
8th: 2017
Ksenia Shagal (University of Helsinki, Finland)
Towards a typology of participles
For more information about the committee’s decision and review of the selected submission, see newsletter 53.
7th: 2015
Katarzyna Janic (Université Lumirère Lyon 2, France)
L’antipassif dans les langues accusatives (The antipassive in accusative languages)
6th: 2013
Eva van Lier (University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands)
Parts of speech and dependent clauses: a typological study
Honourable Mention
Natalia Stoynova (Moscow State University, Moscow, Russia)
2012. Типология глагольных показателей рефактива: модели полисемии и структура семантической зоны (Typology of the verbal markers of refactive: Polysemy patterns and structure of the semantic zone)
Honourable Mention
Alena Witzlack-Makarevich (University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany)
2010. Typological variation in grammatical relations.
For more information about the committee’s decision and review of the selected submissions, see newsletter 51.
5th: 2009
Caterina Mauri (University of Pavia, Italy)
Coordination relations in the languages of Europe and beyond
Honourable Mention
Jan Wohlgemuth (Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig)
A Typology of Verbal Borrowing
For more information about the committee’s decision and review of the selected submissions, see newsletter 45.
4th: 2007
Aleksandr Arkhipov (Moscow State University, Russia)
Tipologija komitativnyx konstrukcij
(Typology of comitative constructions)
Honourable Mentions
Valentin Gousev (Russian Academy of Sciences Institute of Linguistics, Moscow, Russia)
Tipologija specializirovannyx glagol’nyx form imperativa
(Typology of dedicated verbal forms of the imperative)
Olesya Khanina (Moscow State University, Russia)
Jazykovoe oformlenie situacii želania (opyt tipologičeskogo issledovania)
(Linguistic encoding of ‘wanting’: a typological approach)
René Schiering (University of Konstanz, Germany)
Cliticization and the Evolution of Morphology: a Cross-linguistic Study on Phonology in Grammaticalization)
3rd: 2005
Matti Miestamo (University of Helsinki, Finland)
Clausal negation: a typological study
Honourable Mentions
Oliver Iggesen (Universität Bremen, Germany)
Case-asymmetry: a world-wide typological study on lexeme-class-dependent deviations in morphological case inventories
Hsiu-chuan Liao (University of Hawai’i, USA)
Transitivity and ergativity in Formosan and Philippine languages
Adam Saulwick (University of Melbourne, Australia)
Aspect of the verb in Rembarrnga: a polysynthetic language of northern Australia
2nd: 2001
Michael Cysouw (Katholieke Universiteit Nijmegen, The Netherlands)
The paradigmatic structure of person marking
Michael Daniel (Russian State University for the Humanities, Moscow, Russia)
Tipologija associativnoj množestvennosti
(The typology of associative plurality)
Honourable Mention
Elena Filimonova (Lomonosov University, Russia, 1999)
Universal’nye anomalij licnyx mestoimenij
(Universal anomalies of personal pronouns)
1st: 1999
Konstantin Kazenin (Moscow State University, Russia)
Sintaksičieskie ograničenija i puti ix ob’jasnenija (na materiale dagestanskix jazykov)
(“Syntactic constraints and ways of explaining them (based on Daghestanian languages)”)
Sergej Tatevosov (Moscow State University, Russia)
Typological problems of quantification in natural language (based on quantifiers expressing totality)
Honourable Mentions
Sonia Cristaforo (University of Pavia, Italy)
Holger Diessel (University at Buffalo, USA)
Demonstratives in crosslinguistic and diachronic perspective
Ekaterina Ljutikova (Moscow State University, Russia)
Intensifikatory i tipologija reflexiva
(“Intensifiers and the typology of reflexives“)