Jeroen Willemsen studied Linguistics at the University of Amsterdam, Leiden University and Aarhus Universitet in Aarhus, Denmark, respectively. He specialized in descriptive, theoretical and comparative linguistics. His work in Aarhus was focused on creating an initial description of the Papuan language Reta, which involved a year of fieldwork among speakers of the Reta language. He defended his dissertation ‘A Grammar of Reta’ in 2021.
After switching paths to software development due to his ever-growing interest in computers, he started working as a language data-engineer for the Dutch Language Institute (INT) in 2025. At the institute, he primarily focuses on the architecture and processing of corpus data. His spare time is occupied by the writing of a trilingual dictionary of English-Indonesian-Reta.
Publications
- Nash, J., Bakker, P., Bøegh, K. F., Daval-Markussen, A., Haberland, H., Kedwards, D., Ladhams, J. Levisen, C., Markússon, J. S., Robbe, J. & Willemsen, J. (2020). On languages on islands. Acta Linguistica Hafniensia, 52(1), 81–116.
- Robbe, J. R., & Willemsen, J. (2020). Phonaesthemic alternations in Flemish dialects: a matter of language contact in the emergence of phonaesthesia? Folia Linguistica, 56(1), 57–86.
- Willemsen, J. (2020). Reta. In A. Schapper (Ed.) Papuan Languages of Timor, Alor and Pantar: Volume 3. Sketch Grammars, 187–266. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
- Willemsen, J. (2021). The sloped world(s) of the Reta language: The expression of elevation in a montane language community. Journal of Postcolonial Linguistics, 5, 143–177. Special issue: Language and popular geopolitics.
- Willemsen, J. (2021). A Grammar of Reta. Aarhus Universitet, PhD dissertation.
- Willemsen, J. & Goldshtein, D. (2020). Review of lexiRumah 3.0.0. Language Documentation & Conservation, 14, 692-702.
- Willemsen, J., & Miltersen, E. H. (2020). The expression of vulgarity, force, severity and size: phonaesthemic minimal pairs in Reta and in other languages. Studies in Language, 44(3), 659–699.