Professor Rachel Nordlinger is Professor of Linguistics in the School of Languages and Linguistics, Faculty of Arts, at the University of Melbourne. She earned a Bachelors Degree with Honours from the University of Melbourne and a PhD in Linguistics from Stanford University in 1998, where her dissertation was titled 'Constructive Case: Dependent-marking nonconfigurationality in Australia.' Nordlinger's research centres on the description, documentation, and analysis of Australian Indigenous languages, with a focus on morphology, case marking, nominal tense, verbal morphology, and word order. She has conducted extensive fieldwork on languages including Wambaya, Bilinarra, and Murrinh-Patha, contributing grammars and studies that illuminate their complex grammatical structures. Her work also explores broader typological issues, such as reciprocal constructions and the acquisition of polysynthetic languages.

As Director of the Research Unit for Indigenous Language and a Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, Nordlinger leads efforts in language preservation, including community-engaged projects like the 50 Words Project to teach basic vocabulary from Australian Indigenous languages and initiatives to return archival recordings to communities. She was elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities (FAHA) in 2017. Key publications include 'A Grammar of Wambaya, Northern Territory (Australia)' (1998), 'Constructive Case: Evidence from Australian Languages' (1998), 'Nominal Tense in Crosslinguistic Perspective' (2004), 'Verbal Morphology in Murrinh-Patha: Evidence for Templates' (2010), 'A Grammar of Bilinarra: An Australian Aboriginal Language of the Northern Territory' (2014, co-authored with Felicity Meakins), and 'Why We Need a Gradient Approach to Word Order' (2023). Nordlinger's contributions have advanced linguistic typology and supported Indigenous language revitalization through ARC-funded projects and leadership in Australian linguistics.

Professional Email: racheln@unimelb.edu.au