Miri Mertner received her undergraduate degree in linguistics at the University of Edinburgh and went on to the University of Leiden to complete an MA in diversity linguistics with a special focus on language contact and African linguistics. Her experiences travelling and doing field work in southern Africa drew her attention to the many contact situations on the continent, which result in ways of mixing language that provide insights into mechanisms of language change. She is currently a PhD student at the University of Tübingen, where she continues to pursue her interest in the effects of language contact on the global and areal distribution of linguistic features. She is particularly interested in how a better understanding of contact can help shed light on humanity's linguistic past.