Requirements

Everyone who attends the class is expected to do the reading and participate in the discussion. Students taking the course for credit must also write a research paper on a topic chosen in consultation with the instructors. The paper is due at the end of finals week.

The Plan

• January 5
  Syntactic and semantic preliminaries
  Bresnan 1973, Kennedy 2002 (sections 1 and 2), Von Stechow 1984, Heim 1985

  
  

• January 12
  Varieties of reduction in the comparative clause and the phrasal/clausal distinction
  Lechner 2001, Merchant 2009, Pancheva 2006, Pancheva 2009, Lin 2009
  OPTIONAL: Bhatt and Takahashi 2007, Kennedy 2007

  
  

• January 19
  Scope and comparison 1: Scope of comparison
  Kennedy 1997, ch. 1, section 1.4, Heim 2001

  
  

• January 26
  Scope and comparison 2: Scope of the standard
  Bhatt and Pancheva 2004, Fox and Nissenbaum
  OPTIONAL: Gawron 1995

  
  

• February 2
  NO CLASS: BLIZZARD!!

  
  

• February 9
  Comparative quantifiers 1: Semantics
  Nouwen 2010, Kennedy in progress (slides)
  OPTIONAL: Geurts and Nouwen 2007

  
  

• February 16
  Comparative quantifiers 2: Syntax
  Hackl 2001 (ch. 2, though ch. 1 is good background), Ionin and Matushansky 2006, Arregi 2010, Stavrou 2009

  
  

• February 25 (Note special Friday meeting!)
  Analytic vs. synthetic comparatives
  Embick 2007, Bobaljik ms

  
  

• March 2
  Analystic vs. synthetic comparatives cont'd
  Kiparsky, Baker, Merchant (optional)
  Comparative change of state
  Kennedy and Levin 2008

  
  

• March 9
  Comparison and aspectual composition: beyond degree achievements
  Pinon 2008, Kennedy 2011, (OPTIONAL background reading: Krifka 1989)