Hartman at LARC

Magda Oiry writes:

Jeremy Hartman will present his work on Root infinitives at LARC on Thursday 9:45 in the Partee room. All are welcome!

PRG tomorrow: Speed Presentations

Ivy Hauser and Coral Hughto write:

PRG is scheduled to meet this Monday 4/14 at Brian's place in Northampton. Instead of the usual presentation we will be trying something a little different, a "lightning paper discussion."  The idea is that everyone comes with a paper in mind they have recently read to give a quick 5 minute synopsis of over dinner.  It should be something you have already read for class, your research, etc. (no extra work required) and of course no handout or prepared speech is necessary.  The goal is to share the important points of several papers in the time of a single meeting.  I think ideally fairly current papers would be nice to discuss but anything goes.

Jason Merchant gives department colloquium

Jason Merchant (University of Chicago) will give the department colloquium on Friday, April 18, at 3:30 in Machmer E-37. The title of his talk is (the cryptic) “More than one phrasal comparative(*s)."

Field School Program in Peru

Piero Fioralisso, Coordinator of Special Programs of the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, writes:

I am writing to you to announce the launch of the Field School Program in Peru 2014. This program, created and developed by PUCP, provides students with the opportunity to carry out practical work in research projects which are directed by some of our most prestigious faculty members and during its ten years of existence the Field School program has received more than 300 students.

We would like you to know that this season the program is offering courses that we believe may be of interest to you:

-Linguistic Summer Field School

-Spanish Language and Peruvian Studies Program

You will find our complete Field School Program offer in the following links:

-Field School Program Brochure
-Spanish Language Brochure
-Website: http://fieldschool.pucp.edu.pe/

Call for papers: Fall Meeting on Formal Linguistics

The 3rd Fall Meeting on Formal Linguistics : Language(s) and Cognition  will be organized by the UMR "Structures Formelles du Langage" Université Paris 8 / CNRS in Paris.

9-10 October 2014

invited speakers

David Barner (University of California, San Diego)

Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero (University of Manchester)

Jenny Doetjes (Leiden)

Maria Polinsky (Harvard)

Call for Papers Deadline 16 June 2014

Submissions are invited for 30 minute-papers (plus discussion) on all domains of linguistic theory.

Abstracts are invited from all areas (phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics) of formal linguistics (e.g., generative grammar or related frameworks). Topics may include syntax-semantics interface, syntax-morphology interface and others. Abstracts on language acquisition, psycholinguistics and neurolinguistics are also particularly welcome in a perspective that relates them to theories of grammar.
We strongly encourage contributions exploring formal approaches to language diversity and typological works (including but not limited to sign languages, creoles, under-represented languages and comparative studies).

Abstract Submission Presentations may be in French or in English. Abstracts should be anonymous and must not exceed 2 pages (A4) (including data and references) with a 2,54 cm (1 inch) margin on all four sides using Times New Roman 12 pt.

Abstracts must be submitted online using the link below. We will accept electronic submissions only (.pdf files). EasyChair link : https://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=ralfe2014

Calendar Deadline for submission : June 16th, 2014

Notification of acceptance : July 13th, 2014 

Conference dates : October 9th-10th 2014

Research Assistant/Lab Manager position at Georgetown University

We are seeking a full-time Research Assistant/Lab Manager in the Brain and Language Lab at Georgetown University (http://brainlang.georgetown.edu) . The successful candidate will have the opportunity to be involved in a variety of projects, using a range of behavioral, neurological, electrophysiologial (ERPs), neuroimaging (fMRI), and biological (genetic, endocrine) approaches. S/he will have primary or shared responsibility for various aspects of research and laboratory management, including most of the following (depending on abilities and experience): creating experimental stimuli; designing experiments; running experiments on various subject groups; performing statistical analyses; writing papers; helping manage the lab's computers and server; managing undergraduate assistants; and working with the laboratory director and other lab members in preparing and managing grants and IRB protocols. The successful candidate will work closely with Dr. Ullman and with other Research Assistants, PhD students, and postdocs in the lab, as well as with our collaborators at Georgetown and at other institutions in the US and in other countries (e.g., Canada, UK, Spain, Portugal, Norway, Germany, Australia, Brazil, Indonesia, Iran, Turkey, Israel).  
 
Minimum requirements for the position include a Bachelor's degree (a Master's degree is a plus), with a significant amount of course-work or research experience in at least two and ideally three of the following: cognitive psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, computer science, and statistics. The following are highly desirable: at least some experience with Windows, Linux, E-Prime, programming, and statistics. A strong math aptitude is a plus. The candidate must be extremely responsible, reliable, energetic, hard-working, organized, and efficient, and be able to work with a diverse group of people.
 
To allow for sufficient time to learn new skills and to be productive, candidates must be available to work for at least two years, and ideally for three. The successful candidate will be trained in a variety of the methods and approaches used in the lab, including (depending on the focus of his/her work, and ongoing lab projects) statistics, experimental design, and neuroimaging methods. The successful candidate will ideally start as soon as possible (e.g., April 2014), but no later than June 1st 2014. 
 
Interested candidates should email Jarrett Lovelett (at brainlangadmin@georgetown.edu) their CV (which should include a summary of coursework and grades), and have 3 recommenders email him their recommendations directly. Salary will be commensurate with experience and qualifications. The position, which includes health benefits, is contingent upon funding. Georgetown University is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity employer. 

SALT 24 program announced

The program for SALT 24, which is taking place at the end of May at NYU, has been announced. Congratulations to Elizabeth Bogal-Allbritten, whose paper “Interpreting DP-modifying modal adverbs” and Suzi Lima, whose paper “All notional mass nouns are count nouns in Yudja,” are on the program. Yangsook Park is also presenting the poster “Indexicals and the long-distance reflexive `caki’ in Korean.” In addition, the following UMass alumni have posters:

Maria Biezma: “The grammar of discourse: the case of `then.’"

Aynat Rubinstein (with Elena Herburger) “Is ‘more possible’ more possible in German?"

and alumnus Florian Schwarz will be giving the paper “Presuppositions are fast, whether hard or soft — Evidence from the visual world paradigm."

Report from "Sound Systems of Mexico and Central America," at Yale on May 27

John Kingston writes:

Emiliana Cruz, our colleague in Anthropology, Etna Pascacio, a visitor from Mexico to the department since January, Jeremy Pasquereau, and I just returned from a very stimulating workshop "Sound Systems of Mexico and Central America" organized by Ryan Bennett at Yale (http://pantheon.yale.edu/~rtb27/ssmca.html). Emiliana spoke about the 15 tones in the Chatino of San Juan Quiahije (the 15th only just discovered the day before her talk!), Etna gave a poster about her analysis of the synchrony and diachrony of alveolar fricatives and affricates in Matlazinca, and I gave the second of a two-part talk describing and explaining the development of vowel register distinctions and nasal grades in the Chatino of San Miguel Panixtlahuaca -- the first part was given by Tony Woodbury of the University of Texas, Austin. The meeting was also a chance to hear talks from various instructors and participants at the Talleres de Tonos organized by Emiliana in Oaxaca the last two summers. The purpose of the Talleres is to train native speakers of Otomanguean languages in the linguistic analysis of their languages. The third Taller will be held this June 17-27.