[PLing] Talk by Dr. Tue Trinh, October 12 at 2PM

[Madeleine Butschety]

Dear colleagues,

we cordially invite you to a talk by Dr. Tue Trinh (Leibniz ZAS Berlin) on "A binding-theoretic account on a typological divide" (abstract see below). The talk will take place this Thursday, October 12 at 14:00 (2PM) at the Center for Cognitive Science of Language at the University of Nova Gorica (seminar room P5). You can also participate online via Zoom using the following link: 

https://ungsi.zoom.us/j/64626001962?pwd=cXdSYi9KTkwrdHR3OVpJbk5LWTU3dz09

Best,
Madeleine Butschety


>>dr. Tue Trinh
Title: 
A binding-theoretic account of a typological divide

Abstract:
Languages seem to divide into those which require pronominal reference to discourse participants and those which do not. English exemplifies the first type: if John, the speaker, tells Mary, the hearer, that he will help her, "I will help you" sounds much more natural than "John will help Mary". Vietnamese exemplifies the second type. In this language, proper names can be used to refer to the speaker and the hearer. Thus, the Vietnamese counterpart of "John will help Mary", spoken by John to Mary, is perfectly acceptable. I propose to derive this typological divide from a parameterization of Rule I which favors binding over coreference. Specifically, I propose that the candidate set of Rule I for English consists of contextual as well as lexical alternatives, while the candidate set of Rule I for Vietnamese is restricted to contextual alternatives only.