Week of September 9, 2013
Linguists celebrate Chierchia's 60th Birthday
On Friday, September 6, linguists from various parts of the country gathered in Ticknor Lounge, Boylston Hall to celebrate the 60th birthday of Professor Gennaro Chierchia. The surprise event, hosted by Ivano Caponigro, Carlo Cecchetto, and I. Orvieto, celebrated Chierchia's recent publication of Logic in Grammar: Polarity, Free Choice, and Intervention in addition to his birthday, which is this Tuesday, September 10. Another highlight of the event was the presentation of a secret festschrift edited by Ivano Caponigro and Carlo Cecchetto. Several book contributors attended the event including his former adviser Barbara Partee. The Department would like to thank everyone who made this special event possible. Congratulations, and Happy Birthday, Gennaro!
(Photos by Dorothy Ahn)
Harvard at Sinn und Bedeutung 18
On Thursday, September 12, Professor Gennaro Chierchia will deliver his invited talk, titled "Questions about questions and free relatives" at the 18th annual meeting of Sinn und Bedeutung, September 11-13, at the University of Basque Country. In addition, the following talks and posters will feature Harvard presenters:
- Andreea Nicolae: "Encoding strength of exhaustivity within the question nucleus"
- Hazel Pearson and Jeruen Dery: "Dreaming de re and de se: experimental evidence for the Oneiric Reference Constraint"
- Florian Schwarz and Jacopo Romoli: "An experimental comparison between presuppositions and indirect scalar implicatures"
- Gregory Scontras, Cheng-Yu Edwin Tsai, Kenneth Mai and Maria Polinsky: "Chinese Scope: an experimental investigation"
- Elaine Stranahan: "Local vs. global Maximize Presupposition and the temporal duration parameter"
- Yimei Xiang: "Neg-raising: focus and implicatures"
Polinsky Lab Meeting Resumes This Wednesday
The first lab meeting of the semester will be on Wednesday, September 11 at 5:15PM in Boylston 303. Please note the change of location from last year. The meeting's agenda includes introductions and mapping out the schedule for the upcoming weeks.