Slides for “Natural language without semiosis”

 Posted by on 02/26/2022  Comments Off on Slides for “Natural language without semiosis”
Feb 262022
 
In the fall of 2021, I presented some recent work titled Natural language without semiosis at a number of venues (incl. SinFonIJA 14, Cornell, Stony Brook, and MIT). Here are the slides from these presentations. (And here is the abstract.)

Sigwan Thivierge defends!

 Posted by on 07/19/2021  Comments Off on Sigwan Thivierge defends!
Jul 192021
 
I am proud to announce that my student Sigwan Thivierge (co-advised with Maria Polinsky) has defended her PhD thesis! The thesis, Phasehood and phi-intervention, presents a novel syntactic analysis of the Georgian agreement system. While this system has been the topic of a great deal of research in recent decades, what sets Sigwan’s analysis apart is … [read more] “Sigwan Thivierge defends!”

New paper: “A re-evaluation of Arad’s argument for roots” (w/Ezer Rasin & David Pesetsky)

 Posted by on 07/10/2021  Comments Off on New paper: “A re-evaluation of Arad’s argument for roots” (w/Ezer Rasin & David Pesetsky)
Jul 102021
 
Ezer Rasin, David Pesetsky & I have written up our recent WCCFL talk, A re-evaluation of Arad’s argument for roots. The paper re-examines the arguments in Arad 2003, 2005 in favor of the existence of category-neutral roots in the syntax. This work by Arad is widely considered sound, and is frequently cited as the piece de resistance … [read more] “New paper: “A re-evaluation of Arad’s argument for roots” (w/Ezer Rasin & David Pesetsky)”

Rodrigo Ranero defends!

 Posted by on 07/08/2021  Comments Off on Rodrigo Ranero defends!
Jul 082021
 
I am proud to announce that my student Rodrigo Ranero (co-advised with Maria Polinsky) has defended his PhD thesis! The thesis, Identity conditions on ellipsis, argues for a new perspective on the identity requirement underpinning ellipsis in natural language. Specifically, it argues that identity under ellipsis is irreducibly syntactic – at least in part – but the way this syntactic component … [read more] “Rodrigo Ranero defends!”

A “vignette” on phi-agreement in syntax

 Posted by on 04/17/2021  Comments Off on A “vignette” on phi-agreement in syntax
Apr 172021
 
A while ago, I was asked to contribute something to the upcoming Cambridge Handbook of Minimalism. My initial thoughts about what such a contribution might consist of led me at the time to write a blog post about whether I should even be considered a minimalist syntactician at all. (Short version: I think the minimalist era of syntactic theory is largely over, at least … [read more] “A “vignette” on phi-agreement in syntax”

Paulina Lyskawa defends!

 Posted by on 01/15/2021  Comments Off on Paulina Lyskawa defends!
Jan 152021
 
I am proud to announce that my student Paulina Lyskawa (co-advised with Maria Polinsky) has defended her PhD thesis! The thesis, Coordination without grammar-internal feature resolution, presents an extended argument that so-called “resolved” agreement with coordinations (in those cases where agreement doesn’t target just the closest conjunct) is actually not a grammatical phenomenon at all (!). In particular, … [read more] “Paulina Lyskawa defends!”