Mario Alinei is Professor Emeritus at the University of Utrecht, where he taught from 1959 to 1987, currently living in Impruneta, Italy

Impruneta

Impruneta is a town and comune of the province of Florence in the Italian region of Tuscany. The population is about 15,000.-Name and production:...

. He is founder and editor of Quaderni di semantica, a journal of theoretical and applied semantics

Semantics

Semantics is the study of meaning. It focuses on the relation between signifiers, such as words, phrases, signs and symbols, and what they stand for, their denotata....

. Until recently, he was president of Atlas Linguarum Europae at UNESCO.

Alinei has authored hundreds of publications and is a well known scholar in the field of dialectology

Dialectology

Dialectology is the scientific study of linguistic dialect, a sub-field of sociolinguistics. It studies variations in language based primarily on geographic distribution and their associated features...

. He is also the main proponent of the Paleolithic Continuity Theory

Paleolithic Continuity Theory

The Paleolithic Continuity Theory , since 2010 relabelled as the Paleolithic Continuity Paradigm , is a hypothesis suggesting that the Proto-Indo-European language can be traced back to the Upper Paleolithic, several millennia earlier than the Chalcolithic or at the most Neolithic estimates in other...

, which contends that the Indo-European languages

Indo-European languages

The Indo-European languages are a family of several hundred related languages and dialects, including most major current languages of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and South Asia and also historically predominant in Anatolia...

 originated in Europe and have existed there since the Paleolithic

Paleolithic

The Paleolithic Age, Era or Period, is a prehistoric period of human history distinguished by the development of the most primitive stone tools discovered , and covers roughly 99% of human technological prehistory...

.

Some of his main linguistical contributions, which were instrumental in creating the Paleolithic Continuity Theory

Paleolithic Continuity Theory

The Paleolithic Continuity Theory , since 2010 relabelled as the Paleolithic Continuity Paradigm , is a hypothesis suggesting that the Proto-Indo-European language can be traced back to the Upper Paleolithic, several millennia earlier than the Chalcolithic or at the most Neolithic estimates in other...

, regarded tendencies towards the conservation of languages, as opposed to the theories of "biological laws" of linguistic change and the method of lexical self-dating.

Alinei was a pioneer in the use of computers in linguistics. According to Pavle Ivić

Pavle Ivic

-Biography:Professor Pavle Ivić was a leading South Slavic and general dialectologist and phonologist. Both his field work and his synthesizing studies were extensive and authoritative...

 "Alinei is one of the not so numerous European linguists who already in the early sixties were willing and able to apply the results of technological innovations to the study of language".

Works

• Lingua e dialetti: Struttura, storia e geografia (Studi linguistici e semiologici)
• Dal totemismo al cristianesimo popolare: Sviluppi semantici nei dialetti italiani ed europei (Filologia, linguistica, semiologia)
• Etrusco: una forma arcaica di ungherese, 2003, Il Mulino. The Etruscan language
  Etruscan language
  The Etruscan language was spoken and written by the Etruscan civilization, in what is present-day Italy, in the ancient region of Etruria and in parts of Lombardy, Veneto, and Emilia-Romagna...
  
   as an archaic form of Hungarian.
• Alinei, Mario (1991), L'approccio semantico e storico-culturale: verso un nuovo orizzonte cronologico per la formazione dei dialetti, in Atti del Colloquio «I dialetti e la dialettologia negli anni Novanta» (Lecce: 9-11/5/1991), «Rivista Italiana di Dialettologia», 15, pp 43–65.
• Alinei, Mario (1992), Dialectologie, anthropologie culturelle, archéologie: vers un nouvel horizon chronologique pour la formation des dialectes européens, in AA.VV., Nazioarteko dialektologia biltzarra. Agirak. Actas del Congreso International de Dialectologia Euskaltzaindia (Bilbo: 21–25 October 1991), Bilbo, Bonaparte, 1992, pp. 577–606.
• Alinei, Mario (1996), Origini delle lingue d'Europa, vol. I - La teoria della continuità. Bologna, Il Mulino.
• Alinei, Mario (1996–2000), Origini delle lingue d'Europa, vol. I - La teoria della continuità. Vol. II: Continuità dal Mesolitico all'età del Ferro nelle principali aree etnolinguistiche. 2 voll., Bologna, Il Mulino.
• Alinei Mario (1997a); L'aspect magico-religieux dans la zoonymie populaire, in Publications de la faculté des lettres, arts, et sciences humaines de Nice, Les zoonymes, Nouvelle série, n. 38.
• Alinei Mario (1997b); Magico-religious motivations in European dialects: a contribution to archaeolinguistics, «Dialectologia et Geolinguistica» 5, pp. 3–30.
• Alinei, Mario (1997c), L'etude historique des etrês imaginaires des Alpes dans le cadre de la theorie de la continuité, in AA.VV., Actes de la Conference Annuelle sur l'activité scientifique du Centre d'Etude Francoprovencales. Les Etres imaginaires dans les recits des Alpes, Aosta, 1996, pp. 103–110.
• Alinei Mario (1997d), La teoria della continuità ed alcuni esempi di lunga durata nel lessico dialettale neolatino, in «Rivista Italiana di dialettologia», 21, pp. 73–96.
• Alinei, Mario (1998a), Towards an invasionless model of Indo-European origins: the continuity theory, in M. Pearce and M. Tosi (eds.), Papers from the EEA Third Annual Meeting at Ravenna 1997. Vol. I: Pre-and Protohistory, pp. 31–33.
• Alinei, Mario (1998b), Il problema dell'etnogenesi ladina alla luce della "teoria della continuità", in Mondo Ladino. "Atti del Convegno I Ladins dles Dolomites". Convegno Interdisciplinare (Vigo di Fassa, 11-14/9/1996), XXII, pp. 459–487.
• Alinei, Mario (1998c), Nuove prospettive nella ricerca storico-semantica ed etimologica, in «Quaderni di Semantica» 19,2, Atti del XXX Congresso SLI Budapest, Bulzoni, pp. 199–212.
• Alinei, Mario (2000a), Origini delle lingue d'Europa. Vol. II: Continuità dal Mesolitico al Ferro nelle principali aree europee, Bologna, Il Mulino.
• Alinei, Mario (2000b), An alternative model for the origins of European peoples and languages: the continuity theory, «Quaderni di Semantica» 21, pp. 21–50.
• Alinei, Mario (2000c), L'etnogenesi Ladina alla luce delle nuove teorie sulle origini dei popoli indoeuropei, in Atti del Convegno "Ad Gredine forestum: Il costituirsi di una vallata" (Ortisei: 23-25/9/1999), pp. 23–64.
• Alinei, Mario (2001a), European dialects: a window on the prehistory of Europe, «Lingua e Stile» 36, pp. 219–240.
• Alinei, Mario (2001b), Confini archeologici, confini dialettali: verso una dialettologia interdisciplinare, in G. Marcato (ed.), I confini del dialetto, Atti del Convegno (Sappada/Plodn/Belluno: 5-9/7/2000), Padova, Unipress, pp. 75–94.
• Alinei, Mario (2001c), Conseguenze delle nuove teorie indoeuropeistiche sulla dialettologia romanza, in Badia i Margarit
  Antoni Maria Badia i Margarit
  Antoni Maria Badia i Margarit is a Catalan linguist and philologist who has done studies on grammar and history of Catalan language. He graduated in philology or romance langues at the Universitat de Barcelona in 1943, where he was professor of history of Spanish language and Catalan language. He...
  
  (ed.), «Estudis Romànics», 23, pp. 7–47.
• Alinei, Mario (2001d), Nuove prospettive nella ricerca storico-semantica ed etimologica, in Società di Linguistica Italiana SLI 42, Semantica e Lessicologia Storiche. Atti del XXXII Congresso, Bulzoni, pp. 25–46.
• Alinei, Mario (2002), Towards a Generalized Continuity Model for Uralic and Indoeuropean Languages, in K. Julku (ed.), The Roots of Peoples and Languages of Northern Eurasia IV (Oulu: 18-20/8/2000), Oulu, Societas Historiae Fenno-Ugricae, pp. 9–33.
• Alinei, Mario (2003), Etrusco: una forma arcaica di ungherese, Bologna, Il Mulino.
• Alinei, Mario (2003b), Interdisciplinary and linguistic evidence for Palaeolithic continuity of Indo-European, Uralic and Altaic populations in Eurasia, in «Quaderni di Semantica» 24,2.
• Alinei, Mario (fc.a), Continuity from Paleolithic of Indo-European and Uralic populations in Europe: the convergence of linguistic and archaeological frontiers, in Proceedings of the XIVth Congress of the UISPP (Liège: 2-8/9/2001), BAR International Series.
• Alinei, Mario (fc.b), Interdisciplinary and linguistic evidence for Palaeolithic continuity of Indo-European, Uralic and Altaic populations in Eurasia, with an excursus on Slavic ethnogenesis, in Proceedings of Kobarid conference (2003).

Fellowships

• Since 1996: honorary member of the International Society for Dialectology and Geolinguistics
• 1989–1996: President of the International Society for Dialectology and Geolinguistics
• 1989: President of the Societas Linguistica Europaea.
• 1979–1980: Research Fellowship of the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Studies.
• Since 1996: senior member of the Royal Academy Gustaf Adolf, Uppsala (Sweden).
• Ordinary member of the Royal Academy Gustaf Adolf, Uppsala (Sweden).
• Ordinary member of the Accademia Peloritana, Messina.
• Founding member of the Società Linguistica Italiana.
• Founding member of the Societé Internatonale de Linguistique et Géolinguistique

Past positions

• Since 1980: General Editor of the journal «Quaderni di Semantica».
• 1970–1997: Co-founder, Vice-President and President (from 1982) of the Atlas Linguarum Europae, a UNESCO sponsored project.
• 1968–1987: Full Professor of Italian Linguistics and Literature, University of Utrecht (NL).
• 1962–1968: Associate Professor of Italian Linguistics and Literature, University of Utrecht (NL).
• 1959–1962: Assistant Professor of Italian Linguistics and Literature, University of Utrecht (NL).
• Consultant of Olivetti for advanced research on computational linguistics
• Consultant of IBM for advanced research on computational linguistics

External links

• Mario Alinei's website