Sandra Wood (University of Southern Maine)

Multiple Wh-Questions in ASL: Focus movement and D-linking

Friday, March 30 | 10:30 am | 2 Arrow Street, Room 420 (Buzzer #427)

(Talk in ASL, with interpreters.)

 

Abstract: I discuss cross-linguistic strategies for the questioning of multiple wh-phrases, exemplified through the relationship between focus movement and D-linking.  ASL exhibits an in-situ paradox, by which an object wh-phrase is allowed to remain in-situ in a single wh-question, but not in a multiple wh-question.  I show that this in-situ paradox is related to rightward movement of the wh-phrase for focus and the inability of D-linked wh-phrases to undergo focus movement.  Moreover, to understand why this is occurring, I argue that the mechanism of ‘unselective binding’ allows the wh-phrase to remain in-situ. These findings illustrate how ASL fits within the typological framework for the structure of wh-questions and how current theoretical approaches for wh-questions in the ASL research literature are not able to account for the in-situ paradox. 

Naomi Caselli (Boston University)

Lexical factors in the acquisition of sign language vocabulary

Tuesday, March 6 | 03:30 pm | Sever Hall, Rm 102 

(Talk in ASL, with interpreters.)

Emar Maier (University of Groningen)

(Un)quotation and Attraction in Role Shift and Free Indirect Discourse

Friday, November 17 | 10:30am | 2 Arrow Street, Room 420 (Buzzer #427)

 

Abstract: Inspired by Schlenker’s (2003) seminal 'Plea for Monsters', linguists have been analyzing every occurrence of a shifted indexical by postulating a monstrous operator. I will show that Kaplan’s (1989) original strategy of explaining apparent shifting in terms of a quotational use/mention distinction offers a much more intuitive, parsimonious and empirically superior analysis of many of these phenomena. In this talk I focus on role shift in signed languages and free indirect discourse in literary narratives. The main ingredients of the formal analysis will be a semantics of direct quotation as event modification, and a pragmatic account of unquotation. On the empirical side I will discuss data from controlled elicitation tasks with DGS and NGT signers.