Research Interests
Prosody
and Meaning
My primary research interests lie in prosody and meaning.
Specifically, I seek to formalize
those types of semantic and pragmatic meaning that are realized through
tonal categories and metrical prominence (e.g., topic, focus,
contrastivity, etc.). This implies, in turn, that I am
interested
in the phonological properties of intonational contours as well as the
mapping between phonology and semantics. In previous
experimental work (e.g., German, Pierrehumbert & Kaufmann 2006), I
have explored the role played by phonological constraints in the
realization of focus. My dissertation research continues
this exploration through a series of studies on the interpretation and
phonology of nuclear-accented pronouns.
Game
Theory
A second area of interest lies in the application of (situated)
game-theoretic principles to several pragmatic phenomena. A
project developed collaboratively by the Game Theory and Meaning Group
(German, Sagi, Clark, Kim & Kaufmann 2006) explores the
effects of perceived interspeaker cooperativity on the interpretation
of
scalar implicatures associated with certain logical connectives.
In addition, German (2006) applies game-theoretic principles
to the interaction between phonological constraints and focus
realization.
Social
Identity and Grammatical Encoding
Finally, I am interested in the role of social identity in the encoding
of grammatical generalizations, and what it can tell us about the
overall architecture of the phonological grammar. I have explored
these issues through dialect learning studies targeting both allophony
rules (German, Carlson & Pierrehumbert 2005; Carlson, German &
Pierrehumbert, submitted) and
intonational contours.
Publications
German, J.,
Pierrehumbert, J. and Kaufmann, S. (2006).
Evidence for phonological constraints on nuclear accent
placement. Language 82(1). [manuscript]
Carlson, K., German, J. and Pierrehumbert, J.
(submitted).
Reassignment of the flap allophone in rapid dialect adaptation. [manuscript]
Presentations
"The cost of prosodic
markedness as a rationale for the interpretation
and placement of nuclear accents," Games and Decisions in Pragmatics
II, Berlin, January 6-7, 2006. [slides]
"The role of hearer's beliefs in the interpretation of
logical
connectives ," with Eyal Sagi, Brady Clark, Min-joo Kim, and Stefan
Kaufmann. Games and Decisions in Pragmatics II, Berlin, January
6-7 2006. [slides]
"Allophonic reassignment in dialect adaptation," with
Katy Carlson and
Janet Pierrehumbert. 150th Meeting of the Acoustical Society of
America, Minneapolis, October 17-21, 2005. [poster]
"Mapping focus to phonology: Stranded prepositions and
accent
placement," 78th Annual Meeting of the Linguistic Society of America,
Boston, January 8-11, 2004.
Projects