Presenters Danuta Allen and Sophia Eakins joins us in person in Rackham's East Conference Room and on Zoom.

Sophia Eakins is a Ph.D. candidate in Linguistics where her research explores language contact, language change, and Creole languages, often through sociolinguistic and phonetic/ phonological lenses. She is advised by Professors Andries Coetzee and Jelena Krivokapić at the University of Michigan and Professor Marlyse Baptista at the University of Pennsylvania.

Title: Cabo Verdean Creole in New England: Contact and Innovation in the Diaspora

Abstract: The Cabo Verdean language has garnered attention in research due to its rich variation and sociohistorical status as a Creole language (e.g. Swolkein, 2013; Veiga, 1982; Quint, 2001; Lang, 2007; Taveres Moreira, 2020; Baptista, 2002, 2015, 2020). Much of the research, however, has focused on the island community and overlooked the language practices of the vast Cabo Verdean diaspora. The investigations presented in this talk shift the spotlight to one of the largest diasporic communities: Cabo Verdeans in New England. I will share two studies on different aspects of the linguistic practices of this population. The first addresses the bilingual English-Kriolu language mixing strategies. The second explores a key aspect of dialectal variation within the Kriolu language spoken in the diaspora. By employing a community-centered approach to both its design and analysis (Léglise & Migge, 2006; Bancu et al., 2024), this research ultimately hopes to portray some of the unique and rich language practices of Cabo Verdean American diasporans.


Danuta Allen
Title: The Syntax of Complementizer Agreement in Polish

Abstract: In this presentation, I discuss the variation in possible agreement marking present on the complementizer and the verb in sentences with coordinated subjects in Polish. The empirical data poses several problems for various approaches to agreement, which suggests the need to consider alternatives to these analyses on theoretical grounds.