Elisabeth Piirainen, (née Dörrie, born 1943 in Hannover, – December 29, 2017), was a German linguist and philologist. After studying linguistics (including German language and Dutch studies) in Münster, Amsterdam, and Helsinki, she received her PhD in 1970 at the University of Münster. Afterwards she worked as an editor for German Language at the University of Jyväskylä located in central Finland. In 1963 she met the Finnish scholar of German language, Ilpo Tapani Piirainen, and married him in 1967. Since 1975, she was in charge of various projects related to Low German philology. From 2006 to 2010 she was a member of the Scientific Council of the European Society of Phraseology (Europhras). She has been an active scholar in phraseology, with a broad European scope. Fifty of her publicatio