How words are built
LING 449U · Fall 2026 · University of Maryland
meets
Tuesday and Thursday, 2:00 to 3:15pm, JMZ 1104
instructor
Utku Turk
office
Marie Mount Hall 3416. Book a time.
prerequisite
LING 311
credits
3
What this is
In this seminar we look at work on how morphological structure is planned and computed while people are speaking. We start with the seminal work on non-complex words and what it claims about how those words are retrieved and produced in real time. Then we take on a series of old and new puzzles about the productive machinery that builds complex lexical items spanning several syntactic positions.
We also cover recent morphosyntactic theories, Distributed Morphology and Nanosyntax, which already have a lot to say about how several syntactic positions end up inside one word. In the last part of the semester we build an experiment, run it, and analyze the results.
What you will be able to do
- Explain the parts of the major language production models, and the theoretical commitments of modern morphological theories.
- Think critically about what formal linguistic models predict for psychological theories of production.
- Find the overlooked corners of morphosyntax and morphophonology inside language production.
- Come up with novel experiments that probe those corners behaviorally.
- Connect your results or predictions to foundational questions in sentence production and morphology.
- Run and analyze a behavioral experiment.
How the course runs
Discussion. This is a discussion course. Readings are the primary focus, so plan on giving each one real time.
Bringing questions. Before each reading day, post one question about the reading to the ELMS thread by 11:59pm the night before. It can be about anything in the paper. You can skip three of these with no consequence.
Syntheses. Three short reflections through Week 9. One question, half a page at most, pulling together a couple of papers and our discussions. Due Sundays at 11:59pm.
Presentations. Everyone presents one paper from the lock-in weeks (Weeks 6 to 9): background, the question, the assumptions, the method and its logic, and what the results do and do not license.
Coding. After fall break we get into the dirty work of experimentation. Short weekly exercises in R and JavaScript, modifying existing code rather than writing it from scratch. Not graded, completely optional.
Project. An experiment proposal for a production experiment in a language other than English, including understudied dialects of English. You explain the experiment and why it matters for the questions we ask in this course.
There is no textbook. All readings are posted on ELMS. Read them digitally if you can. If you would rather have something on paper, email me ahead of time and I will print it for you.
Grading
| Component | Weight |
|---|---|
| Participation | 30% |
| Bringing questions | 10% |
| Syntheses | 20% |
| Presentation | 10% |
| Project | 30% |
| Coding | 0% |
Full policies are on the syllabus page.