About me
I am broadly interested in language and cognition, natural language syntax and
semantics/pragmatics. I focus especially on how humans draw inferences about natural
language meaning, including inferences relating to negation, quantification,
presupposition, and definiteness.
Some Lecture Notes
Semantics/Pragmatics
Syntax
Publications
To appear, etc.
- Collins, James N. What's an excluded middle inference?: Neg-raising and
presupposition accommodation. Re-submitted. [Draft (Jul 2021)]
2021
- Collins, James N. Mapping meanings to argument structure: The semantics
of Samoan case. Polynesian Syntax and Its Interfaces,
ed. by Lauren Clemens and Diane Massam. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
[Pre-publication version]
- Zhong, Jing Crystal, and James N. Collins. A QUD-based theory of
quantifier conjunction with `but'. The Proceedings
of WCCFL 38, ed. by R. Soo et al, 493--503.
[Pre-publication version]
2020
- Collins, James N. and Peter Schuelke. Roviana fronting and the
relationship between syntactic and morphological ergativity. Proceedings
of AFLA 26: 54--70. [Link] [Pre-publication version]
2019
- Collins, James N. The polarity of clauses embedded under neg-raising
predicates. Proceedings of SuB 23.
[Pre-publication version]
2018
- Collins, James N. Definiteness determined by syntax: A case study in
Tagalog. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory. Online first December 4, 2018.
[Pre-publication version]
- Collins, James N. Review of Paul Kroeger Analyzing meaning: An
introduction to semantics and pragmatics. Oceanic Linguistics 57(2):
253--259. [Pre-publication
version]
2017
- Collins, James N. 2017. Structure-sensitive interpretation. Doctoral dissertation, Stanford University.
[Download]
2016
- Collins, James N. 2016. Samoan predicate initial word order and object
positions. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 35(1): 1--59.
[Pre-publication version]
- Collins, James N. 2016. Reasoning about definiteness in a language without articles. Proceedings of SALT 26: 82--102. [Download]
- Collins, James N. 2016. Composition and definiteness without articles: A case study in Tagalog. Proceedings of NELS 46. [Download]
- Collins, James N. 2016. Definiteness and implicatures in Tagalog. Proceedings of BLS 42: 273--292. [Download]
- Collins, James N. 2016. Ilokano free relatives with man. Proceedings of AFLA 21: 33--50. [Download]
- Collins, James N. 2016. The scope of the future (Squib). Ms., Stanford University [Download]
- Collins, James N. 2016. Revisiting case and voice in Tagalog: Comments on Rackowski and Richards. Workshop handout, Stanford University [Download]
2015
- Collins, James N. 2015. Diagnosing predicate fronting in Samoan. Proceedings of WCCFL 32: 228--237. [Download]
- Collins, James N. 2015. Ergativity and nominalization: The case of Samoan. Ms., Stanford University [Download]
2014
- Collins, James N. 2014. Pseudo noun incorporation in discourse. To appear in the Proceedings of AFLA 20. [Download]
- Collins, James N. 2014. The distribution of unmarked cases in Samoan. Argument Realisations and Related Constructions in Austronesian Languages: Papers from the 12th International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics, Vol. 2, ed. by I. Wayan Arka and N. L. K. Mas Indrawati, 93-110. Asia-Pacific Linguistics. [Download]
- Collins, James N., Daria Popova, Ivan A. Sag, and Thomas Wasow. 2014. Sluicing and the inquisitive potential of appositives. Parenthesis and Ellipsis: Studies in Generative Grammar 121, ed. by M. Kluck, D. Ott, and M. de Vries, 47-73. Berlin: De Gruyter. [Download]
- Collins, James N. 2014. Relation changing affixes in the Philippines. Ms., Stanford University [Download]