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BHP in 1997, taken by David Partee

 

Barbara H. Partee

      

 

            

southcollege-small.jpg (9909 bytes)

Distinguished University Professor Emerita of Linguistics and Philosophy
Department of Linguistics ,  University of Massachusetts
Amherst, MA 01003-7130 USA not MY car! (photo by Kathryn Flack)

Email: partee@linguist.umass.edu

Office: South College 222
Phone: (413) 545-0889,   Fax: (413) 545-2792

New and Recent

An unpublished seminar squib from 1985: "Dependent Plurals" are distinct from Bare Plurals. ms. 1985. [PDF version]

Partee, Barbara H. 2005. Reflections of a formal semanticist as of Feb 2005. Ms. (longer version of introductory essay in 2004 book) [PDF version]

Partee, Barbara H. 2005. Diathesis alternations and NP semantics. In East West Encounter: Second International Conference on Meaning <=> Text Theory, eds. Ju. D. Apresjan and L.L. Iomdin, 361-373. Moscow: Jazyki Slavjanskoj Kultury. [PDF version] [Power Point presentation]

Partee, Barbara H. In press. Richard Montague (1930 - 1971). In Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, ed. Keith Brown. Oxford: Elsevier. [PDF version]

Partee, Barbara H. In press. A note on Mandarin possessives, demonstratives, and definiteness. In Drawing the Boundaries of Meaning: Neo-Gricean Studies in Pragmatics and Semantics in Honor of Laurence R. Horn, eds. Gregory Ward and Betty Birner. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. [PDF version]

Kamp, Hans and Barbara H. Partee, eds. (2004). Context-Dependence in the Analysis of Linguistic Meaning. Series: Current Research in the Semantics/Pragmatics Interface, 11 Amsterdam: Elsevier. pp. 554

Retirement party Sept 18 2004

       BHP (Lisa in bkground) by VB Sept 18     VB and BHP by Luis Alonso-Ovalle 9/18/04     Chris Potts by BHP 9/18    Lisa by BHP 9/18/04   Greg Carlson roasting BHP's thesis! (and presenting festschrift)    AK, John K, Irene et al laughing at Greg C      Veena, AK, Jae Choe, Peggy, Greg, Tom, Roy Wright, Laura, Anne-Michelle, Kyle, ?, Makoto in kitchen at 50 Hobart Lane 9/18   

Barbara Partee Doctoral Guidance Genealogy by Chris Potts

Partee, Barbara H., and Borschev, Vladimir. 2004. The semantics of Russian Genitive of Negation: The nature and role of Perspectival Structure. In Proceedings from SALT XIV, ed. Robert B. Young, 212-234. Ithaca: CLC Publications. [PDF version]

Borschev, Vladimir, and Partee, Barbara H. 2004. Genitives, types, and sorts. In Possessives and Beyond: Semantics and Syntax, eds. Ji-yung Kim, Yury A. Lander and Barbara H. Partee, 29-43. Amherst, MA: GLSA Publications. [PDF version]

Partee, Barbara H. 2004. Compositionality in Formal Semantics: Selected Papers of Barbara Partee. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.

Partee, Barbara H. and Vladimir Borschev. 2003. Genitives, relational nouns, and argument-modifier ambiguity. In E. Lang C. Maienborn, C. Fabricius-Hansen (eds.), Modifying Adjuncts. (Series: Interface Explorations). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. 67-112 [PDF version]

Browne, Wayles, Ji-Yung Kim, Barbara H. Partee, and Robert A. Rothstein, editors, (2003) Formal Approaches to Slavic Linguistics #11: The Amherst Meeting 2002.  Ann Arbor: Michigan Slavic Publications. pp. xii + 568

Ms. March 2001. Partee, Barbara H.  Privative adjectives: subsective plus coercion. To appear in T.E. Zimmermann, ed. Studies in Presupposition. [PDF Version]

Second youngest grandchild: Barbara with son Morriss and grandson Sean Patrick (b. 12/30/98), fall 1999  (Links to more pictures on Personal Page)

Interests

    My research and teaching interests center on formal semantics and its connections with syntax, pragmatics, and logic, and on related issues in the philosophy of language and in cognitive science.
Sgall, Partee, and Hajicova at work in Amherst, fall 1993. Photo taken by Christine Bartels.    One lifelong interest is quantification. An NSF-supported project with Emmon Bach and Angelika Kratzer dealt with cross-linguistic quantification and semantic typology. Another project in collaboration with Eva Hajicova and Petr Sgall of Charles University, Prague, concerned topic-focus structure and quantification, integrating the contemporary Prague school approach with work in formal semantics.
 Photo: Sgall, Partee, and Hajicova at work in Amherst, with coffee, fall 1993. Photo taken by Christine Bartels.

    Other areas of recent and current research include the semantics of adjectives and prototype theory (with Hans Kamp), the interaction of noun phrase semantics with verbal aspect, the semantics of specificational pseudocleft sentences and the question of inversion around “be” in English , and joint work with Vladimir Borschev on the semantics of the “genitive of negation” in Russian existential sentences.
    The main focus of my recent and current research, joint with Borschev, is the integration of lexical semantics (especially including Moscow SchoolPartee, Borschev, Rakhilina, Paducheva, and Testelets at work, VINITI, Moscow, Summer 2002. Photo taken by Ji-yung Kim. lexical semantics) with formal semantics, including issues of type-shifting and of sortal structures and sort-shifting. A recent NSF grant (1999-2003) with Borschev and other Russian colleagues and with UMass graduate students concerned the semantics of genitive (possessive) constructions with relational and non-relational nouns in English and Russian, focusing on problems of the interaction of lexical semantics, compositional semantics, and context. Our current NSF grant (2004-07) focuses on the semantics and distribution of the Russian genitive of negation and its relation to a range of issues including "perspectival structure", existential sentences, scope of negation, unaccusativity, and diathesis shift, semantic bleaching and other effects of the interaction of lexical and compositional semantics.
 Photo: Partee, Borschev, Rakhilina, Paducheva, and Testelets at work, with tea, VINITI, Moscow, Summer 2002. Photo taken by Ji-yung Kim.
   
    A long-term interest relating to philosophy and cognitive science is the bridging of the apparent divide between ‘logical’ and ‘cognitive’ approaches to the foundations of semantics.

Teaching

Spring semester 2005: Fulbright Lecturer, RGGU, Moscow: Formal Semantics and MGU, Moscow: Research Seminar on Topics in Formal Semantics.

Fall semester 2005 UMass: Ling 409: Formal Foundations of Linguistics

Spring semester 2006: Erskine Fellow, University of Canterbury, New Zealand. LING 310: The Structure of Meaning.

For other courses see [Teaching].

Useful Links

FASL 11 - 11th Annual Workshop on Formal Approaches to Slavic Linguistics, May 3-5, 2002, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
Workshop on the Semantics/Syntax of Possessive Constructions, May 5-7, 2002, University of Massachusetts, Amherst. 
WHISC: What's Happening in South College. (News from the UMass Linguistics Department)
Computational Semantics: Compiled by Kyle Rawlins.
Resources for Research on Genitives/Possessives and Beyond: Compiled by Ji-yung Kim for Barbara H. Partee.
semanticsarchive.net : An archive "for exchanging papers of interest to natural language semanticists".
Semantics Web Resources: Compiled by Kai von Fintel.

Background Information

Education
B.A. 1961 in Mathematics with High Honors, Swarthmore College. Minors in Russian and Philosophy.
Ph.D. 1965, MIT, linguistics, minor in mathematics. Dissertation: Subject and Object in Modern English. Dissertation advisor: Noam Chomsky.

Professional
Taught at UCLA 1965-1972, first Linguistics, then Linguistics and Philosophy.
Joined UMass Amherst faculty in 1972. Professor since 1973, department head 1987-93. Emerita as of January 2004.
Taught at 1966, 1974, 1987, 1989, and 1991 LSA Summer Institutes.
Visiting Professorships at El Colegio de Mexico, Charles University, Prague, Moscow State University, Russian State Humanities University, University of Leipzig, University of Canterbury
Board of Managers, Swarthmore College, 1990-2002.

Honors and Awards
Woodrow Wilson Fellow (Hon. '61), NSF Fellow (1961-65)
NSF grants, Co-P.I. or P.I., 1973-75, 1979-81, 1988-92, 1989-90, 1999-2003, 2004-07.
Fellow, Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, 1976-77
Chancellor's Medal, University of Massachusetts, 1977
Faculty Fellowship, University of Massachusetts, 1981-82
NEH Fellowship 1982-83, IREX Fellowships 1989, 1995, Fulbright Senior Lectureship 2000, 2005
President of Linguistic Society of America, 1986
Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Sciences (elected 1984), National Academy of Sciences (elected 1989), American Association for the Advancement of Science (elected 1996). 
Max Planck Research Award jointly with Hans Kamp 1992-95
Foreign Member, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, elected 2002
Honorary doctorates: Swarthmore College (1989), Charles University (1992), Russian State Humanities University (2001), Copenhagen Business School (2005)
Editorial Boards:  Natural Language Semantics, Linguistics and Philosophy

Personal Page - family links and more photos

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Last revised October 02, 2005.   Web page created by Barbara H. Partee, with help from John McCarthy, Paul de Lacy, Ji-Yung Kim.