Colin P. B Davis | Linguist
I am a theoretical linguist, working as Associate Professor of English Language and Linguistics at Nord University in Norway. I received a PhD in linguistics from MIT in 2020, and came to Norway in 2024. I research linguistic theory with a focus on syntax, morphology, and the general principles of language that they reveal. I do this using data from English, and many other languages of the world. All my projects and papers are documented below. My contact information, and a full list of my activities, can be found on my CV.
► Plural morphology for semantically singular possessor pronouns in Korean [Presentations: SinFonIJA 19]
Handout in prep.
► Punctuated movement facilitates (multi-)clausal pied-piping in Albanian [Presentations: WECOL 2023, GLOW 47, FLiNC workshop at NTNU, OLINCO 2025]
Draft coming soon
Poster at GLOW 47
► Morpheme order in superlative adjectives reveals the Final-Over-Final Condition in morphology [Presentations: University of Potsdam colloquium, SinFonIJA 16, GLOW 48]
► Deriving the correlation between word order and preposition stranding with Germanic R-pronouns [Presentations: University of Pavia]
► The over-application of perfect suppletion in Azerbaijani emerges from competition between morphology and phonology [Presentations: Tu+4]
Paper submitted to Glossa
► The unextractability of English possessive pronouns: On Portmamteau Formation and the Syntax-Morphology Interface [Presentations: NELS 52, BCGL 14]
► Anti-locality explains the restricted interaction of subjects and parasitic gaps [Presentations: Colloquia at University of Minnesota and Tel Aviv University and Ben-Gurion University, IGG 48, WCCFL 41]
► Diminutives of English irregular plurals: Morpho-phonological evidence for late merge within the word [Presentations: MFM 29, LSA 98, OLINCO 2023, SLE 56, University of Leipzig colloquium, Tromsø phonology workshop]
► What parasitic gaps reveal about overlapping paths and multiple specifier formation [Presentations: NELS 50, WCCFL 38, University of Konstanz]
Paper to appear in A Festschrift for Danny Fox
► The syntax and semantics of parasitic gaps in relative clauses licensed by extraction from noun phrases [Presentations: NELS 51, LSA 95]
Article published 2025 in Glossa 10
► Doubling by movement within and from PP in Lustenau Alemannic: On the structure of PP and the realization of copies (With David Diem) [Presentations: IGG 48, GLOW 46, WCCFL 41, SLE 56]
Article published 2025 in Glossa 10
► A theoretical and experimental investigation of the morpho-syntax of an anti-honorific prefix in Korean (With Hyewon Jang) [Presentations: ICKL 2023, SICOGG 25, SinFonIJA 16, Social Meaning and Grammar (Zurich)]
► Cross-clausal scrambling and subject case in Balkar: On multiple specifiers and the locality of overt and covert movement (With Tanya Bondarenko) [Presentations: WCCFL 38, LSA 95]
► The interaction of clitic pronouns and parasitic gaps in a variety of Spanish (With Luis Miguel Toquero Pérez) [Presentations: LSA 96, CLS 58, WCCFL 40]
► Extraposition and word order: Evidence from Wolof [Presentations: Accepted to the cancelled ACAL 51]
Paper published 2024 In Pushing the boundaries: Selected papers from the 51–52 Annual Conference on African Linguistics
► The morphology of case and possession in Balkar: Evidence that oblique cases contain accusative [Presentations: WCCFL 39, WAFL 16]
► Concealed pied-piping in Russian: On left branch extraction, parasitic gaps, and discontinuous nominal phrases (With Tanya Bondarenko) [Presentations: FASL 27, NELS 49, LSA 93]
► On the role of Agree in unlocking phrases for extraction (With Kenyon Branan [Presentations: ACAL 49, WCCFL 36, LSA 93]
► The morpho-phonology of accusative and genitive case in Barguzin Buryat [Presentations: MFM 28, AMP 2021]
► The free distribution of parasitic gaps and radical successive-cyclicity (With Patrick Elliott) [Presentations: LSA 95]
► Further insights and inquiries into possessor extraction in English [Presentations: University of Southern California colloquium]
► Case-sensitive plural suppletion in Barguzin Buryat: Case containment, suppletion typology, and competition in morphology [Presentations: AIMM 4, CLS 55]
► Possessor extraction in colloquial English: Evidence for successive-cyclicity and cyclic linearization [Presentations: LSA 93, NELS 49]
► Sub-extraction asymmetries and linearization in Russian (With Tanya Bondarenko) [Presentations: FASL 28, CLS 55, LSA 94]
► Crossing and stranding at edges: On intermediate stranding and phase theory [Presentations: LSA 92, WCCFL 36, WAFL 14]
► The Linear Limitations of Syntactic Derivations (Doctoral dissertation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2020)
► Order preservation in the Russian nominal phrase (With Andrei Antonenko) [Presentations: LSA 94]
► On the restricted distribution of subject heavy NP shift (With Justin Colley) [Presentations: LSA 94]
► Phase extension and case/agreement marking in Turkish nominalized clauses (With Justin Colley) [Presentations: WAFL 12, Tu+2]
► Auxiliaries, locality, and copular allomorphy in North Azeri [Presentations: LSA 89, Tu+1, WAFL 12]