Bertus van Rooy is professor in the research focus area Understanding and Processing Language in Complex Settings at the Vaal Triangle Campus of the North-West University. His principal research interest at the moment is the constraints that shape the form of language, drawing on insights from construction grammar, corpus linguistics, and sociolinguistics. Together with fellow researchers and students, he explores the interplay between linguistic, socio-historical and psycholinguistic factors that constrain the shape of linguistic constructions as well as the ways in which they change over time. His data mainly come from synchronic and diachronic corpora of various forms of South African English, Afrikaans and Cape-Dutch, learner corpora and translation corpora. A significant focus of his current research is the verb phrase, with attention to tense, aspect, and modality and complementation. He is an active researcher in the field of World Englishes, and is also involved as writer of the syntax of the Afrikaans verb phrase as part of Taalportaal.

PUBLICATIONS:

VKruger Haidee & Van Rooy Bertus. 2018. Register variation in written contact varieties of English. English World-Wide 39(2): 214-242. URL: https://benjamins.com/catalog/eww.00011.kru

Van Rooy, Bertus & Kruger Haidee. 2018. Hybridity, globalisation and models of Englishes. In Deshors, Sandra C. (ed), Modeling World Englishes: Assessing the interplay of emancipation and globalization of ESL varieties. Amsterdam: Benjamins, p. 77-108. URL: https://benjamins.com/catalog/veaw.g61.04van

Fuchs, Robert, Van Rooy, Bertus & Gut, Ulrike. 2019. Corpus-based research on English in Africa. In: Esimaje, Alexandra U., Gut, Ulrike & Antia, Bassey E. (eds), Corpus Linguistics and African Englishes. Amsterdam: Benjamins, p. 38-69. URL: https://benjamins.com/catalog/scl.88.03fuc

PROJECTS:

Varieties of South African English and their linguistic description

Language change and contact between Afrikaans and South African English

Constrained Language

Relaxing the verbal dress code? The Hansard and language change in Australian and South African English (c. 1900-2016)

Learner corpora