The New Sesquipedalian

The pragmatics group will assemble again on December 2, 5:30 pm, in Cordura 110. The plan is to discuss sections 3.1 (’Game models revisited’) and 3.2 (’Epistemic lifting of signaling games’) of Michael Franke’s thesis.

Enjoyed the math section of your GRE? Maria Martiniello, from the ETS Center for Validity Research, will be presenting to the group on Language, Equity, and Educational Policy (LEEP) this Tuesday about “Language and the Performance of English Language Learners on Math Problems.” The talk will be from 12:30-1:30pm, in Barnum 116, with free pizza and refreshments.

Abstract:

Guidelines for the assessment of English language learners (ELLs) on academic content tests recommend conducting statistical analysis and empirical studies to investigate the validity and fairness of assessments for ELLs. This session presents an example of such studies in mathematics. The literature claims that excessive linguistic complexity of math word problems is a source of construct-irrelevant difficulty for ELLs. This presentation will examine the impact of linguistic complexity on the relative difficulty of items for ELLs and non-ELLs with equivalent mathematics proficiency. Through students’ responses to think-aloud protocols, this presentation will illustrate linguistic characteristics of math word problems that pose disproportionate difficulty for Spanish-speaking ELLs.

Our visitor Petra Hendriks will be talking about “On the relation between grammar, acquisition and processing: A case study in pronoun interpretation” today at 1:15pm in the Greenberg Room. Here are some details:

The Delay of Principle B Effect (DPBE) in language acquisition is a well-known effect that has motivated widely distinct views on the relation between grammar and other linguistic resources necessary for sentence interpretation. In this talk I discuss a computational model that colleagues in Groningen and I recently developed within the cognitive architecture ACT-R (Van Rij et al., 2009; in press). This cognitive model is based on an optimality theoretic account that attributes the DPBE to children’s inability as hearers to also take into account the speaker’s perspective (Hendriks & Spenader, 2005/6). The cognitive model predicts that child hearers are unable to take into account the speaker’s perspective because their speed of linguistic processing is too limited to perform this second step in interpretation. We tested this hypothesis empirically in a psycholinguistic study, in which we slowed down the speech rate to give children more time for interpretation, and in a computational simulation study. The results of the two studies confirm the predictions of our model. Moreover, these studies show that embedding a theory of linguistic competence in a cognitive architecture allows for the generation of detailed and testable predictions with respect to linguistic performance.

Want to find out more about the Factorial Typology of Prosodic and Morphological Constraints and Classhood in English? Hideki Zamma will answer all your questions at the Phonetics and Phonology Workshop this Monday. Here’s the abstract:

Since Chomsky and Halle (1968), it has been widely assumed that English suffixes can be divided into two major categories (Siegel (1974), Allen (1978), Kiparsky (1982), Halle and Mohanan (1986), Halle and Vergnaud (1987), Benua (1997), etc.). The defining characteristics of classhood include, for example, (i) whether or not a suffix is stress-neutral and (ii) whether or not a suffix is capable of attaching to the root base. From time to time in the literature, however, it is pointed out that some suffixes have “dual membership” in both of the classes. In other words, the same suffix sometimes exhibits both stress-neutral and root-attaching behaviors (Aronoff (1976), Selkirk (1982), Fudge (1984), Szpyra (1989), Giegerich (1999), etc.). This fact has posed a serious problem to any theory of lexicon with dichotomy, because it suggests that some of the characteristics in suffixation might not be attributed to the difference between the two classes.

This paper proposes that a proper analysis of the problem at hand can be given within the framework of Partial Ordering Theory (Anttila and Cho (1998), Anttila (2002)). Assuming that various groupings in the lexicon can have different constraint rankings, the dual membership suffixes can be analyzed as having the same rankings as Class 1 and 2 at the same time. Moreover, a POT analysis predicts a different type of suffixes not observed to date. This kind of suffixes is actually borne out in an overwhelming investigation utilizing the SOED.

Based on a research on the same dictionary, it is also investigated how many suffixes (out of 120) actually belong to each class. Considering the distributional facts revealed from the investigation, it is further discussed if they can be theoretically predicted from POT.

You can stay up-to-date on the workshop by visiting their website every day.

The pragmatics group met on October 28, and now they’re back, just one week later, for another meeting — November 4, 5:30 pm, Cordura 210. The plan is to discuss Chapter 2, Section 3 of Franke’s thesis (pages 76-89). Questions left over from the sections discussed this week will also be under discussion.

Last week’s issue raised the question of what the ideal Pragmatics Group treat is. Curious about how that was resolved? Then see you on Wednesday.

The Pragmatics Group assembles again on Wednesday, October 28, at 5:30 pm, in Cordura 210 — the Pragmatics Lab. The plan is to discuss chapter 2, sections 1 and 2, of Michael Franke’s Signal to Act. All are welcome. There will be supper, and it would be delightful if someone could suggest an appropriately pragmatic treat to go with it — think Choco Leibniz, definitely not Chomsky Alpha Bits.

The Phonetics and Phonology Workshop will be returning to its traditional time of Mondays at 7pm. The first speaker will be Hideki Zamma from Kobe City University, presenting on November 2nd. If you want to talk or want to recommend someone to talk in the workshop just e-mail Stephanie Shih, and stay updated on the official website.

The UCSC Linguistics organizers have posted the schedule for CUSP 2 (California Universities Semantics and Pragmatics …), which takes place November 21 in the Stevenson Fireside Lounge.

From these parts, we have Jessica Spencer (’A game-theoretic analysis of copula emergence in Saramaccan ‘), and Cleo Condoravdi & Sven Lauer (’Performing A Wish: Desiderative Assertions and Performativity’).

Linguists! After an intolerable hiatus, Speech Lunch is returning with two talks today. During Speech Lunch you can hear speeches that speak to speech and phonetics. Specifically, Kate Geenberg will speak about “He’s so smart!”: Testing listener perceptions of phrase-final pauses and speaker style in university discourse” and then eat lunch, whereupon Roey Gafter will take the speech lunch stage and speak about “Where accommodation to non-native speakers doesn’t happen: A corpus study of foreigner directed speech.”

The new home of Speech Lunch, after the cruel destruction of our old phonetics lab and the inimitable Thai Cafe, is Jordan Hall room 050. See you there at noon!

Now is the time for our undergraduates to report on their projects from the summer. All are welcome this afternoon at 1:45pm in the Greenberg Room to hear these presentations in this order:

Rachel Cristy
Syntactic constraints in Barbadian Creole English and the origins of AAVE

Tim Moon
The OI! Project: Omit Needless Words, Include All Necessary Words