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Anthony Struthers-Young

Postdoctoral Research Associate and Lecturer

Princeton University, Program in Linguistics

astruthersyoung@princeton.edu

asy3661@gmail.com

Academic Appointments

Princeton University

Postdoctoral researcher. 2025–present

Education

University of California San Diego

PhD, Linguistics. 2025.

University of California San Diego

Masters, Linguistics. 2023

University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

B.A., Linguistics; Classical Languages and Literature. 2019.

Research interests

• Language documentation
• Phonology, with focus on tone
• Surrogate languages, i.e., the of encoding speech with a musical instrument
• Languages of Africa, with focus on Gur (Mabia), Senoufo, and Mande
• Historical Linguistics
• Reconstruction of Proto-Gur
• Indo-European Studies

Awards and Fellowships

• NSF Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant (Ling-DDRIG). “Doctoral Dissertation Research: A grammar of a minority language and documentation of linguistic and cultural data” ($14,774). 2024–2025.

• UCSD Katzin Prize ($50,000). 2020–2025.

• Graduated from the University of Michigan with High Distinction. 2019.

• Classical Linguistics Prize, University of Michigan. 2019.

• Phillips Prize for Greek Translation, University of Michigan. 2017, 2018.

• Two term Angell Scholar, University of Michigan. 2018.

• University of Michigan Alumni Club, Dayton, Alumni Scholarship. 2015.

Publications

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2025. A grammar of Northern Toussian. PhD Thesis. University of California San Diego.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2025. Double downstep in Northern Toussian: implications on tonal representation. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory.

• Huang, Yaqian, Nina Hagen Khaldhol, Jun Jie Lim, Sharon Rose, and Anthony Struthers-Young. 2024. ACAL in SoCal: Selected papers from the 53rd Annual Conference on African linguistics. Berlin, Language Science Press.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2022. Comparative Toussian nominal morphology. In Ines Fiedler, Jan Junglas, Michael Schulze (eds.), Gur Languages and Nominal Classification Diversity. Köln, Rödiger Köppe Verlag.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2022. A Preliminary Account of the Northern Toussian Balafon Surrogate Language. Frontiers in Communication.

Invited talks

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2025. Double downstep in Northern Toussian. Invited talk for Abbie Hantgan-Sonko’s BANG project. LLACAN.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2022. The History of Multiple Exponence and Serial Verbs in the Toussian Languages. HistLing (historical linguistics meeting) oral presentation. University of Michigan.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2019. Toussian: a survey and a discussion of its vestigial gender system. Gender in Gur languages Workshop. University of Berlin.

• Struthers-Young. 2018. The development of grammatical tone in Northern Toussian Workshop on Tone and Prosody of West African Languages. Bobo-Dioulasso.

Conference presentations

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2025. Register features and cumulativity: the representation of double downstep in Northern Toussian. Southern California Meeting on Phonology (SCAMP) poster presentation. UC San Diego.

• Mamadou Y., Tajudeen and Anthony Struthers-Young. 2025. Pharyngealization in Two Varieties of Toussian. Linguistic Society of America (LSA) annual meeting special session: Illustrating African Phonologies. Philadelphia.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2024. Register features and cumulativity: the representation of double downstep in Northern Toussian. AMP (Annual Meeting on Phonology) poster presentation. Rutgers.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2024. Verbal grammatical tone in Northern Toussian. WOCAL (World Congress on African Linguistics) 11 oral presentation. University of Nairobi.

• Mamadou Y., Tajudeen and Anthony Struthers-Young. 2024. Pharyngealization in the Toussian languages. WOCAL (World Congress on African Linguistics) 11 oral presentation. University of Nairobi.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2024. Apparent double downstep in Northern Toussian. ACAL (Annual Conference on African Linguistics) oral presentation. McGill University.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2021. Multiple Exponence in Northern Toussian. MultEx@ZAS oral presentation. ZAS Berlin.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2021. Multiple Exponence in Northern Toussian. ACAL (Annual Conference on African Linguistics) oral presentation. University of Florida.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2021. Same Subject Reference in Northern Toussian. WOCAL (World Congress of African Linguistics) 10 oral presentation. Leiden University.

• Struthers-Young, Anthony. 2019. Development of grammatical tone in Northern Toussian. ACAL (Annual Conference on African Linguistics) oral presentation. University of British Columbia.

Fieldwork experience

• In-situ fieldwork and documentation of Northern Toussian and Southern Toussian. Data collection for phonetic study. Burkina Faso. 2025 (1 month).

• In-situ fieldwork and documentation of Northern Toussian. Data collection for sociolinguistic study. Burkina Faso. 2024 (2 months).

• In-situ fieldwork and documentation of Northern Toussian. Data collection for phonetic study. Burkina Faso. 2023 (2 months).

• In-situ fieldwork and documentation of Northern Toussian and its musical surrogate language. Data collection for phonetic study. Burkina Faso. 2022 (2 months).

• In-situ fieldwork and documentation of Northern Toussian and its musical surrogate language. Burkina Faso. 2019 (2 months).

• In-situ fieldwork and documentation of Northern and Southern Toussian. Burkina Faso. 2018 (7 months).

Other research experience

• Translation of Grammatica Linguae Selinae by Gregorio Mengarini for Professor Sally Thomason (Linguistics Department, University of Michigan). 2019–2020.

• Research assistant for Professor Benjamin Fortson (Classics Department, University of Michigan), 2019–2020.

• Editing of Jeffrey Heath’s and Brahima Tioté’s A grammar of Pere (Bere, Mbre) of Côte d’Ivoire. May 2019.

• Research assistant for Professor Jeffrey Heath (Linguistics Department, University of Michigan). 2018.

• Research on genetics and its implications on linguistics funded through Mcubed. 2018.

Guest Lectures

• LIGN 141: The Structure of French. West African French. 2024.

• LIGN 111: Phonology. Rule ordering. 2023.

• LIGN 108: Languages of Africa. Musical surrogate languages. 2023.

• LIGN 111: Phonology. Musical surrogate languages. 2021, 20222, 2023.

Teaching experience

• Instructor of LIN260: The Languages of Africa at Princeton University. 2025.

• Teaching assistant for LIGN 110: Phonetics at UCSD. 2020, 2024.

• Teaching assistant for LIGN 101: Introductory Linguistics at UCSD. 2024.

• Teaching assistant for LIGN 111: Phonology at UCSD. 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024.

• Teaching assistant for LIGN 8: Languages and Cultures of America. 2023.

• Teaching assistant for LIGN 108: Languages of Africa. 2023.

• Teaching assistant for LIGN 139: Field Methods at UCSD. 2022.

• Teaching assistant for LIGN 150: Historical Linguistics at UCSD. 2022.

• Teaching assistant for LIGN 120: Morphology at UCSD. 2021.

Language experience

• Northern Toussian, Burkina Faso (nort2787, tsp)
• Southern Toussian, Burkina Faso (sout2797, wib)
• Jula, Mande, Burkina Faso (dyul1238, dyu)
• French (fluent)
• Latin
• Ancient Greek
• Hittite
• Middle Egyptian
• Montana Salish (Kalispel, kali1307)

Computer skills

• Python
• Javascript, HTML, and CSS
• R
• ELAN
• Praat, including Praat scripting

Service

• Co-head of the Graduate Student Body of the linguistics department, an organization for advocacy and support of graduate students. UCSD. 2023–2024.

• Dayton Council of World Affairs presentation. Northern Toussian musical surrogate language. 2023

• Co-organization of the Annual Conference on African Linguistics (ACAL) 53. 2022.

• Co-organization of the Workshop on Tone and Prosody of West African Languages. 2018.