Month: March 2013

We are delighted to announce that Maziar Toosarvandani will join our department as of July 2013.

Dr. Toosarvandani received his Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, in 2010. He was a Visiting Assistant Professor at UCLA in 2010-11. Since then he has been at MIT under the auspices of a prestigious ACLS New Faculty Fellowship.

Toosarvandani’s research investigates the relationship between syntactic and semantic principles. One strand of his currrent work explores the interaction of coordination and ellipsis with information structure, focusing mainly on English and Persian. Another strand investigates clause combination in Northern Paiute, a Native American language that Toosarvandani has done fieldwork on for some years.

Welcome to the department, Maziar!

The UCSC Committee on Research has awarded a Special Research Grant of $8,000 to support the continuation of a project using ultrasound to study the phonetics and phonology of Irish Gaelic consonantal palatalization. The principle investigators of the project, Ryan Bennett (Yale University, Ph.D. 2012), Grant McGuire, Máire Ní Chiosáin (University College Dublin), and Jaye Padgett, have already collected data from the three major dialect regions of Ireland. With the help of the COR grant, the project will enter a new phase next year.

MIT is hosting a Conference on Metrical Structure: Text-Setting and Stress this September 20-21, 2013. Invited speakers include our own Junko Ito and Armin Mester. The organizers are soliciting abstracts for two poster sessions: one on the role of metrical structure in stress and the other on the role of metrical structure in poetics. The deadline for abstract submission is April 30th, 2013. To learn more, click here.

The Dept of Linguistics at the University of Maryland is looking to fill up to five full-time positions for post-baccalaureate researchers. Starting date for all positions is Summer/Fall 2013. Salary is competitive, with benefits included. The positions would be ideal for individuals with a BA degree who are interested in gaining significant research experience in a very active lab as preparation for a research career. Applicants must be US or Canadian citizens or permanent residents, and should have completed a BA or BS degree by the time of appointment. The ability to interact comfortably with a wide variety of people (and machines) is a distinct advantage. Applicants may request to be considered for all five positions.

The positions are open until filled, but for best consideration, applications should be received by April 5th. To learn more about these positions, click here.