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I am a formal linguist with a background in Computer Science, now working as a Lecturer in Linguistics and AI at the Linguistics Department of Queen Mary University of London. In the domain of computational linguistics, I am interested in what the performance of language models on targeted linguistic tasks can tell us about human linguistic competence. In the domain of semantics and pragmatics, I am interested in when and why logically sound and informative sentences sound nevertheless odd. I enjoy using both theoretical and experimental approaches to solve puzzles. Come ask me about it! In my spare time, I love to refurbish stuff (like bikes, old Nintendos), bike/walk/hike/swim depending on the occasion, propagate plants, ~~hunt for free food on campus~~, and simply tell my cat Sachou how cute and pretty she is.

My dissertation about oddness and how it relates to implicit questions is now available for consultation. It will be subject to periodic updates in the coming months; please don't look at the MIT DSpace version, it probably sucks.

Keely New, Margaret Wang and I survived Masala Square's 🌶️🌶️🌶️ Challenge! Now looking for new challenges in the London area 😈

Talks & Publications

2025

Covert operators are picked to minimize QuD-ambiguity: the view from pex and only
September 26, 2025
30th Sinn und Bedeutung (SuB), Goethe University, Frankfurt, Germany.
[Talk]
Exh and only don't really compete -- they just answer different questions
May 20, 2025
The 35th meeting of Semantics and Linguistic Theory, Harvard University, Cambridge, USA.
[Talk]
Repairing bad questions makes for good sentences: the case of but and at least
May 10, 2025
The 61st annual meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society, University of Chicago, Chicago, USA.
[Talk]
Syntax and grounding in adjective learning
February 27, 2025
Queen Mary University of London, London, UK.
[Job Talk]
At least at least shifts the question
January 28, 2025
Joint talk at ZAS and Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany.
[Invited Talk]
On the QuD-dependence of conditionals
January 9-12, 2025
2025 Annual Meeting of the Linguistic Society of America, Philadelphia, USA.
[Poster]

2024

Scalarity, information structure and relevance in varieties of Hurford Conditionals
December 18-20, 2024
Amsterdam Colloquium 2024 (AC2024), University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
[Poster][Preprint]
A QuD-driven approach to incremental constraints on exhaustification
December 7, 2024
Workshop in Honor of Irene Heim, MIT, Cambridge, USA.
[Poster]
How do Large Language Models process scalar Hurford Disjunctions?
November 19, 2024
Harvard Language & Cognition Talk Series, Harvard University, Cambridge, USA.
[Invited Talk]
A corpus study of the acquisition of French "se faire" passives
September 27, 2024
17th Conference on Syntax, Phonology and Language Analysis (SinFonIJA 17), Center for Cognitive Science of Language, Nova Gorica, Slovenia.
[Talk]
"One tool to rule them all"? An integrated model of the QuD for Hurford sentences
September 20, 2024
Special Session "Does semantics have a 'too many tools' problem?" of the 29th Sinn und Bedeutung (SuB), Consorzio Universitario Mediterraneo Orientale (CUMO), Noto, Italy.
[Talk][Preprint]
Redundancy under Discussion
September 18, 2024
29th Sinn und Bedeutung (SuB), Consorzio Universitario Mediterraneo Orientale (CUMO), Noto, Italy.
[Poster][Preprint]
Unifying the French evidential construction on di(rai)t que
September 16, 2024
Special Session "Evidentials in non-canonical speech acts" of the 29th Sinn und Bedeutung (SuB), Consorzio Universitario Mediterraneo Orientale (CUMO), Syracuse, Italy.
[Poster][Preprint]
On the QuD-dependence of conditionals
July 18, 2024
Poster Session of CreteLing 2024, University of Crete, Rethymno, Greece.
[Poster]
Dealing with relevance and redundancy via a compositional model of QuDs
June 28, 2024
BerlinBrnoVienna Workshop 2024, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic.
[Talk]
The French demonstrative paradigm: structurally transparent but semantically intricate
January 26, 2024
54rd Annual Meeting of the North East Linguistic Society (NELS 54), Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, United States.
[Poster][Preprint]

2023

On the optimality of vagueness: "around", "between" and the Gricean maxims.
With Paul Égré, Benjamin Spector, and Steven Verheyen.
2023.
In Linguistics and Philosophy 46 (5):1075-1130.
[Paper]
Morpho-semantics of the French diminutive suffix -et(te)
September 23, 2023
16th Conference on Syntax, Phonology and Language Analysis (SinFonIJA 16), Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic.
[Talk]
September 15, 2023
International Symposium of Morphology (ISMo) 2023, Université de Lorraine & CNRS, Nancy, France.
[Talk][Preprint]
Do Language Models discriminate between relatives and pseudorelatives?
September 11, 2023
Learning with Small Data (LSD) 2023, The Centre for Linguistic Theory and Studies in Probability (CLASP), University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden.
[Paper]
September 2, 2023
Architectures and Mechanisms of Language Processing 2023 (AMLaP 29), Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language, Donostia-San Sebastián, Spain.
[Poster]
August 18, 2023
The 4rd International Conference on Theoretical East Asian Psycholinguistics (ICTEAP-4), Dongguk University, Seoul, South Korea.
[Talk]
Shallowly accurate but deeply confused -- how language models deal with antonyms
September 7, 2023
Special Session "Big Data in Semantics and Pragmatics" of the 28th Sinn und Bedeutung (SuB), Ruhr University Bochum, Bochum, Germany.
[Talk][Code][Data][Paper]
September 1, 2023
Architectures and Mechanisms of Language Processing 2023 (AMLaP 29), Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language, Donostia-San Sebastián, Spain.
[Poster]
Do Large Language Models learn the specificity of parasitic gaps?
August 31, 2023
Architectures and Mechanisms of Language Processing 2023 (AMLaP 29), Basque Center on Cognition, Brain and Language, Donostia-San Sebastián, Spain.
[Talk]
"Bridging the gap" between French tough-constructions and pseudorelatives
August 15, 2023
25th Seoul International Conference on Generative Grammar (SICOGG 25), Dongguk University, Seoul, South Korea.
[Poster][Paper]
Versatile presuppositions in counterfactual conditionals
May 25, 2023
Rencontres Autour de la Linguistique Formelle 2023 (RALFE 2023), Université Côte d'Azur, Nice, France.
[Talk]
Superiority effects and the French Plural Pronoun Construction
March 19, 2023
The 47th Penn Linguistics Conference (PLC 47), University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA.
[Talk][Paper]
Distinguishing levels of morphological derivations in word-embedding models
With Ido Benbaji-Elhadad and Omri Doron
January 12, 2023
53rd Annual Meeting of the North East Linguistic Society (NELS 53), University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany.
[Talk][Paper]

2022

An experimental investigation of the around / between contrast
With Paul Egré, Benjamin Spector, and Steven Verheyen.
December 19, 2022
Amsterdam Colloquium 2022 (AC2022), University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
[Poster][Lightning][Manuscript]
July 21, 2022
Poster Session of CreteLing 2022, University of Crete, Rethymno, Greece.
[Poster]
An Agree-based account of the gap distribution in tough-constructions vs gapped-degree phrases
September 24, 2022
15th Conference on Syntax, Phonology and Language Analysis (SinFonIJA 15), University of Udine, Udine, Italy.
[Talk]
August 12, 2022
24th Seoul International Conference on Generative Grammar (SICOGG 24), Online.
[Talk][Paper]
Alternatives are blind to some but not all kinds of context: the view from Hurford Disjunctions
September 16, 2022
27th Sinn und Bedeutung (SuB), Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic.
[Talk][Paper]
Evidence for an encoding of morphological blocking effects within two English word embedding models
September 7, 2022
Architectures and Mechanisms of Language Processing 2022 (AMLaP 28), University of York, York, UK.
[Poster]
Two kinds of adjective-infinitive constructions in acquisition
With Rachel Stacey, Cindy Torma, and Athulya Aravind.
September 7, 2022
Architectures and Mechanisms of Language Processing 2022 (AMLaP 28), University of York, York, UK.
[Talk]
A dynamic alternative-pruning account of asymmetries in Hurford disjunctions
August 18, 2022
Student Session of the ESSLLI 2022, National University of Ireland, Galway, Ireland.
[Lightning][Poster][Paper]
Word-embeddings distinguish denominal and root-derived verbs in Semitic
With With Ido Benbaji-Elhadad and Omri Doron
August 16, 2022
End-to-End Compositional Models of Vector-Based Semantics Workshop (E2ECOMPVEC@ESSLLI 2022), National University of Ireland, Galway, Ireland.
[Talk][Paper]
It's tough to be pretty: semantic relatedness between tough and pretty predicates
April 28, 2022
45th Generative Linguistics in the Old World (GLOW), Queen Mary University of London, London, UK.
[Talk][Manuscript]

2019

Semantics and pragmatics of approximation expressions.
August 2019
Master's Thesis, École normale supérieure. Paris.
[Manuscript]

2015

A numerical algorithm of parameter estimation for dynamic model for HIV infection of CD4+ t cells.
With Sergey Kabanikhin, Olga Krivorotko, Dmitriy Voronov, and Darya Yermolenko.
October 2015.
In 2015 International Conference on Biomedical Engineering and Computational Technologies (SIBIRCON) (pp. 180-185). IEEE.
[Paper]

Teaching

Fall 2025: Main Instructor for Syntax (QMUL course LIN7209).
Fall 2025: Main Instructor for Foundations of Computational Lingusitics (QMUL course LIN7076).
Summer 2024: TA for Introduction to Syntax (CreteLing course), with Prof. Raffaella Zanuttini.
Fall 2023: TA for Computational Psycholinguistics (MIT course 9.19(0)), with Prof. Roger Levy.
Spring 2023: TA for Introduction to Linguistics (MIT course 24.900), with Prof. Donca Steriade.
Spring 2022: TA for Undergraduate Language Acquisition (MIT course 24.904), with Prof. Athulya Aravind.
Fall 2020: TA for Introduction to Linguistics (MIT course 24.900), with Prof. Adam Albright.