Reconstructing the prehistory of the Austronesian and Papuan languages (especially those attributed to the Trans-New Guinea family) and the implications of this reconstruction for the prehistory and culture history of Pacific peoples.
The theory of language change, and the methodology of linguistic reconstruction.
The study of contact-induced language change and the diachronic fate of grammatical constructions under contact and non-contact conditions.
Reconstructing the histories of languages which have undergone contact-induced change.
The Oceanic Lexicon Project, with Andrew Pawley and Meredith Osmond. See website.
Reconstructing the prehistory of the Trans New Guinea family of Papuan languages. Much of this work is planned rather than current (we don't yet know with certainty where TNG's boundaries lie). I would like to contribute to reconstructing TNG from the bottom up, as top-down reconstruction has probably reached its limits (Pawley & Hammarström, 2017). Others who have recently worked or are working on bottom-up TNG reconstruction are Don Daniels (2019), Jacinta Smallhorn (2011), Edgar Suter (2018), Timothy Usher (Usher & Suter, 2015, 2020; Suter & Usher 2017) and Ruth Wester (2014).
References
Daniels, Don R., 2019. Grammatical Reconstruction: The Sogeram languages of New Guinea. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.
Pawley, Andrew & Harald Hammarström, 2017. The Trans New Guinea family. In Bill Palmer, ed., The languages and linguistics of the New Guinea area: A comprehensive guide, 21–195. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. (The World of Linguistics 4)
Smallhorn, Jacinta, 2011. The Binanderean languages of Papua New Guinea: Reconstruction and subgrouping. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. (Studies in Language Change 9 [Pacific Linguistics 625])
Suter, Edgar, 2018. Comparative morphology of the Huon Peninsula Languages (Papua New Guinea). Inaugural-Dissertation zur Erlangung des Doktorgrades [PhD dissertation], Universität zu Köln [Cologne University].
Suter, Edgar & Timothy Usher, 2017. The Kamula-Elevala language family. Language & Linguistics in Melanesia 35:106-131.
Usher, Timothy & Edgar Suter, 2015. The Anim languages of Southern New Guinea. Oceanic Linguistics 54:110-142.
Usher, Timothy & Edgar Suter, 2020. The Asmat-Muli Languages of Southwestern New Guinea. Language & Linguistics in Melanesia 38:148-175.
Wester, Ruth, 2014. A linguistic history of Awyu-Dumut: Morphological study and reconstruction of a Papuan language family. PhD dissertation, Vrije Universiteit van Amsterdam.