Willem Leo Marie (Leo) Wetzels (born 9 September 1951, Schinnen) is a full professor at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the Netherlands and Directeur de recherche at Laboratoire de Phonétique et Phonologie (LPP), CNRS/Sorbonne-Nouvelle in Paris. He is Editor-in-Chief of Probus International, the Journal of Latin and Romance Linguistics.
Wetzels has received numerous research grants, most recently a VU University research grant for an AIO-project on Aymara Morphophonology and the NWO internationalization grant which aims at constructing an international cooperation network in the area of Amerindian languages and cultures involving the chair of Amazonian Languages at the VU, the Centre d'Etudes des Langues Indigènes d'Amérique, CNRS, Paris, the Leiden Centre for Amerindian Studies, the Anthropology department of the Universidade Federal do Amazonas, Manaus, Brazil, and the Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia (National Institute for Amazonian Studies), Manaus, Brazil.
Wetzels is involved in a variety of research projects, most prominent is the one which regards nasal harmony systems. The project aims at establishing the phonological and morphological parameters that are crosslinguistically involved in long-distance nasal spreading. As part of the project, a digital database (NASDAT) was developed by Rob Goedemans (Leiden University) George N. Clements (CNRS, Paris), and Leo Wetzels himself. The NASDAT database will be made accessible to the international linguistic community via its website.
In another of his projects, Leo Wetzels and Sérgio Meira (Leiden University) present a comprehensive survey and theoretical discussion of the word-prosodic systems of the indigenous languages of South America. The study will be published as a chapter of Rob Goedemans (Leiden University) and Harry van der Hulst (University of Connecticut) to appear, Stress Systems in the Languages of the World. Berlin, Mouton de Gruyter.
In his efforts to complete the reconstruction of Proto-Nambikwara Sound Structure, Januacele da Costa (Universidade Federal de Alagoas, Maceió, Brazil) and Wetzels presented a comparative sketch (in terms of phonology, morphology, and syntax) of the Nambikwara languages of Brazil and propose a reconstruction of the Proto-Nambikwara sound system as well as a Proto-Nambikwara lexicon. The study is meant as a contribution to the comparative and historical linguistics of the Amerindian languages. The research on comparative Nambikwara is part of the larger project supervised by Leo Wetzels, entitled The Nambikwara Indians. A Description of their Languages (Latundê, Sararé, and Sabanê) and of their Cultural Identity, funded by WOTRO/NWO. Grammars of Latundê (S. Telles) and Sabanê (G. Antunes) are completed and published.
Wetzels was elected to the Academy of Europe in 2019.[1]
Wetzels has a number of publications, a chronicological overview of some highlights is given below.
A few of Wetzels' academic journal publications are listed alphabetically here.
1977. ‘Les pronoms clitiques du français. Une étude explicative des mécanismes transformationnels’. Grazer Linguistische Studien, nr. 5: 125–150. (French Clitic Pronouns. Explaining the Transformational Mechanisms)
1985. ’The Historical Phonology of Intrusive Stops: a Non-Linear Approach,’ Canadian Journal of Linguistics, 30,3: 285–333.
1986. (with Yip Wester). ‘Niet-lineaire Fonologie, een theorie in SPE’, Inleiding, Leo Wetzels en Haike Jacobs (eds.), Gramma, themanummer Fonologie: 89–103. Non-Linear Phonology a Theory “in SPE”, Introduction).
1986. (with Engin Sezer).’Derived Opacity in Yakut Vowel Harmony', Leo Wetzels and Haike Jacobs (eds.) Gramma, themanummer Fonologie: 201-224.
1988. (with Haike Jacobs). ‘Early French Lenition. A Formal Account of an Integrated Sound Change’, H.van der Hulst and Norval Smith (eds.) Feature Specification and Segmental Structure. Dordrecht, Foris: 105–129.
1990. ‘Umlaut en Verkleinwoordsvorming in het Limburgs’, Gramma, Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Taalkunde:139-168. (Umlaut and Diminutive Formation in Limburg Dutch)
1991. ‘Harmonia Vocálica, Truncamento, Abaixamento e Neutralização no Sistema Verbal do Português: Uma Análise Autosegmental', Cadernos de Estudos Lingüísticos. IEL/UNICAMP: 25-58. (Vowel Harmony, Truncation, Lowering, and Neutralization in the Portuguese Verb System)
1992. (with João Moraes). ‘Sobre a Duração dos Segmentos Vocálicos Nasais e Nasalizados em Português. Um Exercício de Fonologia Experimental’, Wetzels & Abaurre (eds.), Fonologia do Português, Numero Especial dos Cadernos de Estudos Lingüísticos. IEL/UNICAMP: 153–166. (On the Length of Nasal and Nasalized Vowels in Portuguese, an Exercise in Experimental Phonology)
1992. ‘Mid Vowel Neutralization in Brazilian Portuguese', Wetzels & Abaurre (eds.), Fonologia do Português, Numero Especial dos Cadernos de Estudos Lingüísticos. IEL/ UNICAMP: 19-55.
1992. (with Bernadete Abaurre). ‘Sobre a Estrutura da Gramática Fonológica’, Wetzels & Abaurre (eds.), Fonologia do Português, Número Especial dos Cadernos de Estudos Lingüísticos. IEL/UNICAMP: 5–18. (On the Structure of the Phonological Grammar)
1993. ‘Prevowels in Maxacalí: Where they come from,’ Revista da Associação Brasileira de Lingüística, São Paulo: 39–63.
1995. ‘Mid-Vowel Alternations in the Brazilian Portuguese Verb,’ Phonology, 12: 281–304.
1997. ‘The Lexical Representation of Nasality in Brazilian Portuguese,’ Probus, 9.2: 203–232.
1997. ‘Bakairi and the Feature ‘voice’,’ Revista da Associação Brasileira de Lingüística. Homenagem a Aryon Dall’Igna Rodrigues. Janeiro 97: 21-34.
1997. ‘As Línguas não Têm Dono,’ Anais do 3.0 Encontro Nacional de Acervos Literários Brasileiras: Ética e Política de Gestão de Acervos Literários (PUCRS-Porto Alegre, Brazil): 144–53. (English version ‘Languages Have no Owners’ also available, Ms. VU University Amsterdam).
1999. (with Frans Hinskens and Roeland van Hout). ‘O Balanço entre Dados e Teoria nos Estudos de Variação e Mudança Lingüísticas’. Letras de Hoje, PUCRS, Porto Alegre, Brazil: 7-45. (translation of previous publication by the editors of the Brazilian journal Letras de Hoje)
2000. ‘Comentários sobre a estrutura fonológica dos ditongos nasais no Português do Brasil’. Revista de Letras (UFC) no. 22, vol.1/2 : 25–30. (Remarks on the Phonological Structure of Nasal Diphthongs in Brazilian Portuguese)
2000. ‘Consoantes palatais como geminadas fonológicas no Português Brasileiro’. Revista de Estudos da Linguagem, Vol.9,2: 5–15. (Palatal Consonants as Phonological Geminates in Brazilian Portuguese)
2001. (Leo Wetzels first author, with Joan Mascaró) ‘The Typology of Voicing and Devoicing’ Language 77, 2: 207–244.
2002 ‘O traço [voz], privativo ou binário? O testemunho das línguas indígenas brasileiras Yathé e Bakairi.’ Leitura, Revista do programa de pós-graduação em letras e linguística LCV-CHLA-UFAL: 13–29. (The Feature [voice] Privative or Binary? The Testimony of the Indigenous Brazilian Languages Yathé and Bakairi)
2003. ‘On the Weight Issue in Portuguese. A Typological Investigation’. Letras de Hoje, 134 : 107–133.
2006. ‘Sound Change and Analogy: The Synchronic Reflexes of the Second Compensatory Lengthening in Ancient Greek Dialects’. Vera Pacheco & Gladys Cagliari (eds). Revista Estudos da Língua(gem), 3: 69–89.
2007. ‘Primary Stress in Brazilian Portuguese and the Quantity Parameter’. Gorka Elordieta and Marina Vigário (eds.) Journal of Portuguese Linguistics Vol 5/6, Special Issue on the Prosody of the Iberian Languages: 9-58.
2008. ‘Thoughts on the Phonological Definition of Nasal/Oral Contour Consonants in Some Indigenous Languages of South-America’. Revista ALFA 52(2): Abordagens em fonética e fonologia: estudos auditivos, acústicos e perceptivos; modelos de análise fonológica de ontem e de hoje