Dissertation "Discourse and Grammatical Cues in the Acquisition of Spanish Pronouns" [pdf]
Manuscripts
Pearl, L. and Forsythe, H. (under review) "Inaccurate representations, inaccurate deployment, or both? Using computational cognitive modeling to investigate the development of pronoun interpretation in Spanish"
Pearl, L. and Forsythe, H. (under review) "Inaccurate representations, inaccurate deployment, or both? Using computational cognitive modeling to investigate the development of pronoun interpretation in Spanish"
Papers
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2022) After the Null Subject Parameter: Acquisition of the Null-Overt Contrast in Spanish. Language Learning and Development, 18:2, 171-200, DOI: 10.1080/15475441.2021.1941967 [pdf]
Forsythe, H. and C. Schmitt (2021) Considering the whole paradigm: Preschoolers’ comprehension of agreement is not uniformly late. Language Acquisition, 28:3, 272-293 DOI: 10.1080/10489223.2021.1887872 [pdf]
Forsythe, H. and G. R. Kemp (2021). "How L1 Acquisition in Situations of Contact Drives Long-Term Language Change," Proceedings of the 45th Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD44). [pdf]
Forsythe, H. (2020). "Resolving pronouns with multiple cues: Children use pragmatics before morphology," Proceedings of the 44th Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD44). [pdf]
Forsythe, H., and L. Pearl (2020). "Immature representation or immature deployment? Modeling child pronoun resolution," Proceedings of the Society for Computation in Linguistics, vol. 3, article 59. [pdf]
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2020). "How preschoolers acquire the null-overt contrast in Mexican Spanish: Evidence from production," Colomina-Almiñana, J. & S. Sessarego (eds.). Patterns in Spanish: Structure, Context and Development. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. [pre-publication draft]
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2019) "Learnability in Romance: How indirect input helps children acquire the contrast between null and overt subjects." Proceedings of the 43rd Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD43). Cascadilla Press. [slides] [pdf]
Le, N., H. Forsythe and C. Schmitt (2019) Vietnamese Children's Interpretation of Definite Noun Phrases. in Nigel Duffield, Trang Phan, and Tue Trinh (Eds.), Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Vietnamese Linguistics (215-240). John Benjamins [pdf]
Avellana, A., L. Brandani, H. Forsythe and C. Schmitt (2019). How to be faithful to the input in a situation of language contact. In David Lightfoot and Jon Havenhill (Eds.) Variable properties in language: Their nature and acquisition [pre-publication draft] [google books]
Le, N., H. Forsythe and C. Schmitt (2018) Interactions between number and definiteness: Vietnamese children's comprehension of definite noun phrases. In Bertolini, A.B. and M.J. Kaplan (Eds.), Proceedings of the 42nd Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD42), volume 2, pages 427-440. Cascadilla Press. [slides] [pdf]
Forsythe, H. (2017). Top-down learning in the acquisition of pronouns. In LaMendola, M. and J. Scott (Eds.), Proceedings of the 41st Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD41), pages 250-262. Cascadilla Press [poster] [pdf]
Forsythe, H. (2015). Gradable path prepositions as measure-of-change functions. In Umbal et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of the Poster Session of the 33rd West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics, volume 5, pages 56-65. Simon Fraser University. [pdf]
Forsythe, H. (2015). Person and number asymmetries in child comprehension of Spanish agreement and object clitics. In Grillo, E., K. Jepson and M. LaMendola (Eds.), Supplemental proceedings of the 39th Boston University Conference on Child Language Development (BUCLD39), online. Cascadilla Press [poster] [pdf]
Presentations
Forsythe, H., and L. Pearl (2020). "Immature representation or immature deployment? Modeling child pronoun resolution," Poster presented at the 3rd Annual Society for Computation in Linguistics (SCiL2020), New Orleans, LA, Jan 2-5, 2020. [poster]
Forsythe, H. (2019). "Resolving pronouns with multiple cues: Children use pragmatics before morphology," Poster presented at the 44th Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD44), Boston, MA, Nov. 2-4, 2019. [poster]
Forsythe, H. "Modeling the source of children's non-adult-like pronoun interpretations: representation vs. deployment," Language Science Community Talk, University of California, Irvine. Oct. 14, 2019. Irvine, CA.
Forsythe, H. "Mapping form to (variable) meaning: The case of pronoun acquisition," Invited talk at the University of Iowa. Iowa City, IA.
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2018). Learnability in Romance: How indirect input helps children acquire the contrast between null and overt subjects. Paper presented at the 43rd Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD43), Boston, MA, Nov. 2-4, 2018
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2018). Learnability in Romance: How indirect input helps children acquire the contrast between null and overt subjects. Paper presented at the Hispanic Linguistics Symposium (HLS), UT Austin, Oct. 25-27, 2018 [slides]
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2018). Learnability in Romance: How indirect input helps children acquire the contrast between null and overt subjects. Paper presented at the 8th Generative Approaches to Language Acquisition North America (GALANA8), September 27-30, 2018
Avellana, A., L. Brandani, H. Forsythe and C. Schmitt (2017). How to be faithful to the input in a situation of language contact. Paper presented at the Georgetown University Roundtable (GURT), March 10-12, 2017.
Schmitt, C., L. Brandani, A. Avellana and H. Forsythe (2016). Acquisition and language contact: Generalization vs. input faithfulness. Paper presented at Language Contact from an I-Language Perspective, Donostia-San Sebastián, October 27-28, 2016.
Forsythe, H. (2016). Discourse relations and the null/overt contrast in Mexican Spanish. Poster presented at the 46th Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages (LSRL46), Stonybrook, NY, March 31-April 3, 2016 [unofficial write-up]
Forsythe, H. (2016). Child sensitivity to discourse cues. Paper presented at Graduate Linguistics Expo at Michigan State (GLEAMS) February 27-28, 2016 [slides]
Morril, T., L. Dilley and H. Forsythe (2014). Perceptual isochrony and prominence in spontaneous speech. Poster presented at the 168th meeting of the Acoustical Society of America (ASA), Indianapolis, IN, October 27-31, 2014
Forsythe, H. (2014). Gradable locative PPs vs. Gradable path PPs: Measure functions vs. measure-of-change functions. Paper presented at the Graduate Workshop of the American Midwest and Prairies (GWAMP), UW-Milwaukee, Oct. 18, 2014 [handout]
Forsythe, H. and C. Schmitt, (2014). Children understand 3rd person: Evidence from the acquisition of Spanish agreement and object clitics. Poster presented at the International Conference on Infant Studies (ICIS XIX) Berlin, July 3-5, 2014 [poster]
Forsythe, H. (2014). Path prepositions as measure-of-change functions. Paper presented at the Workshop of Aspect and Argument Structure of Adverbs and Prepositions (WAASAP2) University of Tromsø, June 13, 2014 [handout]
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2022) After the Null Subject Parameter: Acquisition of the Null-Overt Contrast in Spanish. Language Learning and Development, 18:2, 171-200, DOI: 10.1080/15475441.2021.1941967 [pdf]
Forsythe, H. and C. Schmitt (2021) Considering the whole paradigm: Preschoolers’ comprehension of agreement is not uniformly late. Language Acquisition, 28:3, 272-293 DOI: 10.1080/10489223.2021.1887872 [pdf]
Forsythe, H. and G. R. Kemp (2021). "How L1 Acquisition in Situations of Contact Drives Long-Term Language Change," Proceedings of the 45th Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD44). [pdf]
Forsythe, H. (2020). "Resolving pronouns with multiple cues: Children use pragmatics before morphology," Proceedings of the 44th Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD44). [pdf]
Forsythe, H., and L. Pearl (2020). "Immature representation or immature deployment? Modeling child pronoun resolution," Proceedings of the Society for Computation in Linguistics, vol. 3, article 59. [pdf]
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2020). "How preschoolers acquire the null-overt contrast in Mexican Spanish: Evidence from production," Colomina-Almiñana, J. & S. Sessarego (eds.). Patterns in Spanish: Structure, Context and Development. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. [pre-publication draft]
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2019) "Learnability in Romance: How indirect input helps children acquire the contrast between null and overt subjects." Proceedings of the 43rd Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD43). Cascadilla Press. [slides] [pdf]
Le, N., H. Forsythe and C. Schmitt (2019) Vietnamese Children's Interpretation of Definite Noun Phrases. in Nigel Duffield, Trang Phan, and Tue Trinh (Eds.), Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Vietnamese Linguistics (215-240). John Benjamins [pdf]
Avellana, A., L. Brandani, H. Forsythe and C. Schmitt (2019). How to be faithful to the input in a situation of language contact. In David Lightfoot and Jon Havenhill (Eds.) Variable properties in language: Their nature and acquisition [pre-publication draft] [google books]
Le, N., H. Forsythe and C. Schmitt (2018) Interactions between number and definiteness: Vietnamese children's comprehension of definite noun phrases. In Bertolini, A.B. and M.J. Kaplan (Eds.), Proceedings of the 42nd Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD42), volume 2, pages 427-440. Cascadilla Press. [slides] [pdf]
Forsythe, H. (2017). Top-down learning in the acquisition of pronouns. In LaMendola, M. and J. Scott (Eds.), Proceedings of the 41st Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD41), pages 250-262. Cascadilla Press [poster] [pdf]
Forsythe, H. (2015). Gradable path prepositions as measure-of-change functions. In Umbal et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of the Poster Session of the 33rd West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics, volume 5, pages 56-65. Simon Fraser University. [pdf]
Forsythe, H. (2015). Person and number asymmetries in child comprehension of Spanish agreement and object clitics. In Grillo, E., K. Jepson and M. LaMendola (Eds.), Supplemental proceedings of the 39th Boston University Conference on Child Language Development (BUCLD39), online. Cascadilla Press [poster] [pdf]
Presentations
Forsythe, H., and L. Pearl (2020). "Immature representation or immature deployment? Modeling child pronoun resolution," Poster presented at the 3rd Annual Society for Computation in Linguistics (SCiL2020), New Orleans, LA, Jan 2-5, 2020. [poster]
Forsythe, H. (2019). "Resolving pronouns with multiple cues: Children use pragmatics before morphology," Poster presented at the 44th Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD44), Boston, MA, Nov. 2-4, 2019. [poster]
Forsythe, H. "Modeling the source of children's non-adult-like pronoun interpretations: representation vs. deployment," Language Science Community Talk, University of California, Irvine. Oct. 14, 2019. Irvine, CA.
Forsythe, H. "Mapping form to (variable) meaning: The case of pronoun acquisition," Invited talk at the University of Iowa. Iowa City, IA.
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2018). Learnability in Romance: How indirect input helps children acquire the contrast between null and overt subjects. Paper presented at the 43rd Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD43), Boston, MA, Nov. 2-4, 2018
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2018). Learnability in Romance: How indirect input helps children acquire the contrast between null and overt subjects. Paper presented at the Hispanic Linguistics Symposium (HLS), UT Austin, Oct. 25-27, 2018 [slides]
Forsythe, H., D. Greeson and C. Schmitt (2018). Learnability in Romance: How indirect input helps children acquire the contrast between null and overt subjects. Paper presented at the 8th Generative Approaches to Language Acquisition North America (GALANA8), September 27-30, 2018
Avellana, A., L. Brandani, H. Forsythe and C. Schmitt (2017). How to be faithful to the input in a situation of language contact. Paper presented at the Georgetown University Roundtable (GURT), March 10-12, 2017.
Schmitt, C., L. Brandani, A. Avellana and H. Forsythe (2016). Acquisition and language contact: Generalization vs. input faithfulness. Paper presented at Language Contact from an I-Language Perspective, Donostia-San Sebastián, October 27-28, 2016.
Forsythe, H. (2016). Discourse relations and the null/overt contrast in Mexican Spanish. Poster presented at the 46th Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages (LSRL46), Stonybrook, NY, March 31-April 3, 2016 [unofficial write-up]
Forsythe, H. (2016). Child sensitivity to discourse cues. Paper presented at Graduate Linguistics Expo at Michigan State (GLEAMS) February 27-28, 2016 [slides]
Morril, T., L. Dilley and H. Forsythe (2014). Perceptual isochrony and prominence in spontaneous speech. Poster presented at the 168th meeting of the Acoustical Society of America (ASA), Indianapolis, IN, October 27-31, 2014
Forsythe, H. (2014). Gradable locative PPs vs. Gradable path PPs: Measure functions vs. measure-of-change functions. Paper presented at the Graduate Workshop of the American Midwest and Prairies (GWAMP), UW-Milwaukee, Oct. 18, 2014 [handout]
Forsythe, H. and C. Schmitt, (2014). Children understand 3rd person: Evidence from the acquisition of Spanish agreement and object clitics. Poster presented at the International Conference on Infant Studies (ICIS XIX) Berlin, July 3-5, 2014 [poster]
Forsythe, H. (2014). Path prepositions as measure-of-change functions. Paper presented at the Workshop of Aspect and Argument Structure of Adverbs and Prepositions (WAASAP2) University of Tromsø, June 13, 2014 [handout]
Qualifying papers
- Asymmetries within the acquisition of agreement and clitic forms in Spanish [pdf] I ask whether children's delayed comprehension of 3rd person agreement forms is due to their being phonologically reduced (in which case, comprehension should be delayed more generally for phonologically weak forms relative to stronger ones), or due to their being semantically underspecified (in which case, comprehension should be delayed for semantically underspecified plurals, as well).
- A cross-categorial semantics for scalar prepositions [pdf] I defend a degree-based semantics of path prepositions (ex. towards, away from, through, across, around, up, down, etc.) and of projective prepositions (ex. behind, in front of, inside, outside, to the left/right of, etc.). Specifically, I argue for a measure-function analysis of the latter and for a measure-of-change function analysis of the former (Kennedy & Levin 2008).
Squibs
- Overt wh-movement in Vietnamese [pdf] Shows evidence for cases of overt wh- movement in Vietnamese, an otherwise wh-in-situ language.
- Some slightly interesting facts about degree scales and degree modifiers [pdf] Cross-categorial data on the behavior of degree-modifier slightly
- An expressive approach to register differences in Chilean second-person pronouns [pdf] an extension of Potts' (2007) system for expressive meaning, applied to formality marking on 2nd person pronouns.