Henri Kauhanen

Hi, and welcome! My name is Henri, and I am a complex systems scientist working on linguistic variation and change. I formulate and study mathematical models to try to figure out what is and what isn’t universal in the dynamics of human language.

Postdoctoral Researcher / ERC project STARFISH / University of Konstanz

mail (prep) hkauhanen (dot) fi

Selected papers

Geospatial distributions reflect temperatures of linguistic features

Henri Kauhanen, Deepthi Gopal, Tobias Galla & Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero

Science Advances, 7, eabe6540 (2021)

The propensity of features of language to change can be measured using a temperature-like quantity.

Open access: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abe6540

Replicator–mutator dynamics of linguistic convergence and divergence

Royal Society Open Science, 7, 201682 (2020)

Sociolinguistic identity maintenance can be understood as a population game with nonlinear fitness.

Open access: https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.201682

Stable variation in multidimensional competition

The Determinants of Diachronic Stability (Benjamins) (2019)

Stable variation can arise when multiple grammars compete.

Closed access: https://doi.org/10.1075/la.254.11kau

Preprint: https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.06265

Deriving the Constant Rate Effect

Henri Kauhanen & George Walkden

Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 36(2), 483–521 (2018)

The Constant Rate Effect, or something like it, arises from the interplay of variational learning and production biases.

Open access: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11049-017-9380-1

Neutral change

Journal of Linguistics, 53(2), 327–358 (2017)

Changes can be well-behaved even if they are selectively neutral.

Closed access: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022226716000141

Preprint: papers/neutral-change.pdf

Manuscripts

A bifurcation threshold for contact-induced language change

(2021)

The fraction of L2 learners present in a speech community must exceed a critical threshold for L2-difficult features to be lost.

Preprint: https://arxiv.org/abs/2111.12061

Thesis

Individual and population in language change: mathematical explorations of the acquisition–use loop

(2018)

PhD Thesis in Linguistics, The University of Manchester

Open access: https://www.research.manchester.ac.uk/portal/files/93532746/FULL_TEXT.PDF

Trajectory

2021–
Postdoc in the ERC project STARFISH
University of Konstanz

2019–2021
Postdoctoral Fellow, Zukunftskolleg
University of Konstanz

2018–2019
ESRC Postdoctoral Fellow
University of Manchester

2017–2018
Akademischer Mitarbeiter, Department of Linguistics
University of Konstanz

2014–2018
PhD (Linguistics)
University of Manchester

2005–2013
BA (Cognitive Science), BA (English Philology), MA (Cognitive Science)
University of Helsinki

Stuff

I also like music, photography, table tennis, coffee and fountain pens. Here’s a blog.