Merete Brendeford Anderssen

Merete Brendeford Anderssen is a Professor of English Linguistics at UiT The Arctic University of Norway, serving as Academic Programme Director for English Language and Theoretical Linguistics and Deputy leader of the research group AcqVA-Nor. She leads the C-LaBL Learning Domain and oversees study programs in English linguistics (M-EAC) and theoretical linguistics (M-TLIN). Her research focuses on multilingual acquisition, syntactic variation, heritage languages, and cross-linguistic influence. She has contributed to projects like MultiGender (CAS), MiMS (RCN), INPUT (MSCA), and MuMiN (RCN), exploring language representation, attrition, and maintenance across diverse populations.

Her work integrates experimental methods (ERP studies, response time analysis) with theoretical linguistics, examining how structural similarities between languages influence acquisition and attrition. Key themes include heritage language trajectories in Syrian Arabic-German bilinguals, L3 acquisition processes, and dialect levelling mechanisms in Norwegian dialects. She has published extensively on word order variation, possessive constructions, and cross-linguistic influence in multilingual contexts.

Current research interests include studying heritage speakers across ages and examining the role of English-Norwegian similarities in multilingual minds. Anderssen collaborates internationally, leading teams that bridge psycholinguistics and sociolinguistics. Her grants include €1.5M from RCN for MuMiN (2021-2025) and MSCA funding for INPUT (2021-2023).