About me

I am a Ph.D. student at the Department of Czech Language at Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic, under the supervision of Pavel Caha.

My academic interests include (nano)syntax, the semantics of counting phrases and numerals, classifiers, and clitic placement and clitic clusters.

The topic of my Ph.D. project is numerals and the syncretism of noun suffixes in partitive and counting phrases. To study these topics, I use the framework of Nanosyntax (e.g. Starke 2009 or Caha, De Clercq, Starke & Wyngaerd 2023). Nanosyntax, developed by Michal Starke, is a generative framework building on the cartographic approach to grammar. It follows the one feature – one head (OFOH) maxim, where each syntactic head corresponds to a single syntactic-semantic feature (Cinque & Rizzi 2008, Kayne 2005). Unlike other models, Nanosyntax decomposes grammar into fine-grained elements, leading to a highly articulated syntactic structure.

A key aspect is phrasal lexicalization, where entire syntactic configurations are mapped to morphemes, unlike late-insertion models as Distributed Morphology (Harley & Noyer, 2003). This approach unifies syntax, morphology, and semantics, offering a constrained model of grammar (Caha 2009).

Central to Nanosyntax is the functional sequence (fseq) – a universal hierarchy of syntactic features. This rigid structure explains phenomena like syncretism and the ABA pattern, where morphemes lexicalize adjacent features in the sequence (Starke 2009). 

If you want to learn more about Nanosyntax, you can read Exploring Nanosyntax or Nanosyntax: State of the Art and Recent Developments. You can also visit Lingbuzz, where linguistic papers are shared, and you can contribute your own work. 

Outside of academia, I enjoy learning about Ancient Egypt, France and its culture (and its cuisine), reading Harry Potter, writing fantasy stories, and climbing indoor climbing walls. 

My name is pronounced [ˈlukaːʃ ˈʒoɦa].