Research

Topics, Projects, and Publications

Research Topics

Never been a one-trick pony.

Collaboration, creating synergy, and trying to add a piece to the research puzzle that creates more than the sum total of the individual pieces – this is what fuels my passion as a researcher and research consultant.

Diversification, optionality, and serendipity are also what drives me forward in my personal lines of research. My published work covers topics such as exaptation, sign theory (Artistotle), prepositional and constructional semantics, semiotics, Charles Sanders Peirce, and multiple negation. Two major topics that I’ve worked on extensively are iconicity and alternating constructions.

Iconicity

My PhD research involved an epistemological study of iconicity in language, the results of which were published in Limiting the Iconic (Benjamins, 2008). Building on views by E. Coseriu, U. Eco, G. Sonesson, K. Willems, and S. Levinson, my main idea is that a principled distinction must be made between similarity and iconicity. I believe this is a fundamental epistemological distinction that has not yet been fully appreciated in the literature. I got to summarize this idea in the chapter “The explanatory power of iconicity in language” in The Oxford Handbook of Iconicity in Language (Oxford University Press, 2026).

(a) De Cuypere (2008)
(b) Willems & De Cuypere (2008)
(c) Fischer et al. (2026)
Figure 1: From left to right: my published PhD dissertation, a volume co-edited with Klaas Willems, and the OUP Handbook on Iconicity in which I contributed Chapter 7: The explanatory power of iconicity in language.

Rong Chen (California State University, San Bernardino) wrote the following appreciation in his review of Limiting the Iconic (Linguist List 20-1353, 2009)

Growing out of the author’s dissertation, this book [Limiting the Iconic, LDC] reads every bit like a monograph by a seasoned linguist. The survey of the literature on the topic is thorough and the author’s critiques of previous scholars’ theories and constructs are detailed, careful, and balanced. Of all the chapters, Chapter 5 strikes this reviewer as the most substantive and impressive: De Cuypere analyzes major works on iconicity to argue that most of these authors are off the mark. You think hard and eventually agree that he makes sense. At the end of the book, you think hard again and decide that he is largely right. Then you realize that you have read a very good book, a very important book, a book that you would come back to for information and inspiration later in your work.

Alternations

My second line of research deals with alternating constructions, or so-called “unfree variation” (A. Zwicky). This involves the study of optionality in language: formal differences that do not seem to be make any obvious semantic difference. I have studied phenomena such as: The dative and ditransitive alternations, Zero-that complementizer alternation, Differential infinitive marking, Ergativity and the passive alternation, English modal verbs. With my many collaborators, I examined these phenomena in various languages and from multiple perspectives (diachrony, first and second, language acquisition). Methodologically, I’ve mainly followed a corpus-based approach.

Theoretically, my work is situated in the functional-structuralist tradition (Saussure, Humboldt, Coseriu, Willems). My “thematic” (G. Holton) or “axiomatic” presuppositions include: The existence of a language system of signs or constructions; the sign is fundamentally arbitrary; a principled distinction between semantics (monosemy) and pragmatics; the three layers of system, norm, and usage; language ís cognition; speaking is a creative activity, and corpus data is the product of that activity.

Salience

Together with Esli Struys (VUB) and Alex Housen (VUB), and PhD students Georgia Knell and Saioa Cipitria, I am involved in two research projects studying the effect of saliency in language acquisition. In these studies, we add artificial markers (such as -olp or -u) to English test sentences and track participants’ eye movements to examine how these markers influence attention, and how this affects awareness and acquisition. Several papers from this project are currently under review. A systematic review has already been published as Knell et al. (2025).

Projects

  • 2022 – ongoing: Eye-Catching - Investigating the link between salience, attention and awareness in the acquisition of grammatical morphology in a second language.

    • Senior Research Project
    • Funding: Research Foundation Flanders (FWO)
    • Supervisor: Alex Housen
    • Co-supervisors: Elsi Struys and Ludovic De Cuypere
    • Researcher: Saioa Cipitria

  • 2021 – ongoing: What the eyes don’t see, the mind won’t learn: Investigating the role of salience in the initial processing of morphology in SLA.

    • Phd Fellowship
    • Funding: Research Foundation Flanders (FWO)
    • Supervisor: Esli Struys
    • Co-supervisors: Alex Housen and Ludovic De Cuypere
    • Phd-researcher: Georgia Knell

  • 2019 – 2026: Language productivity at work

    • Multiresearcher project
    • Funding: BOF UGent
    • Supervisors: Peter Lauwers (administrative main supervisor), Jóhanna Barthdal, Timothy Colleman, Renata Enghels, Miriam Taverniers
    • Co-supervisors: Ludovic De Cuypere, Anne-Sophie Ghyselen
    • Researchers: Mark Hoff, Emmaline Rice, Joren Somers, Margot Van den Heede, Anouk Van den Stock.

  • 2013 – 2018: A Corpus-Driven Study of the Structure of Noun Phrase in Nigerian English

    • Supervisor: Alex Housen
    • Co-supervisor: Ludovic De Cuypere
    • Researcher: Mayowa Akinlotan

  • 2018 – 2022: Die Dativalternation in der Geschichte des Neuhochdeutschen. Eine historische und korpusbasierte Untersuchung

    • Phd Fellowship
    • Funding: BOF UGent
    • Supervisors: Klaas Willems & Ludovic De Cuypere
    • Researcher: Evi Van Damme.

  • 2016 – 2020: The ditransitive alternation in present-day German. A corpus-based analysis

    • Phd Research project
    • Funding: none
    • Supervisors: Klaas Willems & Ludovic De Cuypere
    • Researcher: Hilde De Vaere

  • 2012 – 2014: Case alternation in present-day German: a corpus-based analysis of the conditions of use of accusative and dative with non-transparant two-way prepositional verbs

    • Phd Fellowship
    • Funding: Research Foundation Flanders (FWO)
    • Supervisors: Klaas Willems & Ludovic De Cuypere
    • Researcher: Jonah Rys

  • 2010 – 2013: Ditransitivity from Old to Middle English

    • Postdoctoral Fellowship
    • Funding: Research Foundation Flanders (FWO)
    • Supervisor: Klaas Willems (UGent)
    • Researcher: Ludovic De Cuypere

  • 2007 – 2010: A diachronic analysis of the English Dative Alternation

    • Postdoctoral Fellowship
    • Funding: Research Foundation Flanders (FWO)
    • Supervisor: Klaas Willems (UGent)
    • Researcher: Ludovic De Cuypere

  • 2003 – 2007: Een kritische analyse van de iconiciteitstheory

    • Research Project
    • Funding: Research Foundation Flanders (FWO)
    • Supervisors: Klaas Willems, Johan Van der Auwera (UAntwerpen), Willy Van Langendonck (KULeuven)
    • Researcher: Ludovic De Cuypere

Doctoral Advisory Board

To date I have served as an advisor in 16 doctoral advisory committees: Dr. Niek Van Wettere (UGent), Dr. Justine Métairy (UGent), Dr. Kim Collewaert (VUB), Dr. Fien De Latte (UGent), Dr. Tom Bossuyt (UGent), Dr. Joren Somers (UGent), Dr. Alessandro Papini (UGent), Dr. Nele Van Den Driessche (UGent), Dr. Giang Hoang (UGent), Dr. Hilde De Vaere (UGent), Dr. Evi Van Damme (UGent), Dr. Thomas Belligh (UGent), Dr. Rachel Nye (VUB), Gil Verbeke (ongoing), Romeo De Timmerman (ongoing) (UGent), Jovana Stanojevic (ongoing) (VUB).

Publications

Monographs

De Cuypere, L. (2008). Limiting the iconic: from the metatheoretical foundations to the creative possibilities of iconicity in language. Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/ill.6

Edited books

Depraetere, I., Cappelle B., Hilpert M., De Cuypere L., Dehouck M., Denis P., Flach S., Grabar N., Grandin C., Hamon T., Hufeld C., Leclercq B. and Hans-Jörg Schmid (eds.)(2023) Models of Modals. From Pragmatics and Corpus Linguistics to Machine Learning. de Gruyter.

De Cuypere, L., Vanderschueren, C., & De Sutter, G. (Eds.). (2017). Current trends in analyzing syntactic variation. Benjamins.

Willems, K., & De Cuypere, L. (Eds.). (2008). Naturalness and iconicity in language. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/ill.7

Colleman, T., De Cuypere, L., De Vogelaer, G., & Rawoens, G. (Eds.). (2007). Studies van de Belgische Kring voor Linguïstiek. Belgische Kring voor Linguïstiek.

Articles

Somers, J., Leuschner, T., De Cuypere, L., & Barðdal, J. (2025). A corpus-based analysis of the dat-nom/nom-dat alternation in German. Zeitschrift für Sprachwissenschaft, 44(2). https://doi.org/10.18148/zs/2025-2009 – DATASET

Knell, G., Cipitria, S., De Cuypere, L., Housen, A., & Struys, E. (2025). Stand-out: a systematic review of the role of salience in second language acquisition. Journal of the European Second Language Association, 9(1), 1–18. https://doi.org/10.22599/jesla.131 – DATASET

Ponnet, A. & De Cuypere, L. (2024). The acquisition of Hindi split-ergativity and differential object marking by Dutch L1 speakers: systematicity and variation. Language Acquisition 31(2), 145–176. https://doi.org/10.1080/10489223.2023.2195390 – DATASET

De Timmerman, R., De Cuypere, L., & Slembrouck, S. (2024). The globalization of local indexicalities through music: African-American English and the blues. Journal of Sociolinguistics 28(1), 3–25. https://doi.org/10.1111/josl.12616

Verbeke, G., Simon, E., Hartsuiker, R., Mitterer, H., & De Cuypere, L. (2024). Perceptie van een anderstalig accent: een experimentele studie naar de perceptieve aanpassing aan een exogeen geaccentueerd Nederlands klinkercontrast. Handelingen - Koninklijke Zuid-Nederlandse maatschappij voor taal- en letterkunde en geschiedenis 76, 225–252. doi: https://doi.org/10.21825/kzm.90450 – DATASET

Ponnet, A., & De Cuypere, L. (2023). The acquisition of Differential Object Marking : a longitudinal study on L1 Dutch learners of Hindi as a foreign language. Linguistica e Filologigia 43, 217–255. https://doi.org/10.13122/LeF_43_p217 – – DATASET

Belligh, T., De Cuypere, L., & Crocco, C. (2023). Alternating Italian thetic and sentence-focus constructions: a case study. Revue Romane, 58(2), 246–277. https://doi.org/10.1075/rro.16006.bel

Verroens, F. & De Cuypere, L. (2023). French ingressives and (phasal) aspect: a frame-semantic corpus-based analysis. Canadian Journal of Linguistics-Revue Canadienne de Linguistique, 68(3), 435–461. https://doi.org/10.1017/cnj.2023.19 – DATASET

Hoang, T. H.-G., Baten, K., De Cuypere, L., Hoang, T. T., & Taverniers, M. (2021). An exploratory study of predictors of vocabulary knowledge of Vietnamese preschool-age children in a city. Dutch Journal of Applied Linguistics, 10. https://doi.org/10.51751/dujal9538

De Vaere, H., De Cuypere, L., & Willems, K. (2021). Alternating constructions with ditransitive geben in present-day German. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory, 17(1), 73–107. https://doi.org/10.1515/cllt-2017-0072

Baten, K., Van Hiel, S., & De Cuypere, L. (2020). Vocabulary development in a CLIL context: a comparison between French and English L2. Studies in Second Language Learning and Teaching, 10(2), 307–336. https://doi.org/10.14746/ssllt.2020.10.2.5 – DATASET

De Vaere, H., De Cuypere, L., & Willems, K. (2020). Constructional variation with two near-synonymous verbs: the case of schicken and senden in present-day German. Language Sciences, 83. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langsci.2020.101313

Lybaert, C., De Clerck, B., Saelens, J., & De Cuypere, L. (2019). A corpus-based analysis of V2 variation in West Flemish and French Flemish dialects. Journal of Germanic Linguistics, 31(1), 43–100. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1470542718000028 – DATASET

Vermote, T., Lauwers, P., & De Cuypere, L. (2017). Transcending the lexical vs grammatical divide regarding the mass/count distinction: lessons from corpus studies and acceptability surveys in French and Dutch. Language Sciences, 62, 37–51. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langsci.2017.02.002

Blondeel, J., De Cuypere, L., & Willems, K. (2017). Nominal word formations and syntagms with super. A corpus-based investigation. Deutsche Sprache, 45(1), 53–77.

Simon, E., Lima Jr, R., & De Cuypere, L. (2016). Acquiring non-native speech through early media exposure: Belgian children’s productions of English vowels. Poznan Studies in Contemporary Linguistics 52(4), 719–743. https://doi.org/10.1515/psicl-2016-0028

De Cuypere, L. (2015). The Old English to-dative construction. English Language and Linguistics, 19(1), 1–26. https://doi.org/10.1017/s1360674314000276

De Cuypere, L. (2015). A multivariate analysis of the Old English ACC+DAT double object alternation. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory 11(2), 225–254. https://doi.org/10.1515/cllt-2014-0011

Vandendaele, A., De Cuypere, L., & Van Praet, E. (2015). Beyond “Trimming the fat”: the sub-editing stage of newswriting. Written Communication, 32(4), 368–395. https://doi.org/10.1177/0741088315599391

Verbeke, S., & De Cuypere, L. (2015). Differential subject marking in Nepali imperfective constructions: a probabilistic grammar approach. Studies in Language, 39(1), 1–23. https://doi.org/10.1075/sl.39.1.01ver

Rys, J., & De Cuypere, L. (2014). Variable satellite placement in spoken Dutch: a corpus study of the role of the proximity principle. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 19(4), 548–569. https://doi.org/10.1075/ijcl.19.4.05rys

De Cuypere, L., De Coster, E., & Baten, K. (2014). The acquisition of the English dative alternation by Russian foreign language learners. Phrasis (Gent): Studies in Language and Literature 2, 187–212.

De Cuypere, L., Baten, K., & Rawoens, G. (2014). A corpus-based analysis of the Swedish passive alternation. Nordic Journal of Linguistics, 37(2), 199–223. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0332586514000183

Baten, K., & **De Cuypere, L. (2014). The dative alternation in L2 German? Conceptualization transfer from L1 Dutch. VIAL-VIGO International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 11, 9–40.

Vanderschueren, C., & De Cuypere, L. (2014). The inflected/non-inflected infinitive alternation in Portuguese adverbial clauses: a corpus analysis. Language Sciences, 41, 153–174. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langsci.2013.08.016

De Cuypere, L. (2013). Debiasing semantic analysis: the English preposition to. Language Sciences, 37, 122–135. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langsci.2012.12.002

De Cuypere, L., & Verbeke, S. (2013). Dative alternation in Indian English: a corpus-based study. World Englishes, 32(2), 169–184. https://doi.org/10.1111/weng.12017

De Backer, M., & De Cuypere, L. (2012). The interpretation of masculine personal nouns in German and Dutch: a comparative experimental study. Language Sciences, 34(3), 253–268. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langsci.2011.10.001

De Cuypere, L. (2010). The Old English double object alternation : a discourse-based approach. Sprachwissenschaft, 35(3), 337–368.

Verbeke, S., & De Cuypere, L. (2009). The rise of ergativity in Hindi: assessing the role of grammaticalization. Folia Linguistica Historica, 30(1), 367–389. https://doi.org/10.1515/flih.2009.004

De Cuypere, L., & Willems, K. (2008). Meaning and Reference in Aristotle’s Concept of the Linguistic Sign. Foundations of Science, 13(3–4), 307–324. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10699-008-9134-y

Van der Gucht, F., Willems, K., & De Cuypere, L. (2007). The iconicity of embodied meaning. Polysemy of spatial prepositions in the cognitive framework. Language Sciences 29(6), 733–754.

De Cuypere, L. (2006). Iconiciteit in taal: evolutionarisme en creativiteit. Studies van de BKL, 1.

De Cuypere, L. (2005). Exploring exaptation in language change. FOLIA LINGUISTICA HISTORICA, 26(1–2), 13–26.

Book Chapters

De Cuypere, L. (2026). In O. Fischer, K. Akita, & P. Perniss (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook on iconicity in language (Chapter 7). Oxford. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780192849489.013.0008

Capelle, B., De Cuypere, L., Depraetere, I., Grandin, C., & Leclercq, B. (2023). Possibility modals: which conditions make them possible? In I. Depraetere, B. Capelle, & M. Hilpert (Eds.), Models of modals: from pragmatics and corpus linguistics to machine learning (pp. 93–117). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110734157-004

Van Damme, E., De Cuypere, L., & Willems, K. (2022). Die Dativalternation im 18. Jahrhundert : eine vergleichende Fallstudie zu den Verben “senden” und “verkaufen.” In A. Havinga & B. Lindner-Bornemann (Eds.), Deutscher Sprachgebrauch im 18. Jahrhundert: Sprachmentalität, Sprachwirklichkeit, Sprachreichtum (pp. 135–165). Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter.

Van Damme, E., De Cuypere, L., & Willems, K. (2020). The ditransitive alternation in the history of German: the case of verkaufen (‘sell’). In C. Fedriani & M. Napoli (Eds.), The diachrony of ditransitives (pp. 197–228). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110701371-007

Bossuyt, T., De Cuypere, L., & Leuschner, T. (2018). Emergence phenomena in German W-immer/auch-subordinators. In E. Fuß, M. Konopka, B. Trawiński, & U. H. Waßner (Eds.), Grammar and Corpora 2016 (pp. 97–120). https://doi.org/10.17885/HEIUP.361.509

Willems, K., De Cuypere, L., & Rys, J. (2018). Case alternation in argument structure constructions with prepositional verbs: a case study in corpus-based constructional analysis. In H. C. Boas & A. Ziem (Eds.), Constructional approaches to syntactic structures in German (pp. 85–130). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110457155-003

De Cuypere, L., & De Sutter, G. (2017). Introduction: current trends in analyzing syntactic variation. Belgian Journal of Linguistics, 31(1), 1–7. https://doi.org/10.1075/bjl.00013.dec

Simoens, H., Housen, A., & De Cuypere, L. (2017). The effect of perceptual salience on processing L2 inflectional morphology. In S. Gass, P. Spinner, & J. Behney (Eds.), Salience in second language acquisition (pp. 107–130). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315399027-6

Simon, E., Lima Jr, R., & De Cuypere, L. (2015). No immersion, no instruction: children’s non-native vowel productions in a foreign language context. In E. Babatsouli & D. Ingram (Eds.), Proceedings of the International Symposium on Monolingual and Bilingual Speech.

Rys, J., Willems, K., & De Cuypere, L. (2014). Akkusativ und Dativ nach Wechselpräpositionen im Deutschen: eine Korpusanalyse von “versinken”, “versenken”, “einsinken.” In I. Doval & B. Lübke (Eds.), Raumlinguistik und Sprachkontrast: neue Beiträge zu spatialen Relationen im Deutschen, Englischen und Spanischen (pp. 217–234). München, Deutschland: Iudicium.

De Cuypere, L., & Willems, K. (2008). Introduction: naturalness and iconicity in language. In K. Willems & L. De Cuypere (Eds.), Naturalness and iconicity in language (pp. 1–23). Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/ill.7.03de

De Cuypere, L., Van der Auwera, J., & Willems, K. (2007). Double negation and iconicity. In E. Tabakowska, C. Ljungberg, & O. Fischer (Eds), Insistent images (pp. 301–320). Benjamins.

Van der Auwera, J., De Cuypere, L., & Neuckermans, A. (2006). Negative indefinites: a typological and diachronic perspective on a Brabantic construction. In T. Nevalainen, J. Klemola, & M. Laitinen (Eds.), Types of variation: diachronic, dialectal and typological interfaces (pp. 305–319). Benjamins.

De Cuypere, L., & Willems, K. (2006). Charles Sanders Peirce. In: K. Brown (Ed.), Encyclopedia of language and linguistics. Vol. 9. p.256-257. Elsevier.

Willems, K., Van der Gucht, F., & De Cuypere, L. (2004). Semantische inclusie, variabele valentie en iconiciteit. In J. De Caluwe, M. Devos, J. Van Keymeulen, & G. De Schutter (Eds.), Taeldeman, man van de taal, schatbewaarder van de taal: liber amicorum Johan Taeldeman (pp. 1061–1078). Academia Press.