source: University of Potsdam

Professor Hans-Georg Wolf has held the Chair of Development and Variation of the English Language at the University of Potsdam, Germany, since 2009 and has served as Dean of its Faculty of Arts since 2019. Previously, he held academic positions at Humboldt University Berlin and the University of Hong Kong, where he was Associate Professor (2003–2009) and subsequently Honorary Professor until 2016. His research focuses on World Englishes, cognitive sociolinguistics, cultural linguistics, and intercultural communication. He is one of the leading experts in research on cultural conceptualisations and lexical variation in African and Asian varieties of English.

His major publications include English in Cameroon (2001), World Englishes: A Cognitive Sociolinguistic Approach (2009, co-authored with Frank Polzenhagen), and A Dictionary of Hong Kong English (2011, co-authored with Patrick Cummings). He is also co-editor of the second edition of The Routledge Handbook of Language and Culture (2026) and serves on the editorial board of World Englishes.