March 28, 2024

Congratulations to Lex Konnelly!

The SGS Awards Committee has selected Lex Konnelly (PhD 2023) as the sole winner of the University of Toronto’s 2024 John Leyerle-CIFAR Prize for Interdisciplinary Research. This award recognizes outstanding doctoral dissertations with a strong emphasis on interdisciplinary research and significant contributions to both the academic community and to Canadian society. Note that the award is open to candidates from all SGS programs, not just Social Sciences and Humanities. Many thanks to Lex for putting Linguistics in the spotlight among all these disciplines!

Lex’s dissertation (committee members: Prof. Atiqa Hachimi, Prof. Susan Ehrlich and Prof. Derek Denis) explores the linguistic strategies employed by non-binary patients to negotiate medical expectations while expressing their gender identities authentically, highlighting the interplay between language, identity, and healthcare access. Lex’s work not only puts in conversation the fields of linguistics, (trans)gender studies,  and studies of health communication, but also identifies barriers to accessing competent, truly affirming healthcare [quoted from the dissertation].

Please join me in congratulating Lex for their distinguished work!


Thanks to Guillaume for the text.

March 26, 2024

Julien Carrier goes to Kentucky

Dr. Julien Carrier, who earned his PhD in our Department in 2021, and then held a postdoc position at UQAM (working with former UofT student Richard Compton), is excited to be starting a tenure-track position in the Department of Linguistics at the University of Kentucky.  

He says, "This is a great place for me because people there really like the fact that my research is in socio-syntax."

We wish him all the best in his new job!  Félicitations!

March 22, 2024

LGCU has started a new newsletter!

The LGCU has started a monthly newsletter to be sent out to members of the Department. If you are looking to advertise any events, post announcements, or simply share some linguistic fun facts or positivity, send it on over! Submissions for the next (April) newsletter close on March 28. Please submit to aliya.zhaksybek@mail.utoronto.ca.

March 20, 2024

Spring is coming (!) (?)

People, especially prospective students, often ask what the weather is like in Toronto. So here's some evidence. This week is the first day of Spring, according to the calendar. We had a very mild winter with little snow, but it's been coming this week. 

Please add your favourite shots from your commute!

Crocuses

Daffodils and irises

Forsythia


March 18, 2024

New paper by Prof. Samuel Akinbo in Glossa!

A new paper by Prof. Samuel Akinbo entitled "Iconicity as the motivation for the signification and locality of deictic grammatical tones in Tal" has recently appeared in Glossa. The paper presents evidence in favour of iconicity in the core morphophonological grammar.

Here is the abstract:

We present novel evidence for iconicity in core morphophonological grammar by documenting, describing, and analysing two patterns of tonal alternation in Tal (West Chadic, Nigeria). When a non-proximal deixis modifies a noun in Tal, every tone of the modified noun is lowered. When the nominal modifier is a proximal deixis, the final tone of the modified noun is raised. The tone lowering and raising are considered the effects of non-proximal and proximal linkers, which have the tone features [–Upper, –Raised] and [+Raised] as their respective exponents. The realisation and maximal extension of the non-proximal tone features are considered effects of morpheme-specific featural correspondence constraints. Similarly, the exponent of the proximal linker docking on the final TBU is due to the relative ranking of the proximal-specific correspondence constraints. The association of the tone features [–Upper, –Raised] and [+Raised] with non-proximal and proximal linkers, respectively, is in line with crosslinguistic patterns of magnitude iconicity. Given that the local and long-distance realisations of the proximal and non-proximal featural affixes respectively are perceptually similar to deictic gestures, the locality of the featural affixation is considered a novel pattern of iconicity. To motivate this pattern of iconicity, we extend the notion of perceptual motivation in linguistic theory to include the crossmodal depiction of sensory imagery. Consequently, Tal presents evidence for iconicity as a motivation for morphophonological grammar.

Congratulations Prof. Akinbo! 

March 14, 2024

Congratulations to Prof. Suzi Lima for her new paper in Language Documentation and Description

Congratulations to Professor Suzi Lima whose new article entitled "On Quotatives and Speech Verbs in Yudja" has recently appeared in the journal Language Documentation and Description. The article examines the argument structure of speech verbs in Yudja, an indigenous language spoken in Brazil.

Here is the abstract:

Much literature has debated the argument structure of speech verbs. For example, Munro (1982) has provided evidence to show that, in many languages, quotations do not pattern like the complements of transitive verbs. In this paper, I analyze the distribution of four speech verbs in Yudja (Juruna branch, Tupi), an Indigenous language spoken in Brazil, and compare them with bona fide transitive verbs. I provide morphosyntactic evidence to argue that direct quotations are not complements of speech verbs based on the distribution of such verbs both in quotative and non-quotative constructions.

Happy reading!

March 13, 2024

Colloquium Talk: Prof. Matt Wagers (UCSC), Friday March 15

Prof. Matt Wagers (University of California Santa Cruz) will be delivering a colloquium talk this Friday. Please find below the details for the meeting and the abstract:

Title: (Re-)encoding Interference
Presenter: Prof. Matt Wagers
Time: Friday, March 15, 3:30pm-5:00pm

Abstract:  


March 12, 2024

2024 IGNITE grant recipients

 Congratulations to Samuel Akinbo and Suzi Lima! 

They got a 2024 IGNITE grant which supports "interdisciplinary research led by Black faculty, librarians, post-doctoral scholars, clinical scientists and medical research fellows/residents at the University of Toronto." These funds will help support their "project to document the preparation of traditional foods and investigate the grammar of counting and measuring in Gã and Yoruba, two closely related languages spoken in Ghana and Nigeria, respectively. Collaborating with universities in Ghana and Nigeria, one of the project’s key goals is to preserve and revitalize stigmatized traditional foods."

See great photos and more about other winners here:
https://brn.utoronto.ca/announcing-the-2024-brn-ignite-grant-recipients/

March 8, 2024

New paper from Michela Ippolito in the Journal of Semantics!

Faculty member Michela Ippolito has recently published a new paper in the Journal of Semantics entitled "The Hell with Questions." The paper examines current approaches to wh-the-hell questions, and proposes a new theory based on the idea of doxastic dissonance.

Here is the abstract:

We discuss previous proposals for the semantics of wh-the-hell questions (domain widening theories and domain restriction theories), highlighting the challenges these accounts face in trying to explain the different properties of wh-the-hell questions and capture the contribution this expression makes to the semantics of the question. We review the semantic properties of wh-the-hell questions discussed in the literature and propose a new analysis according to which the hell signals doxastic dissonance. We argue that this proposal accounts for the semantic properties of this type of expletive question, and has the potential to extend to the class of wh-the-hell questions we see across languages.

Congratulations Michela! 

March 6, 2024

Linguistics Open House on Feb 26

On Monday Feb 26th we had an open house for all our undergraduates who will soon choose their Programs of Study. Students had the opportunity to chat with faculty, staff and current students about all things Linguistics at U of T. 

Program selection begins March 1st for students, if you have any questions about joining our program please email undergrad.linguistics@utoronto.ca








(Thanks to Kai Herzog-Hara for text and photo credit) 

February 15, 2024

New book about heritage languages


Cambridge University Press has just produced a fantastic collection of chapters about phonetics and phonology in a wide range of heritage languages. U of T is well-represented:

 

1 - Front Rounded Vowels of Heritage Korean in Northern China

BYoonjung KangNa-Young RyuJessamyn Schertz (and their co-authors  Sungwoo Han, Suyeon Yun


16 - Perception and Production of English and Portuguese Voiceless Stops by Heritage Learners

By Anabela RatoVanina Machado. (Dept. of Spanish & Portuguese)


as well as this output from the HLVC Project:


Check out The Phonetics and Phonology of Heritage Languages on the CUP website

Huge thanks to Rajiv Rao for his amazing work editing this volume!



February 7, 2024

SLUGS hoodies are officially here!!

 


The Society of Linguistics Undergraduate Students is selling the linguistics hoodies pictured here! For just $45 you can finally rep your linguistics program and support TULCON

Hoodies will be sold in-person during SLUGS office hours (Tuesdays 19:00-20:00 or Wednesdays 17:00-18:00) in SS568, or you can reserve your order using the Stripe link (https://buy.stripe.com/5kA4hz9s28aYepGcMM) and pick it up during office hours. 

 

All proceeds fund TULCON and future SLUGS initiatives!




January 30, 2024

Alternate Location for meetings

 Research Group and Department meetings with a tropical flair as we met in an unusual location on January 26, 2024!

Alexei, Samuel, Suzi, Naomi

Cool Nathan & Naomi

Sun-lovers Pedro and Naomi

Thanks to Nathan and Alexei for the photos!

January 29, 2024

New paper by Prof. Pedro Mateo Pedro in Linguistic Variation

Congratulations Prof. Pedro Mateo Pedro and coauthors Philip T. Duncan (University of Kansas) and Harold Torrence (UCLA) for their new paper 'Indeterminate pronouns in Kaqchikel' in Linguistic Variation. The article examines the morphology, syntax, and semantics of certain non-interrogative structures involving wh-expressions in the Mayan language Kaqchikel.

Abstract:

This paper investigates the morphology, syntax, and semantics of five non-interrogative constructions that involve wh-expressions in Kaqchikel, a Mayan language of the K’ichean branch spoken in Guatemala. We focus on the properties of maximal free relative clauses, existential free relative clauses, ever free relative clauses, free choice items and negative indefinites. We show that the interpretive properties of these constructions are strikingly similar to those found in a number of unrelated languages.

Happy reading!

January 26, 2024

Congratulations Prof. Emily Atkinson for Publication in Languages

Congratulations to faculty member Emily Atkison who has coauthored a new paper with Akira Omaki (University of Washington) entitled 'Adaptation of Gap Predictions in Filler-Gap Dependency Processing during Reading' in the journal Languages.

Abstract:

Syntactic adaptation effects have been demonstrated for an expanding list of structure types, but the mechanism underlying this effect is still being explored. In the current work on filler-gap dependency processing, we examined whether exposing participants to a less common gap location—prepositional object (PO) gaps—altered their gap predictions, and whether these effects would transfer across tasks when this input was presented in a quasi-naturalistic way (i.e., by reading stories). In Experiment 1, we demonstrated that comprehenders dampened their direct object (DO) gap predictions following exposure to PO gaps. However, Experiments 2A and 2B suggest that these adaptation effects did not transfer when the quasi-naturalistic exposure phase was presented as a separate task (Experiment 2A) and when they also needed to generalize from a syntactic to a semantic measure of direct object gap predictions (i.e., filled gap vs. plausibility mismatch sentences; Experiment 2B). Overall, these experiments add filler-gap dependency processing, as well as the gap predictions associated with it, to the growing list of structures demonstrating adaptation effects, while also suggesting that this effect may be specific to a singular experimental task environment.

The article is published open-access so anyone is free to read it!

January 17, 2024

Linguist Kathleen Wynne on Aging

 You might enjoy this article, written by former Premier and linguistics student, Kathleen Wynne.

January 15, 2024

UTism 2024 will be February 10-11

Imagination is boundless, knowing no limits or restrictions. It is able to take our minds beyond the norm, where strings of thought are spun together into a tapestry of ideas, innovations, questions and answers. While often undervalued when compared to testable knowledge, the impact of imagination in our everyday lives may be deeper than we expect. 

For the 20th anniversary of UTism (the University of Toronto Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Mind), CASA (the Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence Students Association) brings to you a conference which will aim to examine the interplay between imagination and the mind through various interdisciplinary fields. 

Admission for UofT students is 10$, and general admission is 15$. 

Save the date for February 10-11, 11am-5pm, 2024. 

This year's UTism invites you to imagine the possibility of imagination through contemporary research in philosophy, psychology, computer science, neuroscience, and linguistics.

Our own Myrto is a speaker!

 


Instagram: https://instagram.com/casa.uoft

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/uoftcasa/

Discord: https://tinyurl.com/casa-discord

 

January 12, 2024

First Winter in Toronto?



This year, we have quite a few people who have travelled a long way to join our Department and experience their first Toronto winter.  

Samuel, Suzi and Liam checked out Keith Haring at the AGO. 
I hear that the fortune cookies with the meal were a big hit, too!




Rhoda and Nathan had dinner at Si Lom Thai Bistro in the Village then took a stroll to look at the Christmas decorations along Yonge Street and at the Eaton Centre


January 9, 2024

TWPL Volume 46 Released

 The Toronto Working Papers in Linguistics recently released a new volume (their 46th!) featuring several members of the Toronto Linguistics community. The volume was edited by Gregory Antono and includes 11 papers that were presented at the 1st Toronto-Montreal Bantu Colloquium held at UTSC. 

Here is a summary of the contributions.

We thank all of the student volunteers and staff who helped make this edition possible.

Happy reading!

Holiday Cocktail Party 2023

Some scenes from our holiday party a few weeks ago. Students and faculty gathered to mark the end of the semester with good food, cocktails, fun party games, and live music.  






Thanks to everyone who helped clean up. 
Although Sahar didn't make it onto the board, we thank her too!