Phonology Group
TBA
10:00 AM - 11:30 AM in BA 2139: Language Variation and Change Research Group
Marisa Brook (faculty) reporting on work on intensification with Emily Blamire (Ph.D.) and Sali A. Tagliamonte (faculty).
1:15 PM - 2:45 PM in SS 560A: Semantics Group
Nadia Takhtaganova (MA) on French epistemic modals:
In their paper on strong and weak universal modals, Von Fintel and Iatridou identify a cross-linguistic tendency that 'counterfactual', e.g. conditional, inflectional morphology on a modal verb marks a weaker modal claim than indicative morphology (2008:2). This is explained in the context of Domain Restriction Theory as follows. The conditional morphology signals an additional ordering source that is applied on top of a modal base and primary ordering source in order to restrict the domain of worlds evaluated. But what about existential epistemic modals? In work to appear, Silk claims that the notion of a secondary ordering source incorrectly predicts a stronger reading with counterfactual morphology on existential modals. It seems that his conjecture is corroborated by native French speaker intuitions, which suggest that conditional morphology on the verb pouvoir, roughly equivalent to the English 'can/could', signals a 'weaker possibility' than indicative morphology would. My forum paper compares the epistemic uses of the French modal verbs devoir (“must, have to”) and pouvoir in their conditional and indicative inflectional paradigms to test Silk’s prediction. I will do this by examining the relationship between negative polarity and domain widening and the blocking effects that arise with the use of stronger modality in positive polarity environments.
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