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Research
Languages (fieldwork)
African languages:
- Kru languages (Vata, Dida, Gbadi..),
- Gur (Nawdem),
- Mande (Bambara),
- Kwa (Abe(y))
- Grassfield Bantu (Nweh, Ncufie, Bafanji)
- West Atlantic (Wolof, Fulani)
- Bantu (Ndendeule, Siswati)
- Nilotic (Maasai, Dholuo)
Austronesian
Malagasy, Javanese, Samoan, Tongan
Creole languages
Haitian, Sranan, Saramaccan.
Formal Linguistics
- Syntactic theory
- Morpho-syntax – Morphology as Syntax
- Comparative syntax
- Syntax/Phonology interface
Publications
Books
- 2013. An introduction to syntactic analysis and theory (with Dominique Sportiche and Ed Stabler). John Wiley & Sons.
- 2000. Verbal complexes (with Anna Szabolcsi). MIT Press.
- 2003. The syntax of specifiers and heads: Collected essays of Hilda J. Koopman. Routledge.
- 1984. The Syntax of Verbs: From verb movement rules in the Kru languages to Universal Grammar. Foris Publications. Dordrecht. (out of print)
Edited books
- 1983. Current Approaches to African Linguistics (with J. Kaye, D. Sportiche and A. Dugas). Foris Publications, Dordrecht.
- Hilda Koopman with Murat Kural Aspects of the Grammar of Ncufie, UCLA working papers vol 14. link
Articles
- 2023 A measure of progress: a Merge based account of some basic properties of Mandarin V1V2 resultative clusters (to appear in Giuliano Bocci, Daniele Botteri, Claudia Manetti and Vincenzo Moscati (eds), Rich Descriptions and Simple Explanation in Language Structure and Acquisition. Oxford University Press.
- 2022. with Cristina Guardiano. Managing Data in TerraLing, a Large-Scale Cross-Linguistic Database of Morphological, Syntactic, and Semantic Patterns https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/12200.003.0060 Chapter 55 in: Berez-Kroeker, Andrea, Bradley McDonnell, Eve Koller, and Lauren Collister (eds), The Open Handbook of Linguistic Management, MIT Press. https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/12200.001.0001
- 2021 (old version) A measure of Progress: some basic properties of Mandarin resultative clusters
- 2020. On the Syntax of the can’t seem construction in English. in Adriana Belletti and Chris Collins, Smuggling in Syntax. OUP [prepublication version] [book]
- 2018. Burnett, H., Koopman, H., & Tagliamonte, S. Structural Explanations in Syntactic Variation- The Evolution of English Negative and Polarity Indefinites. Language Variation and Change, 30(1), 83-107. (prepublication version)
- 2017a. Neurophysiological dynamics of phrase-structure building during sentence processing (with Nelson, M.J., El Karoui, I., Giber, K., Yang, X., Cohen, L., Cash, S.S., Naccache, L., Hale, J.T., Pallier, C. and Dehaene, S.). Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, p.201701590.
- 2017b. When the Syntax is not what it seems. In Clemens Mayr und Edwin Williams (eds.), Festschrift für Martin Prinzhorn (pp. 163-171). Wiener Linguistische Gazette.
- 2017c. Cross-linguistic evidence for a non-distributive lexical meaning of conjunction. (with Enrico Flor, Nina Haslinger, Eva Rosina, Magdalena Roszkowski and Viola Schmitt). In Alexandre Cremers, Thom van Gessel and Floris Roelofsen (eds.), Proceedings of the 21st Amsterdam Colloquium (pp. 255-264).
- 2017d. A note on Huave Morpheme Ordering: Local Dislocation or Generalized U20?. In Gautam Sengupta, Shruti Sircar, Gayatri Raman, and Rahul Balusu (eds), Perspectives on the Architecture and Acquisition of Syntax: Essays in Honor of R. Amritavalli. Springer.
- 2016. A Further Step towards a Minimalist Analysis of Japanese -no (with Tomoko Ishizuka). Presented at the 24th Japanese/Korean Linguistics Conference.
- 2014a. The que/qui alternation: new analytical directions (with Dominique Sportiche). In Peter Svenonius (ed), Functional Structure From Top to Toe. Oxford University Press.
- 2014b. Recursion restrictions: Where grammars count. In T. Roeper and M. Speas (eds.), Recursion: Complexity in Cognition (pp. 17-38). Springer International Publishing.
- 2012a. Samoan ergatives as double passives. In L.Brugé, A. Cardinaletti, G Giusti, N. Monera, and C. Poleto (eds), Functional Heads, Oxford Studies in Comparative Syntax, 7.
- 2012b. Notes on Malagasy Causatives. In Dennis Paperno and Anna Szabolcsi, Theories of everything. In Honor of Ed Keenan UCLA working papers in Linguistics, 19, 19, 163-167.
- 2010a. On Dutch allemaal and West Ulster all. In J. Wouter Zwart (ed), Structure Preserved Benjamins Publications, pp.267-275.
- 2010b. The Dutch PP: Prepositions, Postpositions, Circumpositions and Particles. In G. Cinque and Luigi Rizzi (eds), Mapping spatial PPs: The cartography of syntactic structures (Vol. 6). Oxford University Press.
- 2010c. Verbal complexes and complex verbs: a single computational engine. 12th International Symposium on Chinese Language and Linguistics. Taipei, June 2010. (available on demand)
- 2007. Topics in Imperatives. In W. van der Wurff (ed). Imperative clauses in generative grammar, pp.153-180
- 2006. Agreement: in defense of the “Spec head configuration”. In Cedric Boeckx (ed), Agreement systems, pp.159-199.
- 2006. When to pied-pipe and when to strand in San Dionicio Octotepec Zapotec. Organizing Grammar: Linguistic Studies in Honor of Henk van Riemsdijk, 86, p.331.
- 2005a. Malagasy Imperatives. In Jeffrew Heinz and Dimitrios Nthelitheos, Proceedings of AFLA XII, pp.141-160.
- 2005b. On the parallelism of DPs and clauses: Evidence from Kisongo Maasai. In A. Carnie (ed), Verb First, On the Syntax of Verb-initial Languages. John Benjamins, Amsterdam, pp.281-302.
- 2005c. Korean (and Japanese) morphology from a syntactic perspective. Linguistic Inquiry, 36(4), pp.601-633.
- 2003. The locality of agreement and the structure of the DP in Maasai. In William E.Griffin (ed.), The role of agreement in natural language: TLS 5 Proceedings (pp. 207-227).
- 2002. Derivations and complexity filters. In A. Alexiadou, E. Anagnostopoulou, S Barbiers, H Gaertner (eds), Dimensions of Movement: From features to remnants, 48, p.151-189.
- 2001. On the homophony of past tense and imperatives in Kisongo Maasai. In H. Torrence (ed), Papers in African Linguistics 1, UCLA Working Papers in Linguisticsno, 6, pp.1-13.
- 1999. The internal and external distribution of pronominal DPs. In Kyle Johnson and Ian Roberts (eds), Beyond principles and parameters (pp. 91-132). Springer Netherlands.
- 1999. Hungarian complex verbs and XP-movement (with Anna Szabolcsi). In I. Kenesei (ed), Crossing Boundaries: Theoretical Advances in Central and Eastern European Languages, Benjamins p. 115-137.
- 1997. Unifying predicate cleft constructions. In K. Moore (ed.), Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (Vol. 23, No. 2, pp. 71-85).
- 1996a. The position of incorporated heads within the Dutch verbal cluster. In F. Lee and E. Garret (eds), Syntax at Sunset, pp. 31-36.
- 1996b. The Spec Head configuration. In F. Lee and E. Garret (eds), Syntax at Sunset, pp. 37-64.
- 1995. On verbs that fail to undergo V-second. Linguistic Inquiry, 26(1), pp.137-163.
- 1994. Licensing heads. In D. Lightfoot and N. Hornstein (eds), Verb movement, pp.261-295
- 1992. On the absence of case chains in Bambara. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 10(4), pp.555-594.
- 1991. The position of subjects (with Dominique Sportiche). Lingua, 85(2-3), pp.211-258.
- 1989. Pronouns, logical variables, and logophoricity in Abe. Linguistic Inquiry, pp.555-588.
- 1986. A Note on Long Extraction in Vata and the ECP. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 4(3), pp.357-374.1986. On Deriving Deep and Surface order. NELS 14, Umass. pp. 220-235
- 1986. The genesis of Haitian: Implications of a comparison of some features of the syntax of Haitian, French and West African languages. In P. Muysken et al (ed), Universals versus substrata in Creole genesis. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, pp.231-259.
- 1983. ECP effects in main clauses. Linguistic Inquiry, 14(2), pp.346-350.
- 1982. Control from COMP and comparative syntax. Linguistic Review, 2(4), pp.365-391.
- 1982. Variables and the Bijection Principle (with Dominique Sportiche). In The Linguistic Review 2.3. pp. 139-160.
- 1978. Jan Vat (pseudonym). On Footnote 2- Evidence for the pronominal status of þaer in Old English relatives. Linguistic Inquiry 9.4. pp. 695-717.
Unpublished papers
- 2011. To find language universals, at least look for them (with Robyn Rider and Dominique Sportiche). (contact me for a copy)
- 2004. Agreement-lite. A short summary of judgment patterns of 17 speakers for plural agreement in English there-insertion constructions, taking interveners into account.
- 1997. The Doubly filled C filter, the Principle of Projection Activation and Historical Change.
Selected Handouts of Talks
- 2023 (Upcoming June 18) “TerraLing: La diversité cross-linguistique des nominaux avec ou sans articles et la poursuite des Universaux du Language” Collège de France
- 2023 The “puzzling” articles of Samoan (March 2023 TerraLing User meeting).
- 2021 Towards developing a database for passive-like constructions. Presented at Online Terraling Workshop 2. October 2021
- 2020 Towards a direct syntax phonology interface: A case study of Huave morphology-as-syntax presented at Syntactic approaches to morphology NYU, dec 4/5/2020 . Links to handout, video and audio can be found at https://wp.nyu.edu/morphology_as_syntax/talks/,
- 2020 September 18/19 Online Terraling workshop for property authors.
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- Introduction to the database
- Project report from SSWL: Some (interim) results on bare Ns and “articles” (with Cristina Guardiano)
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- 2020. On the Path from VO to OV. African Linguistics Conference. (delayed because of Covid 19)
- 2019. With Vincent Homer. On Scattering and “the agent as possessor” puzzle in Samoan. [slides] Celebrating 25 years of Antisymmetry and 75 years of Richard S. Kayne. Celebrating 25 years of Antisymmetry and 75 years of Richard S. Kayne. https://wp.nyu.edu/
richiefest/ - 2018. When (and why) Syntax-Semantics mismatches and Syntax-Phonology mismatches go together: Evidence from English, Dutch and German. Utrecht University.
- 2018. Summer School “Form-Meaning Mismatches in Natural Language” University of Göttingen. Lecture notes.
- 2017. The View From the Syntax- Some Comments on Winfried Lechner’s (Semantically Active) Head Movement Presentation. Talk presented at the Workshop for Martin Prinzhorn.
- 2016. Unifying Syntax and Morphology and the SSWL database project. Presented at The 1st SynCart Workshop, Chiusi.
- 2016. A Further Step towards a Minimalist Analysis of Japanese no (with Tomoko Ishizuka). Presented at the 24th Japanese/Korean Linguistics Conference.
- 2015. Scattering objects and developing SSWL. Presented at Università Ca’ Foscari, Venezia.
- 2014. On the importance of being silent or pronounced: English –able and Japanese –rare potentials compared. (with Tomoko Ishizuka) Presented at GLOW 37th, Brussels.
- 2013. Remnant Movement, Intervention, and Structure Building- the view from Samoan. Presented at the Conference on Remnant Movement, Frankfurt.
TerraLing and SSWL
The SSWL database is one of the datasets in terraling. Other datasets include Conjunction and Disjunction (project pages can be found here and here), Anaphora, and Cinque’s Universal 20 database.
If you are interested in joining the community, please sign up for our terraling google group at terraling@lists.ucla.edu. This site is used to send out letters to the community with updates of recent developments.
We also have monthly community meetings on zoom during the year (email me if you are interested in participating), and a Discord channel for discussion (email me for an invitation to Discord!).
Introductory materials on TerraLing, the history of the project, and SSWL.
- 2020. Hilda Koopman and Cristina Guardiano. Managing data in TerraLing, a large-scale cross-linguistic database of morphological, syntactic, and semantic patterns. To appear as Chapter 23 in: Berez-Kroeker, Andrea, Bradley McDonnell, Eve Koller, and Lauren Collister (eds), The Open Handbook of Linguistic Management, MIT Press.
- (2020) Citation guidelines
Supporting Materials/questionnaire(s) for property development.
- Navigating TerraLing explains how to access and navigate the site. We are in the process of changing the user interface: this document will be updated (probably in feb 2021),
- Nov 2020: Here is a list of contents of SSWL properties under development.
- A general description (from 2019) and an overview of the current content in SSWL can be found here
- Questionnaire: For a (draft of a) guided questionnaire on how to elicit data and develop a coding schema and SSWL type database of Adjectival Properties in the World’s Languages, check Adjectival Questionnaire. If you are interested in helping it develop it further, please contact me!
For further development
Together with Cristina Guardiano we have started developing property definitions for existential constructions, where ultimately we are interested in the form and distribution of (non modified) indefinite subjects (and variation in existential constructions), and how this compares to definite subjects.
The following documents are linked from within the database.
- (2018) Existential Constructions_01
- (2018) Existential_constructions_02
If you are interested in the question how to go about developing a coding schema for Terraling/SSWL, read the following document about negative existentials.
- (2018) Negative_Existentials_02
For handouts on some Research results please contact me (or here.)
Terraling Workshops (2021- 2020)
TerraLing Workshop- 2021
Dates: 21–23 October 2021, 9–12 PT / 12–15 ET / 18–21 CET
The 2021 TerraLing Workshop was a venue for work-in-progress that uses the TerraLing platform for crosslinguistic research, as well as projects that will use TerraLing but are still in the planning stages. The workshop took place online. Everyone who is interested in getting involved in collaborative, crosslinguistic work using TerraLing or is curious about doing so, was invited to join.
Thematic sessions
The workshop was divided into three thematic sessions, corresponding to different groups of people working on different projects using the TerraLing platform:
- Group 1: Quantification and plurality (21 Oct)
- Group 2: Passive-like constructions (22 Oct)
- Group 3: Clausal embedding and intentional constructions (23 Oct)
The thematic sessions were a combination of short presentations of ongoing TerraLing projects and preliminary results, discussions of questionnaires for TerraLing that are still under development, and invited talks by researchers who are not currently involved in the TerraLing project, but have done crucial crosslinguistic work on the respective topic.
TerraLing Workshop- 2020
Dates: 18-19 September 2020. 9–12 PT / 12–15 ET / 18–21 CET
This workshop aimed to get researchers interested in the Terraling database, to familiarize them with the technology (so that they can carry out their own projects), and to pave the road for future projects making use of the database, thus also supporting further international community building.
The Terraling database (http://terraling.com/) is a collaborative research tool for theoretically guided cross-linguistic research: It is an open-access, open-ended database where linguists can both pose data questions to others and answer such questions for their native languages.
The workshop involved introductions to different aspects of the database, a `hands-on trial session for participants, short presentations of projects that have been carried out via the database and a discussion (including all participants) of potential future research projects building on the database. (See below for the full program.)
Program (all times are given in Central European Summer Time, which will mean, e.g., -6 hours for New York City/East Coast, -9 hours for Los Angeles/West Coast …)
September 18
6 pm – 6.20 pm: Introduction to the database (Hilda Koopman, UCLA)
6.20 pm – 6.40 pm: A guided tour through the database (Nina Haslinger, University of Göttingen)
6.40 pm – 7.10 pm: Try-out session (all participants, using break-out rooms)
7.10 pm – 7.30 pm: Discussion (all participants)
7.30 pm – 7.40 pm: Break
7.40 pm – 8.25 pm: Terraling and fieldwork (Ryan Bochnak, UBC)
8.25 pm – 9 pm: Networking discussion (all participants)
September 19
6 pm-6.30 pm: Project presentation: SSWL Some (interim) results from on bare Ns and “articles“. (with Cristina Guardiano, Università degli Studi di Modena e Reggio Emilia)
6.30 pm-7 pm: Project presentation: Conjunction and disjunction (Nina Haslinger, University of Göttingen & Viola Schmitt, University of Graz)
7 pm-7.30 pm: Project presentation: Universal 20 (Guglielmo Cinque, Ca’ Foscari University, Venice)
7.30 pm – 7.40 pm: Break
7.40 pm – 8.30 pm: Property development and property writing
(includes a session on syntax, a session on semantics and a Q & A session, will involve all participants)
8.30 pm – 9 pm: Networking discussion (all participants)
MaS2 Workshop June10-11 2022
The Morphology as Syntax2 (MaS2) workshop took place online on June 10-11 2022. For the program and slides/handouts/ (videos still need to be posted!) check out our webpage here:
Thanks to all participants for a very stimulating and inspiring workshop. Looking forward to the third MaS workshop to be held at UQAM!