Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
Welcome to the Institute of Linguistics! On this website you can find all the important information about the institute.
Best student presentation of MMSYM 2024 is from Frankfurt
Employee and doctoral student Alina Gregori as well as Vera Wolfrum (Uni Würzburg) win the award for the best student presentation at this year’s MMSYM.
Best student presentation of Speech-Prosody 2024 is from Frankfurt
Employee and doctoral student Anna Preßler wins the award for the best student presentation at this year’s Speech-Prosody Conference.
Orientation event for BA Linguistics
The orientation event for first-semester students in the BA Linguistics program will take place on October 14, 2024 from 3 p.m. in room IG 454.
Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm Prizes for International German Studies awarded to Ermenegildo Bidese
Ermenegildo Bidese (University of Trento) completed his habilitation in the Department of Modern Philology in Frankfurt in 2021. In 2024 he received the Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm Prizes for International German Studies from the DAAD.
Summer schools Linguistics 2024
There are two relevant summer schools for students:
End of Seminars = Start of Term Papers
With the conclusion of the lecture period, the work on the term papers begins. We kindly request all students writing term papers or theses in linguistics to follow our guidelines.
We celebrate Katharina Hartmann’s 60th birthday
During the birthday workshop “Syntax in Focus – A workshop in honour of Katharina Hartmann’s 60th birthday” we presented the festschrift in honour of Katharina on January 12, 2024: “To the left, to the right, and much in between“. It can be downloaded for free as an e-book (PDF) here.
We congratulate the Institute of Linguistics on the newly approved special research area NegLaB
From April 2024, the new DFG special research area “Negation in Language and Beyond” (SFB 1629 NegLaB) will start at Goethe University. The Institute of Linguistics is significantly involved in numerous projects at the SFB.
MA student Farbod Eslami Khouzani receives this year’s DAAD Prize
The MA linguistics student Farbod Eslami Khouzani (picture, middle) received this year’s DAAD Prize for international students on October 5th, 2023. His outstanding academic achievements as well as his social commitment were recognized. We congratulate him! More information
Prof. Katharina Hartmann and Prof. Frank Kügler nominated for the best doctoral supervision
The Goethe Research Academy for Early Career Researchers (GRADE) awards a prize every year for the best doctoral supervision. This year, two of the professors from linguistics have been nominated: Prof. Frank Kügler and Prof. Katharina Hartmann. More information
Apply now for the BA Linguistics until August 31, 2023
You can find information and links under: Freshmen/Beginners
The Department of Linguistics at Goethe University Frankfurt offers in collaboration with the Department of English and American Studies, the Department of Psycholinguistics and the Teaching of German, and the Department of Romance Literatures and Languages two linguistic programs, a BA Linguistik taught in German and an MA Linguistics taught in English. In addition, the Department takes part in the BA Germanistik and in the Teacher Education Program.
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The Institute of Linguistics, which is based in the Faculty of Modern Languages (FB 10), has special expertise in the fields of language structure (syntax and phonology), semantics and pragmatics, psycholinguistics (language acquisition, language processing), and historical linguistics, and represents known researchers. In addition, there are close contacts and cooperation with the linguists in the Institutes of English and Romance Studies, with philosophy (Faculty of Philosophy and History, FB 08), and the Institute for Empirical Linguistics (Faculty ofLinguistics and Cultural Studies, FB 09).
Besides the Institute of Linguistics, there is also research and teaching in linguistics in other institutes. More details can be found here:
The potential of the Frankfurt linguistics is especially in the realm of foundational research in linguistics. The active research is bundled in various projects.
The following professorships belong to the Department of Linguistics:
In teaching, the following professorships are affiliated to the Institute of Linguistics:
We are happy to announce a talk by Prarthanaa Bharadwaj (Frankfurt) in the Semantics Colloquium.
The talk will take place on campus in IG 4.301.
If you wish to participate virtually via Zoom, please contact Lennart Fritzsche for the link.
Date: February 6, 2025
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm c.t.
Title: Deconstructing Modal Necessity in Kannada
Abstract:
The study of modality in semantics has long focused on modal flavour (epistemic vs. root modality; Kratzer 1977, 1991) and modal force (possibility vs. necessity; Rullmann et al. 2008). More recent research has explored the previously understudied dimension of modal strength, particularly the distinction between weak and strong readings (Vander Klok and Hohaus 2020; Weingartz and Hohaus 2024). Languages employ diverse strategies to denote modal strength distinctions (von Fintel and Iatridou, 2008). Certain languages (English, German) mark this distinction lexically, while others employ morphological means, such as counterfactual constructions (Greek, French) or specialized derivational suffixes (Javanese). In some cases, this distinction remains unmarked (Afrikaans, Samoan). Kannada presents a novel case where strong necessity arises by exhaustifying over a necessity modal, a phenomenon that contrasts with existing literature, where exhaustification typically applies to possibility modals (Leffel 2012; Grubic and Mucha 2021).
We are happy to announce a talk by Alexander Turtureanu (Berlin) in the Semantics Colloquium.
The talk will take place on campus in IG 4.301.
If you wish to participate virtually via Zoom, please contact Lennart Fritzsche for the link.
Date: January 30, 2025
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm c.t.
Title: Homogeneity from an MRT perspective
Abstract:
I my PhD dissertation, I develop a psychologistic approach to natural language semantics (MRT), which opens up a novel perspective on some traditional semantic topics and problems. In this talk, I will introduce some basic notions of MRT and describe how they give rise to an understanding of homogeneity that differs structurally from conventional truth-conditional-semantic accounts of this phenomenon: Instead of rooting homogeneity in the “lexical semantics” of definite plurals, I derive its emergence from the more basic question of how different semantic contexts determine the way speakers interpret the application of predicates to sets of individuals.
We are happy to announce a talk by Elin McCready (Tokyo) in the Semantics Colloquium.
The talk will take place on campus in IG 4.301.
If you wish to participate virtually via Zoom, please contact Lennart Fritzsche for the link.
Date: January 16, 2025
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm c.t.
Title: Norms of Language Use and Perspective
Abstract:
In this talk I argue that the perspectives agents hold — their ideologies, beliefs, and identities — can be extracted from their linguistic behavior. Specifically, because social meanings relate to speaker values and social beliefs, their language use tends to reflect these values. Taking such meanings and treating them in terms of self-ascription, together with norms of speech relating to how particular pieces of language are properly used, yields a `public perspective’ in partial correspondence to the notion of agential identity proposed in the recent philosophical literature.
We are happy to announce a talk by Julia Bacskai-Atkari (Amsterdam) in the Syntax Colloquium.
The talks will take place in person. Room IG 4.301
Date: January 13, 2025
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm ct
Title: “Peripheral cases: Deviations in morphological case at the clausal edge”
Abstract:
We are happy to announce another talk by Janek Guerrini (Frankfurt) in the Semantics Colloquium.
The talk will take place on campus in IG 4.301.
If you wish to participate virtually via Zoom, please contact Lennart Fritzsche for the link.
Date: December 19, 2024
Time: 4 pm – 6 pm c.t.
Title: Similatives as inherent generics
Abstract:
In this paper, I give an account of constructions expressing similarity such as like John and like a lawyer. The main point of the paper is that in like a lawyer, the indefinite receives a generic interpretation, which explains why under its most available reading, John looks like a lawyer is equivalent to John looks like a typical lawyer. However, this indefinite is generic in a surprising way. Generic quantification is standardly thought to be brought about by a silent quantificational adverb, Gen, bearing a meaning akin to generally (see e.g. Krifka et al. 1995). It is therefore expected, on the standard picture, that an indefinite that can receive generic interpretations should also be bound by explicit quantificational adverbs, as for instance in a bird flies ≈ typical birds fly, parallel to a bird rarely flies ≈ few birds fly. However, indefinites embedded by like escape this generalization: John looks like a lawyer ≈ John looks like a typical lawyer, but John rarely looks like a lawyer ≠ John looks like few lawyers. To solve this puzzle, I propose that like comes with a generic quantifier that is lexically hard-wired in its lexical entry, and show how this makes a number of surprising predictions which all turn out to be correct. Along the way, I also analyze properties of like that are not necessarily linked to genericity, mainly: (i) it is a gradable expression over a closed scale, since it supports proportional modification such as in the DNA of humans is 99% like that of chimps. (ii) It can be modified both by scalar modifiers like much and by with respect to phrases like with respect to size, in similar but non-identical ways. (iii) It gives rise to homogeneity (and non-maximality; see Križ 2015, a.o.), as John is like Mary suggests they share all relevant properties, while John isn’t like Mary suggests they share none of them.