Whamit!

The Weekly Newsletter of MIT Linguistics

Issue of Monday, March 9th, 2026

LingLunch 3/12 - Yimei Xiang (Rutgers University)

Speaker: Yimei Xiang (Rutgers University)

Title: Function alternations of the Mandarin particle ye: from ‘also’ to ‘even’

Time: Thursday, March 12, 12:30pm - 2pm

Location: 32-D461



Abstract: The Mandarin adverb ye exhibits both a simple additive use (‘also’) and a scalar additive use (‘even’). This alternation is unlikely to be accidental: across genetically and typologically diverse languages, additive markers frequently extend to scalar interpretations. Why does additivity so often give rise to scalarity, rather than to some other meaning component? Mandarin offers a particularly revealing testing ground for this question, as the ‘even’ use of ye overlaps with that of another multifunctional adverb, dou, which displays a distributor–’even’ alternation.

Building on Heim’s (1982, 1983, 1992) model of dynamic semantics, I propose a unified analysis of the two uses of ye. I argue that in both cases ye presupposes Vacuity of Anti-Exclusion (VAE). This condition derives focus-sensitivity and additivity, and—when exclusion is defined in terms of likelihood—scalarity as well. On this view, the scalarity presupposition of ‘even’ ye is not an independent lexical requirement, but a natural consequence of how exclusion is parametrized.

This account clarifies both the parallels and the contrasts between ye and dou in scalar environments. I argue that the ‘also’–’even’ alternation of ye parallels the distributor–’even’ alternation of dou. Both particles can associate with minimizers, a possibility licensed by their shared scalar inference. At the same time, their difference in additivity yields distinct evaluative flavors as well as different distributional patterns in concessive constructions.

Finally, the talk revisits the “independence” requirement of additive expressions. I argue that independence emerges from the interaction between the VAE requirement and constraints on the QUD. This analysis also accounts for cases in which apparent violations of independence do not result in deviance.

LF Reading Group 3/11 - Haoming Li (MIT)

Speaker: Haoming Li (MIT)

Title: Assertion and presupposition of change-of-state verbs across different aspects

Time: Wednesday, March 11th, 1pm - 2pm

Location: 32-D461
 
Abstract: Sudo (2012); Zehr & Schwarz (2018), among others, have drawn attention to the different discourse and projection behaviors of presuppositions that are entailed by the assertion (e.g., the prior negative state presupposition of stop) versus those that are non-entailed by the assertion (e.g., the gender presupposition of herself). Doron, Fox, & Wehbe (2025) note that two dimensional systems of assertion and presupposition specification are too unconstrained and propose to retrieve the assertion of sentences from trivalent propositions via an algorithm that takes into account the deletability of the presupposition triggers. This talk presents new data on the non-uniform presuppositional behavior of certain change-of-state verbs in different aspects (present perfect and simple past) which calls for the system in DF&W, where the same presupposition trigger can in principle be variably deletable or non-deletable depending on the semantic context, and which motivates lexical decomposition approaches to change-of-state verbs.
 

Colloquium - Jordan Lachler (University of Alberta) 

Speaker: Jordan Lachler (University of Alberta) 
Title: “The Evolving Challenge of Skills Training for Intergenerational Language Sustainability” 
When: Friday, March 13th, 3:30-5pm 
Where: 32-141 
 
Abstract: 

The global language endangerment crisis has unfolded against a backdrop of accelerated and unprecedented changes to society, technology and the planet itself. These ever-shifting realities challenge linguists’ understanding of key theoretical concepts such as language community, language vitality and language sustainability. More importantly, they often complicate the efforts of individuals and communities to reclaim their traditional languages. 

 

In this presentation, we will examine the role that skills training plays in supporting the reclamation of minoritized and endangered languages. We will review efforts over the past half-century to aid in building capacity within these communities to carry out language revitalization and revival on their own terms. We will then provide a framework for categorizing the skills required for this type of socially transformative work, and give a critical analysis of the state-of-the-art in skills training, highlighting areas of success as well as on-going challenges which remain unmet. Finally, we will chart a path forward for international collaboration in this area, as we aim to support the improvement of existing training programs, and the proliferation of new programs to reach underserved communities worldwide.

Phonology Circle 3/9 - Jian-Leat Siah (UCLA)

Speaker: Jian-Leat Siah (UCLA), joint work with Sam Zukoff and Feng-fan Hsieh

Title: Resolving Reduplicative Opacity in Malay Nasal Spreading: An Argument for Base–Reduplicant Correspondence Theory

Time: Monday, March 9th, 5pm - 6:30pm

Location: 32-D831



Abstract: In Malay (Austronesian), nasality spreads iteratively and rightward from nasal consonants to following vowels and glides, but is blocked by supralaryngeal consonants. In reduplicated forms, Onn (1976) reported overapplication of nasal spreading (e.g., [w?ã??-w?ã??]): the first syllable of the reduplicant acquires nasality even though there is no local trigger preceding it. This pattern carries significant theoretical implications because only parallelist (McCarthy & Prince 1995) but not serial/derivational theories of reduplication (Inkelas & Zoll 2005; Kiparsky 2010; McCarthy et al. 2012) can account for it. In this talk, we present acoustic data from 30 native speakers of Malay showing that nasal spreading in reduplication displays substantial variation both within and across individuals. In reduplicated words such as /aba?-aba?/ ‘brothers’, all logically possible combinations of oral and nasal realizations were attested, including underapplication ([aba?-aba?]), normal application ([aba?-a?ba?]), unmotivated “pathological” application ([a?ba?-aba?]), and crucially, overapplication ([a?ba?-a?ba?]). Of these, overapplication emerged as the most frequent variant, corroborating Onn’s (1976) descriptive observations and providing support to parallelist theories of reduplication. The study further reveals a phonetic correspondence effect, whereby vowels in the reduplicant and base tend to exhibit matching degrees of nasality/orality. To capture these variable and gradient patterns, we develop a constraint-based model within the framework of generative phonetics, in which constraint violations are assessed scalarly rather than categorically (Flemming 2001; Lefkowitz 2017). The model achieves a strong fit to the experimental data, demonstrating how integrating phonetic detail into a formal grammar can shed new light on longstanding questions at the morphology-phonology interface.

Doron to Masaryk University, Brno

Congratulations to our very recent alum Omri Doron (PhD 2025), who has received a Marie Sk?odowska-Curie fellowship!  He will be leading a two-year project titled “Mapping complexity in Language” under the supervision of Pavel Caha at Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic,  Omri is currently a visiting lecturer at UMass Amherst.

Tsilia to University of Illinois

Congratulations to finishing student Anastasia Tsilia, who has accepted a tenure-track Assistant Professor position in semantics at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign! 

Rouillard to Laval

Congratulations to our alum Vincent Rouillard (PhD 2023), on his new position as Assistant Professor (Professeur adjoint) in the Département de langues, linguistique et traduction at Université Laval in Québec!!

MITHIC linguistics!

We are delighted to announce that two projects from MIT Linguistics have been selected for funding under the MIT Human Insight Collaborative (MITHIC) initiative, a new program in MIT’s School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences:

  • Elise Newman and Norvin Richards have received funding for a project entitled “Passamaquoddy-Wolastoqey Research, Revitalization and Documentation” (PWRRD, pronounced “powered”):

    PWRRD is the union of two facets of linguistic research conducted at MIT: theoretical advancement and the revitalization of indigenous languages. PWRRD brings these two threads together by assembling a coalition of Passamaquoddy-Wolastoqey speakers and MIT linguistics students, postdocs, and faculty to document, model, and ultimately revitalize the Passamaquoddy-Wolastoqey language. Passamaquoddy-Wolastoqey is critically endangered, with an aging speaker population. To increase access to language instruction among the Passamaquoddy-Wolastoqey community, we will use the results of our research to build an online language learning tool in collaboration with teachers and learners of the language.

  • Donca Steriade has received funding for the project “Tuc?ture: A Living Laboratory for Kirundi Language Preservation and Linguistic Discovery”

    We plan to develop a tool that helps speakers of Kirundi, the national language of Burundi, improve their tonal literacy levels, while also contributing to Kirundi’s linguistic analysis.  Kirundi is a tonal language. Kirundi speakers are literate, but tonal literacy is low. Most texts omit tone marks entirely, creating extensive ambiguity. We address this challenge in two ways. One component evaluates if existing tone marks are suboptimal and, if so, proposes changes. Another component is a mobile application that improves tone-marking proficiency among Kirundi speakers through interactive drills to strengthen the association between tone marks, possibly revised, and tones.

https://shass.mit.edu/mit-human-insight-collaborative-announces-funding-awards-for-25-projects/
https://mithic.mit.edu/humanities-cultivation-fund-projects/