Professor Abhishek Avtans teaches Hindi language & literature, and south Asian linguistics at Leiden University in the Netherlands. A linguist by training, Prof. Avtans specializes in south Asian linguistics, second language acquisition, lexicography, semantics, historical linguistics and stylistic analysis of vernacular literature written in languages of Hindi/Urdu speaking regions of the world. He has worked on languages such as Pnar (Jaintia) of Meghalaya, Bhojpuri, Braj Bhasha, Marwari, Awadhi etc. along with an endangered language named Great Andamanese (Andaman Islands, India) under a research project of university of London (UK). Before joining Leiden University, he was an Assistant Professor of Applied Linguistics at Central Institute of Hindi, Agra (Government of India) for several years. He holds a BA in Japanese language & literature and later earned his post-graduate degrees in Linguistics from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. He has published on topics such as pidgins and creoles of south Asia, mixed languages of south Asia, sign languages of south Asia, south Asian Braille, Bible translations in south Asian languages, word etymologies, Hindi/Urdu linguistics, and documentation of lesser-known languages of India. He continues to learn and speak several Indian and world languages including Bengali, Punjabi, Marathi, Gujarati, Sanskrit, English, Japanese, Mongolian and Dutch. He has written extensively for Himal Southasian (Sri Lanka and Nepal), Hindustan Times (India), and Sama News (Pakistan). He is compiling a 'Dictionary of Indian words and phrases' for Aleph Book Company (New Delhi, India). Some of his publications can be accessed through this page: https://avtans.com/2022/06/26/words-in/
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