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linguistics
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These topics are suggested by DELG staff. They only serve as an appetizer. You may come up with any other topic and convince a member of DELG to supervise you and that topic. You may also select a supervisor different from the one offering your topic.
Irina Burukina, Marcel den Dikken, Mark Newson, Krisztina Szécsényi
- The syntax and morphology of tense and aspect in English: How many
tenses and aspects are there? What is the relationship between tense/aspect and finiteness? Is there a genuine future tense in English? How does the marking of tense, aspect and futurity in English compare to that in other languages?
- The subjunctive mood in English: Does it exist and, if so, under
which circumstances do we find it? What is the relationship between the subjunctive and imperative mood?
- How can the differences and similarities between topicalisation
(This dish I wouldnât recommend to anyone), focus fronting (Only this dish would I recommend), âheavy NP shiftâ (I wouldnât recommend to anyone a dish prepared by this chef) and dislocation (both left-dislocation, as in This dish, I wouldnât recommend it, and right-dislocation, as in I wouldnât recommend it, this dish) be modelled in a syntactic analysis of these phenomena?
- Cleft (It is a pizza that he is eating) and pseudo-cleft (What he
is eating is a pizza, A pizza is what he is eating) sentences: How does their syntax work? What are they useful for?
- Degrees of comparison in the adjectival system, and the interaction
between morphology and syntax: e.g., pleasanter \~ more pleasant; most quickly \~ the most quickly; dumb \~ a lot more dumb \~ more dumb than cruel (metalinguistic comparison).
- The placement of adverbial modifiers in the English clause: pre- vs
post-modal adverbial insertion (He likely will say yes \~ He will likely say yes; He likely wonât say yes \~ He wonât likely say yes); the distribution of the split infinitive (I decided to fully describe it / fully to describe it / to describe it fully).
- The distribution of the quantifiers some and any in negative and
non-negative clauses: syntax and semantics (I donât want to talk to somebody/anybody; If somebody/anybody tries to take my place; I wonder if somebody/anybody could help me).
- The status of that in restrictive relatives: relative pronoun or
complementiser (the man who/that I saw, the man to who(m)/\to that I spoke, \the man who that I saw)?
- The status of if and whether: complementiser or something else
(I am wondering {whether/\if} to go, It depends on {whether/\if} heâs there, {Whether/\if} or not he did it remains an open question)?
- Sentential vs constituent negation: How does the distinction
manifest itself, in English and other languages? Is the distinction syntactically real, and, if so, how is it represented in syntax?
- The English determiner system: How many different types of
determiners can be distinguished? Are these all treatable in syntax as representatives of the category D (for âdeterminerâ)? If not, what would be the most appropriate treatment(s) of determiner-like elements that are not exponents of the head D?
- Inversion of the subject and the finite verb occurs in a variety of
different contexts in English: root interrogatives (Have you eaten yet?, What are you eating?); root- and non-root clauses featuring fronting of a negative constituent (Under no circumstances would they accept this; It is reported that under no circumstances would they accept this) sentences; conditionals (Had you been more diligent, you would have been more successful); locative inversion (On this wall hung a picture of the president). Discuss the syntax of inversion in English in as comprehensive a way as possible.
- Typical errors made by non-native learners of English: (a) the use
of English articles (He became pilot, I love the music (as a generic statement about music in general), Budapest of my youth); (b) English word-order (Who did take my pen?, Why you are doing this?, \Near Budapest have they a house). What can the theory of syntax take away from or contribute to an understanding of these errors?
- The English genitive: Are âs and of exponents of the same
syntactic category or not? How to analyse the co-occurrence of âs and of in expressions such as a friend of Johnâs? What should the syntax say about special uses of âs and of in constructions such as menâs room, a city of great beauty, that jewel of a city, the City of London.
- Light verbs ([make]{.underline} a turn, [take]{.underline} a
walk): How are these best represented in syntax? Do they have meaning? If so, is their meaning constant or variable?
- Different ways of expressing causation in English (lexical
causatives, morphological causatives, make causatives, have causatives, cause+to causatives): What are the syntactic differences and similarities between them?
- The special syntax of English news headlines and other forms of
âabbreviated Englishâ or telegraphic speech.
- Accusative pronouns in English: How can we account for their
distribution (I want him to leave; Who wants to leave? Me!; Me and him are good mates; Him walking out like that was rude; Poor me!; Him a vegetarian?! No way!; What would you rather me say?)?
- Different strategies in forming wh-questions in English and
cross-linguistically: wh-fronting (What did he buy?); wh-in-situ (e.g., in âquiz master questionsâ (John F. Kennedy was shot in which American city?), and in âecho questionsâ (He bought WHAT?!)); fronting just one wh-phrase or all of them in multiple wh-questions (Who bought what? \~ Hungarian Ki mit vett?); the âsuperiority effectâ (Who bought what? \~ \What did who buy? \~ Which book did which person buy?).
- The Uniformity of Theta Assignment Hypothesis and a comprehensive
syntactic representation of the distribution of the Theme (They took the pirates off the ship; The pirates walked off the ship; The pirates are off the ship; With the pirates off the ship, the voyage can finally continue; As soon as they have left the gangplank, I consider the pirates off the ship).
ZoltĂĄn G. Kiss
- is there voicing assimilation in English?, compare the behaviour of obstruent clusters with respect to voicing in voicing languages (like Hungarian, Spanish, Russian, etc.) vs. aspirating languages (like English)
- neutralization in phonology, does complete neutralization exist?, neutralization phenomena (flapping, stops after fortis fricatives, vowel reduction, nasal place assimilation in English, voicing assimilation in Hungarian, etc.), the role of speech perception in potentially neutralizing positions
- the role of Voice Onset Time in the laryngeal contrast of obstruents; the role of phonetic features other than vocal fold vibration in the contrast of obstruents (vowel duration, consonant duration, glottalization, release, etc.)
- the laryngeal contrast of fortis vs lenis fricatives and affricates in English, what is their contrast based on?
- phonological and non-phonological (social, stylistic, dialectal, frequency, etc.) factors in phonological variation (e.g., glottalization, glottalling, flapping, Linking/Intrusive R, the distribution of /j/, etc.)
- different theoretical approaches to the analysis of Linking and Intrusive R (rule-based theories vs. phonetics-based vs. historical approaches vs. analogy-based analyses, etc.)
- variation in the realizations of CUBE vowels, when are the diphthongs pronounced long (without glides), when are the long monophthongs (R-vowels) realized as long vs. diphthongized; phonological and nonphonological factors in broadening, smoothing, breaking, unbreaking
PĂ©ter A. LĂĄzĂĄr
- Multiword items classified in various English (and Hungarian) sources/frameworks.
- Regular polysemy types in English (and Hungarian): a heavy book vs a difficult book; a chicken vs some chicken. How language (type) has a role.
- Instances of word forms of a lexeme having different/restricted/special senses: in my eyes vs a black eye.
- Word families vs lexical/semantic fields.
- Dictionaries: print or electronic? Which, when, how? Advantages and disadvantages.
- Types of oppositeness: just two, three, or many more? Oppositeness with various word classes?
- Polysemy developing into homonymy: when/why/how it happens.
- Combining forms (neo-classical âcompoundsâ) in English (and Hungarian).
- Non-right-headed compounds in English (and Hungarian).
- The opacity and the fixity gradience of English (and Hungarian) idioms. Can a word be an idiom?
- Creative variation with English (and Hungarian) idioms.
- âEnglish gets millionth word on Wednesday, site saysâ. On how many levels is this an impossible claim?
- Inflection vs derivation: crisp contrast or gradience?
Attila StarÄeviÄ
- Palatalization in English: how many times and when?
- Rules and lexicalization: when and how does a rule die?
- Lexical and postlexical rules in English
- Treatment of a historical rule in English: e.g., the influence of /l/ on the preceding vowel (all vs. ally)
- How did breaking and broadening happen in English?
- Analysing an older piece of text linguistically (e.g., Chaucerâs poetry)
- Has coda /l/ always been âdarkâ in English?
PĂ©ter SzigetvĂĄri
- Phonotactic constraints of English
- The distribution of glides
- The distribution of liquids
- Excrescent plosives in consonant clusters (prin[t]ce)
- R-vocalization and its effects on the vowel system of English
- L-vocalization and its effects on the vowel system of English
- How many degrees of stress are there in English?
- The sound system of Hunglish
Miklós Törkenczy
- Flapping after sonorant consonants in English accents
- CĂ pi[ÉŸ]alĂstic vs. mĂŹli[t]arĂstic: the (non)applicability of flapping in âidenticalâ environments
- âYod-droppingâ in unstressed syllables
- The phonology of the irregular past
- How regular is English stress?
- The stressing of compounds: patterns and predictability
- Stress clash (adjacent stresses) in words.
- Socially conditioned phonological variation in English