Zheltov Alexander

Date of birth: July 31,1967

Current position:

• Professor and the Chair of the Department of African Studies, St. Petersburg State University,
• the Head of the Department of African Ethnology, Museum of Anthropology and Ethnology of Russian Academy of Science.

Research interests:

• African linguistics,
• linguistic typology,
• methods in African Studies,
• Bantu languages,
• Mande languages,
• Adamawa languages,
• nominal classification,
• personal pronouns,
• role marking typology,
• ditransitive constructions,
• systems of kinship terms.

Publications: more than 125 publications among which Niger-Congo languages:

• structural-dynamic typology (St. Petersburg, 2008, in Russian).
• Some elements of Gban language and linguistic typology. (In Mande languages and linguistics, St.Petersburg, 2008).
• Brothers, sisters, and noun class typology: what is special about Niger-Congo? (In African Languages in Global Society, Cologne 2009).
• 1 and 2 person in Niger-Congo languages: together or separately, and who is higher in the latter case. (In Personal pronouns in Niger- Congo languages, St. Petersburg, 2010.
• What do personal pronouns mean, and what means do they use for that: specifics of Gban (South Eastern Mande) (In St. Petersburg Annual of Asian and African Studies, Wurzburg, 2012).
• The coauthor of 6 collective monographs, the editor or coeditor of 11 books.

Languages:

• Russian,
• English,
• Swahili,
• French

Membership in academic structures:

• Academic Council of St. Petersburg State University,
• Academic Council of the Faculty of Asian and African studies,
• Dissertation Jury of the Faculty of Asian and African studies and Museum of Anthropology and Ethnograpy,
• Academic Council of Museum of Anthropology and Ethnograpy, Council on the Problems of Africa (Russian Academy of Sciences),Editorial board of «St. Petersburg Annual of Asian and African Studies» and “Vestnik SPbGU,
• Head of Master Program “Languages of Asia and Africa” at the Faculty of Asian and African studies

Expeditions:

• Svanetia, Georgia (1989),
• Cot d’Ivoire (2002, 2003),
• Nigeria (2012, 2013, 2014),
• Kenia-Tanzania (2013)

Lectures:

• Paris (France),
• Hamburg (Germany),
• Helsinki (Finland),
• Fes, Casablanca, Rabat (Morocco),
• Yola (Nigeria)  

Some international conferences:

• Some elements of Gban language and linguistic typology // Mande languages and linguistics. 2^nd International Conference. St.Petersburg, 2008.
• 1 and 2 person in Niger-Congo languages: together or separately, and who is higher in the latter case. // Personal pronouns in Niger-Congo languages. International workshop. St. Petersburg, September, 2010.
• Some aspects of Swahili object indexation // 24th Swahili Colloquium, Bayreuth, June 3-5, 2011.
• Some problems of Mande pronominal systems: terminology and interpretation. // 3^rd International Conference on Mande languages and linguistics, Paris, September 14-17, 2011.
• Towards a comparative description of the Adamawa languages of Mumuye-Yendang and Leko-Nimbari groups: a preliminary analysis of the field data. (with T. Anikina and A.Lyakhovich) // Towards Proto-Niger-Congo: Comparison and Reconstructions. International Congress. Paris, September, 18-21, 2012.
• Object indexation in Bantu: the competition of parameters (the case of Swahili and Kinyarwanda). // 5^th International conference of Bantu languages, Paris, June 12-15, 2013. Object indexation in Bantu: the competition of parameters (the case of Swahili and Kinyarwanda). // 5^th International conference of Bantu languages, Paris, June 12-15, 2013.
•       Different strategies of ditransitive constuctions in related languages (the case of Bantu and Adamawa, Niger Congo). // World Congress of African Linguistic, Kyoto, Japan, 22-26 августа 2015.
• Numerals in Adamawa languages: Common roots, diversity of strategies, analogical changes. // 47^th Annual Conference on African Linguistics, March 23-26, 2016, University of California, Berkeley.
• The comparative analysis of morphemic and submorhemic neutralizations in Bantu pronominal paradigms (what they are for, and what they say about the language change). // 6^th International Conference on Bantu Languages. Helsinki, June 20-22, 2016.
• Towards a comparative description of the Adamawa languages of Mumuye-Yendang and Leko groups. (with A. Lyakhovich) // Towards Proto-Niger-Congo: comparison and reconstruction (2^nd international congress). Paris, September 1-3, 2016.

Some important publications (2008-2016):

Monographs:

• Языки нигер-конго: структурно-динамическая типология. СПб.: Издательство СПбГУ, 2008. 270 с. (14 пл).

Collective monographs:

• African Language Studies in St. Petersburg // North-South Contribution to African Studies (edited by Ch. Thornell and Karsten Legère), Rüdiger Köppe Verlag, Köln, 2011, 208 p., p. 197-203
• Язык суахили. Именные категории // Очерки по теоретической грамматике восточных языков: существительное и глагол / Под ред. В. Г. Гузева, СПб.: Издательство СПбГУ, 2011. 395 с. С. 42-75. (Совм. с 8 соавторами)
• Глагольное словоизменение в языке суахили // Очерки по теоретической грамматике восточных языков: существительное и глагол / Под ред. В. Г. Гузева. СПб.: Издательство СПбГУ, 2011. 395 с. С. 256-268. (Совм. с 8 соавторами)
• Суахили // Грамматика и семантика восточного текста. Квантитативные характеристики / Под ред. В. Б. Касевича. СПб.: Изд-во РХГА, 2011. 214 с. С. 145-156. (Совм. с 15 соавторами)
• Старосуахилийская литература // Литературы стран Азии и Африки. Начальный период развития / Под ред. В. В. Емельянова. СПб.: Студия НП-Принт, 2012. 346 с. С. 329-343. (9 соавторов)
• Об именной классификации в языках нигер-конго, типологии именных классификаций и взаимодействии языковых и внеязыковых данных // Концепции современного востоковедения / Под ред. Е. И. Зеленева, В. Б. Касевича. СПб.: Каро, 2013. 463 с. С. 217-238.

Editor:

• Петербургская африканистика. Памяти А. А.Жукова. СПб.: Издательство СПбГУ, 2008. 279 с. (отв. редактор)
• Personal pronouns in Niger-Congo languages. International workshop. (V. Vydrine, K. Pozdniakov, A. Zheltov — eds.). St. Petersburg, 2010, St. Petersburg, 96 p.
• Сказки народов Африки // Под науч. ред. В. Ф. Выдрина, А. Ю. Желтова. СПб.: Филологический ф-т СПбГУ, 2010. 516 с.
• Le Mond Mandé. К 50-летию Валентина Феодосьевича Выдрина. Материалы экспедиции в Западную Африку // Отв. ред. Е. В. Перехвальская, А. Ю. Желтов. СПб.: Нестор-История, 2011. 180 с.
• Между Нигером и Конго: Заметки на полях: К 60-летию Константина Игоревича Позднякова. СПб.: Нестор-История, 2012. 254 с. (отв. редактор, совм. с В. Ф. Выдриным)
• Африканский сборник – 2011. СПб.: МАЭ РАН, 2012, 422 с. (отв. редактор).
• Африканский сборник – 2013. СПб.: МАЭ РАН, 2013, 472 с. (отв. редактор)
• Антропология и лингвистика: материалы  петербургских экспедиций в Африку. СПб.: МАЭ РАН, 2014, 234 с. (отв. редактор)
• Африканский сборник - 2015. СПб.: МАЭ РАН, 2015, 40 п.л. (отв. редактор)

Articles in English:

• Some elements of Gban language and linguistic typology // Mande languages and linguistics. 2nd International Conference. St.Petersburg, 2008, p. 126-129. (0,2 пл).
• Brothers, sisters, and noun class typology: what is special about Niger-Congo?//African Languages in Global Society Papers read at the Symposium “Text in Context: African Languages between Orality and Scripturality”. University of Zurich, October 18–20, 2001. Edited by Thomas Bearth / Jasmina Bonato / Karin Geitlinger / Lorenza Coray-Dapretto / Wilhelm J. G. Möhlig / Thomas Olver. Rüdiger Köppe Verlag • Cologne 2009, p. A 127- A130 (0,2 пл).
• 1 and 2 person in Niger-Congo languages: together or separately, and who is higher in the latter case. // Personal pronouns in Niger- Congo languages. International workshop. St. Petersburg, 2010, St. Petersburg University Publishing House, c. 176-186. (0,4 пл).
• What do personal pronouns mean, and what means do they use for that: specifics of Gban (South Eastern Mande) // St. Petersburg Annual of Asian and African Studies. Ergon Verlag, Wurzburg, 2012. p. 73-85.
• Оbject indexation in Bantu: the competition of parameters (the case of Swahili and Kinyarwanda 3-valency verb constructions).// St. Petersburg Annual of Asian and African Studies. Ergon Verlag, Wurzburg, 2014, p. 35-43 (0,5).
• Comparative analysis of morphemic and submorhemic neutralizations in Bantu pronominal paradigms  (what they are for, and what they say about the language change) // Вестник СПбГУ, серия 13, вып. 4, 2016, с. 13-21.