LINGUIST List 14.3441

Fri Dec 12 2003

All: Obituary: Helma van den Berg

Editor for this issue: Sarah Murray <sarahlinguistlist.org>

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  • Martin Haspelmath, Obituary: Helma van den Berg

    Message 1: Obituary: Helma van den Berg

     Date: Tue, 02 Dec 2003 11:46:38 +0100
    From: Martin Haspelmath <haspelmatheva.mpg.de>
    Subject: Obituary: Helma van den Berg


    Obituary: Helma van den Berg

    We were deeply saddened to learn of the death of our colleague Helma van den Berg, one of the leading Western experts on Daghestanian languages, who passed away in Derbent (Daghestan, Russia) on 11 November 2003. Helma was only 38 years old. She suffered a heart attack while working on a dictionary of the Dargi language with her native-speaker collaborator Ms. Omarova. She is survived by her husband Leo.

    Helma studied Slavic and Caucasian linguistics at the University of Leiden and did her Ph.D. research on the Daghestanian language Hunzib (1995). She taught and did further research at the University of Leiden, before joining the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (Leipzig) in 2000. During her stay here she concentrated on Dargi lexicography and dialectology, wrote a series of articles on the comparative grammar of Daghestanian languages, and initiated a large project on the grammar of Avar, which involved collaboration with native-speaker linguists.

    Helma's untimely death is a terrible blow not only for those who were close to her, but also for the field of Caucasian linguistics. She had just been awarded a prestigious grant for innovative research that would have allowed her to continue her research at the University of Leiden for five years.

    We still find it hard to understand that she should not be among us anymore. We will miss her dearly.

    - Martin Haspelmath (haspelmatheva.mpg.de) Max-Planck-Institut fuer evolutionaere Anthropologie, Deutscher Platz 6 D-04103 Leipzig Tel. (MPI) +49-341-3550 307, (priv.) +49-341-980 1616