Elisabeth Selkirk Explained

Elisabeth O. Selkirk (born 1945) is a theoretical linguist specializing in phonological theory and the syntax-phonology interface. She is currently a professor emerita in the Department of Linguistics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.^[1]

Selkirk received her PhD in linguistics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1972, under the supervision of Morris Halle.^[2] She served as Head of the Linguistics Department at UMass for a term beginning in 1998.^[3]

Selkirk's influential work has focused on organizing phonological units (i.e. constituents in the prosodic hierarchy) into prosodic structure, as well as how phonology interacts with other parts of the grammar, including morphology and syntax.^[4]

Honors and distinctions

She was inducted as a Fellow of the Linguistic Society of America in 2012.^[5] A volume of essays in her honor examining the phonology of many languages was published in 2011.^[6]

Selected publications

• Selkirk, E. (2011). The Syntax-Phonology Interface. In J. Goldsmith, J. Riggle, and A. Yu, eds., The Handbook of Phonological Theory, 2nd edition, 435–484. Oxford: Blackwell.^[7]
• Selkirk, E. (2003). The Prosodic Structure of Function Words. In J. McCarthy, ed. Optimality Theory in Phonology: A Reader, Blackwell Publishing, 2003.^[8]
• Selkirk, E. (2003). Sentence phonology. In William Frawley and William Bright, The Oxford International Encyclopedia of Linguistics, 2nd edition. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.^[9]
• Selkirk, E. (2000). The interaction of constraints on prosodic phrasing. In M. Horne, ed., Prosody: Theory and Experiments, 231–261. Kluwer.
• Selkirk, E. (1982). The Syntax of Words. Cambridge (MA): MIT Press.

External links

• Faculty home page

Notes and References

1. Web site: Emeritus, Adjunct, and Allied Faculty Linguistics UMass Amherst. www.umass.edu. 2016-01-08.
2. Web site: MIT Department of Linguistics: Graduate Program: Dissertation. web.mit.edu. 2016-01-08.
3. Web site: New Faculty and Department Head Changes Announced at UMass Amherst. News and Media Relations. January 10, 2016.
4. Web site: Elisabeth Selkirk. 2021-03-08. scholar.google.com.
5. Web site: LSA Fellows By Name Linguistic Society of America. 2016-01-08. www.linguisticsociety.org.
6. Web site: Prosody Matters: Essays in Honor of Elisabeth Selkirk . January 10, 2016 . Equinox Publishing . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20150426053617/http://www.equinoxpub.com/home/prosody-matters-essays-honor-elisabeth-selkirk-toni-borowsky-shigeto-kawahara-mariko-sugahara-takahito-shinya/ . April 26, 2015 .
7. Book: Selkirk, Elisabeth. Wiley-Blackwell. 2011-01-01. 9781444343069. 435–484. 10.1002/9781444343069.ch14. John. Goldsmith. Jason. Riggle. Alan C. L.. Yu. The Handbook of Phonological Theory. The Syntax-Phonology Interface. 10.1.1.222.5571.
8. Web site: Wiley: Optimality Theory in Phonology: A Reader - John J. McCarthy. www.wiley.com. 2016-01-08.
9. Book: Sentence Phonology - Oxford Reference. http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780195139778.001.0001/acref-9780195139778-e-0968?rskey=H78tjm&result=968. 10.1093/acref/9780195139778.001.0001. 9780195139778. Sentence Phonology. Oxford University Press. 2003.