Chrissy, Anna, and Kate at XPrag in Italy!
June 1, 2018
- Christina Zlogar, Anna Alsop, and Kathryn Davidson (talk): Description and depiction in a reference game
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Kate and Annemarie at SALT 28!
May 19, 2018
- Kathryn Davidson, Annemarie Kocab, Laura Wagner, and Andrea Sims (poster): Verbal form and event structure in sign languages. Link to our poster here.
3/30 invited speaker: Sandra Wood
March 30, 2018
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.
Kate at PLC 42!
March 23, 2018
- Kathryn Davidson (invited talk): Signs, speech, and gesture: integrating continuous and discrete representations into a single proposition
Kate at Angelika Fest 2018!
March 9, 2018
3/6 invited speaker: Naomi Caselli
March 6, 2018
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.)
Our lab in Harvard Gazette!
Alex and Kate at Linguistic Evidence 2018!
February 15, 2018
- Alexander Klapheke and Kathryn Davidson (talk): NPI intervention: Crosslinguistic judgments
Aurore at ConSOLE 2018!
February 15, 2018
- Aurore Gonzalez (poster): Countability Distinctions without Linguistic Cues
11/17 invited speaker: Emar Maier
November 17, 2017
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.
