Julie Anne Legate
jlegate_at_alum-dot-mit-dot-edu
42 East Delaware Ave, Room 203
Department of Linguistics
University of Delaware
Newark, DE
I am an assistant professor in the
Department of Linguistics, University of Delaware. Before coming to Delaware, I was a visiting assistant professor at Yale University (2003-2004) and a visiting assistant professor at Harvard University (2002-2003).
My primary research interests lie in the syntax and morphology of "interesting" languages, and in syntactic theory. I have secondary research interests in language acquisition. I'm currently investigating case and agreement (especially in ergative languages), second position clitics, and preverbs and vP structure. My favourite languages are Warlpiri and other Australian languages, Modern Irish, and Mandarin.
I did my PhD in the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy at MIT. My dissertation argued for a configurational account of Warlpiri syntax: Warlpiri: Theoretical Implications . Phenomena I
looked at included non-configurationality, split ergativity, applicatives, topic/focus/wh-question constructions, wh-scope marking. It's available from MITWPL. Before going to MIT, I did my M.A. in Linguistics at the University of Toronto, and my Honours B.A. in Linguistics and Language Studies at York University.
TEACHING
RESEARCH:
Comments always welcome.
- Differential case marking and nominal hierarchies
- Morphological versus Abstract Case, especially in Ergative-Absolutive languages
- 2006 Recent handout from a colloquium talk at Cornell. Includes the differential case marking stuff, and two additions that aren't yet in the related paper below: discussion of Hindi, and discussion of the morphology of case syncretisms.
- 2005 Morphological and Abstract Case
REVISED DRAFT OCT 2005 (This paper is currently under revision to appear in LI; new version should be up soon-ish. I argue (a) that abstract Case features are realized morphologically according to the Elsewhere Condition; (b) abstract absolutive Case does not exist; in one class of languages, absolutive is nominative Case; in another class, absolutive is a morphological default masking abstract nominative Case on intransitive subjects and abstract accusative Case on transitive objects. I focus mostly on ergative-absolutive languages, with a brief look at Icelandic quirky case for good measure.)
- 2005 Split Absolutive In Alana Johns, Diane
Massam, and Juvenal Ndayiragije, Ergativity. Kluwer. (link is to prefinal draft)
(This is sometimes cited as 2003 Split Ergativity in Warlpiri)
- Complex Predicates: The Expression of Manner and Result in Warlpiri, an
Endangered Pama-Nyungan Language; this is a University of Delaware International Research Award that will allow me to do field work this year on the morpho-syntax of Warlpiri complex predicates.
- Morpho-syntax of second position clitic placement
- 2004 Warlpiri and the Theory of Second Position Clitics.
(This is a paper under revision to appear in NLLT arguing that second position clitic placement in Warlpiri is mostly syntax, a little bit morphology, and no phonology. I'll send the draft by email to anyone interested.)
- Optional Infinitives in language acquisition (with Charles Yang)
- Recent talk (with Charles Yang ): The Richness of the Poverty of the Stimulus, at the Happy Golden Anniversary,
Generative Syntax workshop at the LSA Institute, July 16 2005.
Phases, Architectural Issues
- 2004 Moving to a higher phase LSA Annual Meeting
, Boston. Related paper, to appear with changes in MITWPL: Phases and Cyclic Agreement
(Proposes an operation of Cyclic Agreement operating through phase edges. This operation solves a technical problem raised by unaccusative phases (see my 2003 LI contribution), and is morphologically realized in a variety of languages.)
- 2003 Some Interface Properties of the
Phase. Linguistic Inquiry 34:3. (link is to prefinal version)
- 2003 Identifying Phases. Invited talk, Workshop on EPP and Phases , MIT, Boston, MA. (see related paper above Phases and Cyclic Agreement to appear in MITWPL)
- 2002 Phases in Beyond Explanatory Adequacy. MIT ms.
- 2000 (with
John Frampton, Sam
Gutmann, and Charles
Yang) Remarks on "Derviation by Phrase": Feature
Valuation, Agreement, and Intervention. MIT, Northeastern University,
and Yale University ms.
- 1999 Verb Phrase Types and the Notion of a Phase. MIT ms.
(Argues
for VP-level phases. See substantially revised version in LI)
- 2005 Recent talk at NELS 36: Two Types of Nominal Split Abstract , Handout
- 2005-2006 Complex Predicates: The Expression of Manner and Result in Warlpiri, an Endangered Pama-Nyungan Language
This is a University of Delaware International Research Award that will allow me to do field work on the morpho-syntax of Warlpiri complex predicates.
- 2005 Morphological and Abstract Case
REVISED DRAFT OCT 05 (This is a draft paper arguing (a) that abstract Case features are realized morphologically according to the Elsewhere Condition; (b) abstract absolutive Case does not exist; in one class of languages, absolutive is nominative Case; in another class, absolutive is a morphological default masking abstract nominative Case on intransitive subjects and abstract accusative Case on transitive objects. I focus mostly on ergative-absolutive languages, with a brief look at Icelandic quirky case for good measure.)
- 2004 Warlpiri and the Theory of Second Position Clitics.
(This is a revised ms arguing that second position clitic placement in Warlpiri is mostly syntax, a little bit morphology, and no phonology. I'll send the draft by email to anyone interested.)
- (to appear) Split Absolutive In Alana Johns, Diane Massam, and Juvenal Ndayiragije, Ergativity. Kluwer. (link is to prefinal version) (This is sometimes cited as 2003 Split Ergativity in Warlpiri)
- (under revision) The Polysynthesis Parameter
Revisited. (Argues against Baker's polysynthesis parameter, both
for Warlpiri and for Mohawk.)
- 2003 The Morpho-Semantics of Warlpiri Counterfactual Conditionals. Linguistic Inquiry 34:1.
- 2003 Split Ergativity in Warlpiri. See Split Absolutive to appear.
- 2003 The Configurational Structure of a Nonconfigurational Language. Linguistic Variation Yearbook.
- 2003 Reconstructing Nonconfigurationality. In Selected Papers from the Asymmetry Conference, John Benjamins.
- 2002. The Hows of Wh-Scope Marking in Warlpiri. NELS 33, MIT, Boston, MA.
- 2002. Split Absolutive. Ergativity Workshop, University of Toronto, Canada. (handout slightly revised)
- 2002. My dissertation: Warlpiri: Theoretical Implications
- 2002. Microparametric Non-Configurationality: The Case of Warlpiri. Invited talk, Department of Linguistics Colloquia Series, University of Wisconsin, Madison.
- 2002. Functional Projections in Warlpiri. WCCFL-21, UC Santa Cruz.
- 2001 Warlpiri Datives: A High Applicative, A Low Applicative, and an "Applicative". Paper presented at Appl Fest , MIT.
- 1999 The Morphosyntax of Irish Agreement. In Karlos Arregi,
Benjamin Bruening, Cornelia Krause, and Vivian Lin (eds), MITWPL
33: Papers on Morphology and Syntax, Cycle One. Cambridge, MA:
MITWPL.
(Uses
Distributed Morphology to analyse why agreement morphology and overt
arguments are in complementary distribution in Irish. Key proposals
are: (i) Vocabulary insertion proceeds top-down and root-out, (ii) the
Invisibility Condition--features unrealized by a Vocabulary item are
deleted.)
- 1998 On the Interpretation of Indefinites. Paper presented at NELS 29, University of Delaware, Newark, DE.
- 1998 Review of Hisatsugu Kitahara Elementary Operations and Optimal Derivations. Linguist List 9.44
- 1997 A Minimalist Account of Irish Predication. University of Toronto MA thesis.
Personal Interests